The Virtual Coffee Podcast: Recent Episodes
Virtual Coffee
Virtual Coffee is an intimate community for developers at all stages of the journey. In the Virtual Coffee Podcast, hosted by Bekah Hawrot Weigel and Dan Ott, you'll find interviews with members of our community to learn more about their stories, who they are, how they found Virtual Coffee, and how it has influenced their lives as developers. We want to bring everything that's special about Virtual Coffee, the intimacy and the friendships we’ve built, and share that with everyone through the podcast. We’re always growing and learning together as a group, and there’s something really special about being able to do that knowing that you’ll have the full support of the community around you. And that’s what this podcast is about too.
Bekah and Dan explore the community's engagement with Hacktoberfest, a month-long event encouraging open source contributions. They discuss what Hacktoberfest is and what it means to be a positive contributor in the open source community. They highlight the importance of meaningful contributions, respecting maintainers' time, and provides tips for navigating and contributing to open source projects, and touches on ways to be a good open source citizen and the benefits of contributing consistently to a single project or organization. The episode emphasizes understanding project documentation and being patient with maintainers, while exploring various ways to support open source initiatives beyond writing code.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In Season 10, Episode 3 of the Virtual Coffee Podcast, hosts Bekah and Dan explore the topic of 'Big M' versus 'Little m' Mentorship. They distinguish between formal, one-on-one mentorship ('Big M') and more informal, community-based mentorship ('Little M'). They discuss the advantages and potential pitfalls of each approach, emphasizing the importance of finding the right mentorship fit. They also touch on the role of coaches, the value of community support in events like Hacktoberfest, and the concept of a personal 'board of mentors.'
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In Episode 2 of Season 10 of the Virtual Coffee podcast, hosts Bekah and Dan discuss the concept of 'trust capital' and its importance in tech communities. They define trust capital as the value and trustworthiness one has with others. The hosts explore how to build trust through consistent actions, showing up, transparency, and effective communication. They highlight the difference between networking and building genuine relationships, emphasizing practical ways to accumulate trust capital, such as writing blog posts, mentoring, and being an active, dependable community member. The episode underscores the benefits of trust capital in fostering credibility, enhancing professional relationships, and reducing barriers to collaborative progress.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In the first episode of Season 10 of the Virtual Coffee podcast, hosts Bekah and Dan introduce the new format focusing on "back pocket topics" from Virtual Coffee community discussions. They delve into common remote collaboration tools and techniques, sharing insights from their experiences in tech. Topics include effective communication, the importance of documentation, and how different company cultures influence remote work. The episode also touches on the role of community members in improving knowledge sharing, both in work settings and open-source projects.
Episode Sponsor!
We're grateful to be sponorsored by LevelUP Financial Planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join hosts Bekah and Dan as they engage in a captivating conversation with Jessica Wilkins, a prominent figure from freeCodeCamp. In this episode, Jessica shares her invaluable insights on nurturing and developing relationships within the open source community. Delve into the nuances of effective collaboration with maintainers, understand the significance of embracing non-traditional skillsets, and discover the pathways to flourish as a contributor. Jessica's experiences with freeCodeCamp provide a unique perspective on the human dynamics and interpersonal relationships that form the backbone of successful open source projects.
Episode Sponsor!
We're grateful to be sponorsored by LevelUP Financial Planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
About JessicaJessica Wilkins is a self taught developer and technical writer from Los Angeles, California.
In her previous career, she was a professional oboist, educator and owner of JDW Sheet Music.
Jessica's interest in programming came during the pandemic when she wanted to build the Black Excellence Music Project which celebrates black artists from the jazz and classical fields.
She now works for freeCodeCamp on the curriculum team.
- @jdwilkin4 on GitHub
- @codergirl1991 on Twitter
- @jessica-wilkins-developer on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join hosts Bekah and Dan with guests Matt McInnis, Ray Deck, and Tom Cudd, as they chat about the complicated topic of open source software (OSS) licenses. They share insights into how to choose the appropriate license, how to understand licenses on other projects, and general guidelines for maintainers and contributors.
Links:
- ChooseALicense.com by GitHub
- Example of clarifying subfolders in the LICENSE: TensorFlow’s models repo.
- Example of a License section in the README indicating what parts of the repo the license applies to: OpenAI’s Whisper model.
- Example of a paid product with an open source license: CraftCMS
We're grateful to be sponsored by LevelUP Financial planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
About Matt
Matt is a full-stack developer (Rails+React) at Typist based in Toronto, Canada. Former artificial intelligence lead at IBM and Microsoft, mathematics professor at Centennial College and Saskatchewan Polytechnic. He really loves brunch.
- @MattyMc on GitHub
- @MattLovesMath on Twitter
About Tom
As an advocate for DevOps within teams and communities, Tom strives to bring positive change in the way Development and Operations teams work together. Tom loves to help people learn about teams, leadership, infrastructure, cloud, and automation.
- tomcudd.com
- @tomcudd on GitHub
- @tomcudd on Twitter
About Ray
Veteran leader of technology teams and startup companies over the last 20 years. Most recently founder of Statechange.ai, a learning community for solving the hardest 5% of no-code/low-code/AI-code challenges.
- raydeck.com
- statechange.ai
- @rhdeck on GitHub
- @ray_deck on Twitter
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join hosts Bekah and Dan in this episode with Nadia Eghbal's "Working in Public" enthusiasts Jessica Wilkins and Brian Meeker. We discuss the nuances of open source collaboration highlighted in the book, the challenges and rewards of being both a contributor and a maintainer, and the profound impact of individual contributions in the open source community. Dive into the transformative journey of participating in open source and redefining its true meaning with OpenSauced.
Links
- Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software by Nadia Eghbal
- Virtual Coffee Book Club Discussion
- The left-pad story
Episode Sponsor!
We're grateful to be sponorsored by LevelUP Financial Planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
About JessicaJessica Wilkins is a self taught developer and technical writer from Los Angeles, California.
In her previous career, she was a professional oboist, educator and owner of JDW Sheet Music.
Jessica's interest in programming came during the pandemic when she wanted to build the Black Excellence Music Project which celebrates black artists from the jazz and classical fields.
She now works for freeCodeCamp on the curriculum team.
- @jdwilkin4 on GitHub
- @codergirl1991 on Twitter
- @jessica-wilkins-developer on LinkedIn
About Brian
Brian Meeker is a full stack engineer who occasionally leaves his basement in Indiana. Currently, he works as a Senior Engineer at Online Rewards. He works mostly in Elixir these days, but has a past littered with a wide variety of technologies and platforms. Outside of work, Brian is a devoted father, avid nerd, and lover of metal.
- brianmeeker.me
- @CuriousCurmudgeon on GitHub
- @CuriousCurmudge on Twitter
- @brianmeeker on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join hosts Bekah and Dan in this episode with monthly challenge Preptember leads, Dominic and Ayu. We talk about the importance of preparing both as a contributor and a maintainer, some of the challenges you might face as someone new to those roles during Hacktoberfest, and some of the benefits you'll receive by participating in open source.
Links
- Ayu's Episode: Working through burnout as a self-taught developer
- Dominic's Episode: Finding value in challenging ourselves
- Your GitHub Issues
About DominicDominic is a Full Stack Developer, community builder, remote worker and aspiring polymath. He's passionate about open source everything, decentralization, peer-to-peer tech and cryptocurrency. He's also to be found playing board games, studying paper maps and riding public transport.
About AyuAyu is a self-taught front-end developer and technical blogger based in The Netherlands.
She has a strong interest in building projects that are accessible to everyone.
Her passion for life-long learning is what motivates her open-source contributions, project collaboration, and community engagement.
Learning new things is something that fills her with excitement and she's eager to share her learning in public and pass on her knowledge through her blog and Twitter.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Sponsor: LevelUP Financial PlanningWe're grateful to be sponsored by LevelUP Financial planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
Join hosts Bekah and Dan in this episode featuring Rafi, a talented full-stack developer from Bangalore. In this episode, you'll discover how building new things and making progress helps him find calmness and focus. Learn Rafi's approach to side projects, including his exploration of Blender, mobile development, Chrome extensions, and Ionic framework. Rafi also shares valuable tips on leveraging AI to enhance learning during project work
About Rafi:I am a developer, hobbyist who loves JavaScript, Star trek and Cats. I build things, talk tech and write things.
- @Rafi993 on GitHub
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Sponsor: LevelUP Financial PlanningWe're grateful to be sponsored by LevelUP Financial planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
Join Bekah and Dan in this week's episode, where they talk with Taiwo Yusuf, a back-end engineer with a passion for developing innovative solutions. Despite being the top of his class in Electrical Engineering, he found his passion in backend development. He shares the importance of always learning, growing, and surrounding yourself with people who are more skilled than you are to find inspiration, support, and motivation.
Links:
- Grace Health
About Taiwo:I'm Taiwo Yusuf, a back-end engineer with a passion for developing innovative solutions. I've been fortunate enough to work with amazing companies like Grace Health, LogicShift, and JufoPay. When I'm not busy coding, I'm an avid fan of generative art, and I adore cats. So, whether you want to talk about tech, art, or felines, let's connect and have a chat!
- @Taiwo_HY on Twitter
- @teezzan on GiHub
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join Bekah and Dan in this week's episode, where they talk with Josh Goldberg, an independent full time open source developer working on projects in the TypeScript ecosystem, where he shares valuable tips and insights on how you can get started with contributing to open source, whether you're a seasoned developer or just dipping your toes into OSS. Josh also shares the story of his prolific speaking journey over the last couple of years and how staying involved in the tech community has been a rewarding experience.
Links:
- typescript-eslint
- typescript-eslint GitHub
- Code Academy
- Microsoft Sway
- Josh's Blog posts about applying to conferences:
- How I Apply to Conferences
- How I Apply to Conferences: FAQs
- Josh's Book: Learning Typescript
About Josh:
Hi, I’m Josh! I’m an independent full time open source developer. I work on projects in the TypeScript ecosystem, most notably typescript-eslint: the tooling that enables ESLint and Prettier to run on TypeScript code. I’m also the author of the O’Reilly Learning TypeScript book, a Microsoft MVP for developer technologies, and an active conference speaker.
- @JoshuaKGoldberg on Twitter
- @JoshuaKGoldberg on GitHub
- @JoshuaKGoldberg@fosstodon.org on mastodon
Sponsor: LevelUP Financial PlanningWe're grateful to be sponsored by LevelUP Financial planning, who understands the importance of finding balance between having an awesome life today, and being confident and excited about your future possibilities. If you want to take your financial confidence to the next level, check out levelupfinancialplanning.com.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join Bekah and Dan in this week's episode, where they dive into the transformative journey of Reda, a self-taught developer. Hear about the unique challenges and victories Reda faced as he navigated the journey to becoming a front-end developer. Gain valuable advice on the ideal timing for job applications, as Reda shares advice he heard along his journey: "When should you start applying for jobs? Yesterday." Tune in for an enriching conversation that will inspire aspiring self-taught developers and offer practical insights for your career paths.
Links:
- Free Code Camp
- Collab Lab
- Python Course
About Reda:I'm a self-taught front-end developer based in Morocco, with a background in Marine Mechanics. I first got introduced to programming back in college where I learned about some basic algorithms and C++. During the pandemic, I decided to take the leap and teach myself ML and then Python. When I'm not coding, I do traveling, read manga, watch anime, or play video games.
- redapy on GitHub
- redabaha12 on Twitter
- redabaha on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Caitlin Floyd, a front-end developer, to chat about the concept of collective learning and explore new possibilities in the evolving landscape of tech mentorship. Discover firsthand how Caitlin's experiences highlight the power of collaboration, breaking down silos, and leveraging collective knowledge to drive innovation and success.
About CaitlinCaitlin is a front-end developer driven by the power of technology as a force for good. Before entering tech, she worked in linguistics, education, and nonprofit management. When not coding, she loves reading, studying languages, traveling, and most of all doting on her puppy.
- caitlinfoyd.com
- @cafloyd on GitHub
- @caitlinfloyd on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Carmen Kohole, a DevOps Engineer based in Portland, Oregon, to chat about the benefits of collaboration and the valuable opportunities you can gain just by asking for help. We also discussed the benefits of fostering strong relationships in the tech industry, and what it means to be a DevOps engineer.
About CarmenDevOps Engineer based in Portland, Oregon. Big fan of house plants, hiking, hats and cats. Here to help build stuff, break stuff, learn stuff and make friends.
- @carmenkolohe on GitHub
- @carmenkolohe on Twitter
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Alex Curtis-Slep, long time member and volunteer and self-taught developer, about documenting the small wins, falling in love with the process, and aligning your goals to maintain a healthy life while job searching and during your tech career.
About AlexAlex Curtis-Slep is a self taught software developer. After getting his initial tastes of HTML and CSS in the early 2000’s on his basketball blog, Alex jumped into coding in early 2019. He heard about a course Madison Kanna created on roadmapping to become a developer and took the plunge. Following a few years of learning, creating, contributing to open source, and much more, Alex landed his first job in tech at Paypixl. When he’s not coding and hyping up his developer friends, he loves everything basketball, tropical fruit, vegan, travel, family, friend, and foreign language related!
- alexcurtisslep.com
- @AlexVCS on GitHub
- @AlexCurtisSlep on Twitter
- @alexcurtisslep on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
We're starting the new season with a conversation with our maintainers, including our new maintainer, Julia Seidman! We share our thought process for adding a maintainer and walk through our culture citizenship statement to share how we intend to create a positive community.
About JuliaJulia Seidman is a developer education consultant based in the Seattle area. Julia is a believer in embracing the 'careen' over the career.
- @juliaseid on GitHub
- @juliaseid on LinkedIn
About KirkA full stack developer in the Caribbean interested in Functional Programming, Domain Driven Development, and Security.
- @KirkCodes on Twitter
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Join Bekah, Dan, and Special Guest Nick Taylor for a live-streamed episode of the Season Seven Finale!
Watch the video replay here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Wj-zlORvm8
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Ramón Huidobro, a developer advocate and DevEd enthusiast, and chatted about the process of learning and growing and how asking questions and knowing what questions to ask is an important part of the tech experience.
Check out Ramón's article about reaching out for help!
About Ramón
Ramón Huidobro is a developer advocate and DevEd enthusiast. He thrives on lifting others up in their tech careers and loves a good CSS challenge. Always excited to talk about teaching tech, especialmente en Español, oder auf Deutsch.
- ramonh.dev
- @hola-soy-milk on GitHub
- @hola_soy_milk on Twitter
- @hola_soy_milk on Mastadon
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Dominic Duffin, a Full-Stack Developer, Co-founder of ArtTechChat Twitter chat, Salon Host at The Interintellect, and Open Source contributor, and chatted about the the value gained in creating a learning environment wherever you go and the importance of participating in community experiences.
Links:
- Pass the Pen: https://codepen.io/collection/nZrZLy
- https://twitter.com/arttechchat
About Dominic:
Full Stack Developer, community builder, remote worker and aspiring polymath. Passionate about open source everything, decentralization, peer-to-peer tech and cryptocurrency. Also to be found playing board games, studying paper maps and riding public transport.
- dominicduffin.uk
- @dominicduffin1 on GitHub
- @DominicDuffin1 on Twitter
- @dominicduffin1 on Mastadon
- @dominic-duffin on LinkedIn
- @dominic on Polywork
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Arthur Doler, a Software Engineer and Community and Culture Steward, and chatted about the human side of tech, the importance of recognizing our emotions, communication styles, and the dynamics of the environments we're working in.
Links:
- Daniel Pink's Drive
- Arthur's talk: You're Not Just Tired: The Psychology of Burnout
- Aikido
- Pro Disc Golfers
About Arthur
Arthur (or Art, take your pick) has been a software engineer for 19 years and has worked on things as exciting as analysis software for casinos and things as boring as banking websites. He is an advocate for talking openly about mental health and psychology in the technical world, and he spends a lot of time thinking about how we program and why we program, and about the tools, structures, cultures, and mental processes that help and hinder us from our ultimate goal of writing amazing things. His hair is brown and his thorax is a shiny blue color.
- arthurdoler.com
- @doleraj on GitHub
- @arthurdoler on Twitter
- @arthurdoler on Mastodon
- @arthurdoler on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Rebecca Key, a PhD in Organic Chemistry and now Software Engineer, and chatted about her career journey, Ham radios, being left-handed, taking notes, and the importance of consistency.
About Rebecca
Rebecca Key is a Software Engineer based out of Atlanta, GA. She is a first-generation college graduate that went on to obtain a PhD in Organic Chemistry from Georgia Tech. After many years in research (roles ranging from Laboratory Technician to Research Director), she made a career change into the tech field, where she currently works as an Independent Front-End Engineer. When not coding, she enjoys mountain biking, running, weightlifting, crocheting, and knitting!
- rebeccakeyphd.com
- @rek990 on GitHub
- @rebeccakeyphd on Twitter
- @rebecca-key on LinkedIn
Links:
- Brassica oleracea (the plant Dan was talking about)
- SOTA-AT: An interactive map that displays and provides information for peaks along the GA section of the Appalachian Trail that count toward activations for “Summits on the Air”, a ham radio contest.
- Row Counter: A tool to help fiber artists (crocheters, knitters, rug makers, basket weavers, etc.) keep track of the row they are on with a given project. Live Demo of the Progress Toward my Row Counter App
- Rebecca's RF Quests: Blog and YouTube Channel
- Parks on the Air (POTA)
- Summits on the Air (SOTA)
- SOTA Mountain goat award
- Emacs Org Mode
Left-handed Deep Dive
- Your Left-Handed Brain
- Left-handed DNA found - and it changes brain structure
- The inheritance of left-handedness
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Aishwarya, front-end developer from India, about her first open source contributions and how her perspective on open source changed after her fourth (of ten!) Pull Request during Hacktoberfest.
- One word to describe you - Dedicated
- One word to describe your developer journey - Evolving
- Me Before You by Jojo Moyes
- Open-Source YouTube Videos:
- How to Find Beginner-Friendly Open Source Projects
- 4 Beginner Friendly Open Source Projects to Contribute before 2023
- 5 Beginner friendly Open Source Organisations to start your Open source journey
About Aishwarya
Aishwarya Mali is a front-end developer (React+XState+Redux) based in Pune, India. She loves to read!
- @aishwarya-mali on GitHub
- @aishwaryamali24 on Twitter
- @aishwaryamali24 on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Kai Katschthaler, a technical writer and content creator, about their creation process, finding learning approaches that work for them, and mentoring others.
Links:
- Kai's appearance on the Coming Out Pod
- Kinesthetic Learning
- Freecodecamp
- Codecademy
- Flatironschool
- Exercism
Kai Katschthaler
Kai is a tech content specialist and mental health advocate. They run Taboola Rasa, a mental health awareness project that seeks to erase the stigma connected to mental health.
- linktr.ee/thegrumpyenby
- @thegrumpyenby on GitHub
- @thegrumpyenby on Twitter
- @kaikatschthaler on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Joe Karow, the Lead Engineer at a nonprofit, about his career change from the hospitality industry, his experience with the online bootcamp, 100devs, and about the ADHD experience.
Joe Karow
Joe is the Lead Engineer at InReach, a 501(c)3 registered non-profit building world’s first tech platform matching LGBTQ+ people facing discrimination and persecution with safe, verified resources. Formerly a Director of Finance for a large hotel chain, he made the leap in to tech in 2022. Tech was always a part of Joe's life, it just took a global pandemic for him to decide to start getting paid for it.
- joekarow.dev
- @JoeKarow on GitHub
- @JoeKarow on Twitter
- @jkarow on LinkedIn
Links
- All Hands Job Board
- 100devs
- Resilient Coders
- Leon Noel
- Cedar Point
- Busch Gardens
- Kennywood
- cssbattle.dev
- remo
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Jörn Bernhardt, a 2x founder in Germany, about his career path, the challenges of being a founder, and the key traits that have led to his success.
About Jörn
Jörn started developing web-based software in the last century when he was still in school. In 2018, he founded his second company compose.us where they implement digital solutions and share their knowledge with public administrations. In his spare time Jörn organizes local meetups in Germany and creates at least one open source commit per day to push his side projects.
- compose.us
- Jörn on GitHub
- Jörn on Twitter
- Jörn on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
It’s the final episode of season six of the podcast and we’re bringing it to you live with Bekah, Dan, and Kirk! We talked a lot about Hacktoberfest with many side-tracks and segues in between.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
- Kirk: @kirkcodes
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Shelley McHardy, a former chemistry teacher turned front end developer at Rightpoint, and talked about the early career developer's journey. She gave insight into what her seven-month interview process looked like, forcing interviewers to interview you, the importance of finding "your people", and being picky in your job search.
Links:
- edX
- Collab Lab
- PLCs- Professional learning communities
About Shelley
Shelley is a former chemistry teacher turned front end developer at Rightpoint. A native San Franciscan, she is currently doing her best to stay cool in Atlanta, Georgia. When not crocheting, she and her wife love hiking the Georgia State Parks, geocaching, cooking, baking, and video games.
- GitHub: @shelleymcq
- Twitter @shelleymcqDev
- LinkedIn shelleymchardy
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In today's episode, Bekah and Dan talk to Ryan Kahn, a developer experience and productivity consultant from New York City, about his work as a consultant helping companies to build better software teams. He emphasizes the importance of recognizing that teams are made up of individuals who have different needs and approaches. He also breaks down the difference between quality, technical, knowledge, and innovation debt and the need to identify which most impacts teams as they seek better communication to build a stronger team.
Links:
- ADR GitHub organization
- Oblique Strategies
About Ryan
Ryan loves solving the human and technical problems of software development, and works on both as a developer experience and productivity consultant. He lives in New York City with his partner, daughter, and dog. Outside of his work he loves Astronomy and Amateur Radio.
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Julia Seidman, a technical marketing consultant and developer in the Seattle area, and talked about her work writing about different technologies, learning by teaching, and embracing the careen over the career. She talks about her career journey from studying anthropology to financial analysis to teaching high school English, ESL and Debate, before landing her current role as a technical writer.
Links
- Krugerrand
- Gold Doubloons
- Rhodium
- Flutter
- Developer Marketing Does Not Exist
About Julia
Julia Seidman is a technical marketing consultant and developer in the Seattle area. She has 2 terrific kids and a wonderful partner, and her family cos-plays as a “normal” family.
Julia is a believer in the careen, rather than the career.
After studying anthropology and writing a senior thesis on the ethics of museum collections of human skeletal remains, she took the job she could get, which was fundraising for a hospital.
From there, she became a financial analyst and employee educator for 401(k) and pension plans. After that, she got a Master’s in Teaching, and taught high school English, ESL and Debate for most of a decade.
Now, she works as a freelance technical writer and software developer, specializing in technical content marketing.
Along the way, she has learned a lot about a lot of things, including the Python ecosystem.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In today's episode, Bekah and Dan talk to Chad Stewart, a Software Engineer from Kingston, Jamaica, about his journey into contributing to Open Source projects like Open Sauced and how to find your way to your first contribution. He shares the inspiration behind his #TechIsHiring project, which helps to identify tech jobs and resources, but more importantly, to connect people in the wider tech community.
Links
- My Side of the Mountain
- Brian Douglas, aka Bdougie
- Open Sauced
- Tech Interview Handbook
- The Algorithms
- Ayu
- Tech is Hiring
- Virtual Coffee Contributors Guide
About Chad
Software Engineer from Kingston, Jamaica. Founder of TechIsHiring.
- @Chad_R_Stewart on Twitter
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Sadie a frontend developer for a federal agency, to chat about her experience navigating the interview process and how she found success after giving tech a second shot. She shares tips on how to avoid burnout both during the interview process and while you're working in tech.
Links:
- 18f
- Skill Crush
- Leet Code Challenge
- Jennifer's List of Interview Questions
- Technical Test Preparation Advice post by Sadie
- Words of Mouth job email
- US Web Design Standards
- Jekyll
About Sadie
Sadie is a Front-end Developer and bootcamp alum. In 2016, Sadie started her journey into tech with web design courses. Along the way, she graduated with a Masters specializing in Web Design and Online Communication, taught yoga, searched for cheap flights at a travel startup, volunteered as a writer and proofreader for various non-profits, and contributed to a number of open source projects. Outside of coding and writing, Sadie can be found petting her cat Maxie, hanging out with her mom, or looking up the next vegan restaurant to check out.
- Sadie's Portfolio Site
- @sadiejay on GitHub
- @sadiej on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
For the 50th episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah are live at the Kansas City Developer Conference 2022 answering listener questions and practicing their accents.
Check out the video version on YouTube!
Listener questions:
- What time do you go to sleep? (2:19)
- How does a computer get drunk? (12:42)
- What's the hardest part of community? (22:20)
- Ayu would like to hear the history of how Virtual Coffee was founded. (31:57)
- What does community mean to you? (38:01)
- At in-person events, what are some techniques or tactics you used for starting a conversation with a stranger? (41:00)
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
The Virtual Coffee Podcast is produced by Dan Ott and Bekah Hawrot Weigel and edited by Dan Ott
In today's episode, Dan and Bekah talk with Seth Hall about the importance of intimate collaboration, advocating for yourself, and transferable skills as part of his job as a Technical Product Owner at Uniform. He shares how his background as a creative producer informs how he guides demo initiatives, creates roadmaps, and collaborates with other departments.
About Seth
Seth is a Technical Product Owner at Uniform
- Website: sethhall.dev
- Dev.to: dev.to/sethburtonhall
- Polywork: polywork.com/sethhall
- Twitter: @sethburtonhall
- GitHub: @sethburtonhall
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Bogdan Covrig, a Software Engineer in the Netherlands who's into Typescript, React and Node, about navigating different learning and career paths in tech before landing a job that fulfills his interests to see the changes he's making and provides a dynamic work environment. He also drops his tips on the most important things you can do if you're starting your journey into tech.
Links
- p5.js
- Arduino
- Twitch TypeScript Tuesdays
- Nick and Bekah's Lunch & Learn Coding questions: Problem-solving and working through challenges
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with David Alpert, Director of Engineering at Northfield IT, about taking a personalized approach to helping others as they ask coding questions and navigate career paths. David shares the importance of bringing empathy to every situation and gives tips on how to handle challenging situations.
Links:
- Logo (the programming turtle)
- Virtual Coffee Co-Working Room
- The Agile Manifesto
- Typescript Tuesdays
About David
David Alpert is a collaborative leader and agile coach striving to reduce friction between people and software. Based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, David has over 20 years of professional IT experience in software development, system design, and project and people management spanning the finance, manufacturing, and sports entertainment industries. David is passionate about test-driven development, refactoring, pair programming, and helping people become better developers.
- Website: Spin the Moose
- Twitter: @davidalpert
- GitHub: davidalpert
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In this episode of the podcast, Bekah, Kirk, and Dan discuss the decision to pause new membership and what the maintainers are doing to progress towards opening the community up again. We share what we think makes our community special, how we're working to preserve that, and some of the challenges we're figuring out as we take steps towards reopening membership. What goes into the long-term strategy of making Virtual Coffee an intimate group of devs, optimized for you? You'll find out in this episode.
Links:
- DX Ball
- Omega Virus
- Othello
- virtualcoffee.io/members
- Virtual Coffee Paths to Leadership
- Suze Shardlow
- Dunbar's Number
About Kirk Shillingford
Software Developer, and Community Maintainer at Virtual Coffee.
- @KirkCodes on Twitter
- @tkshill on GitHub
About Bekah Hawrot Weigel
Front-end developer, and Org Maintainer at Virtual Coffee.
- dev.to/bekahhw
- @bekahhw on Twitter
- bekahhw on Instagram
About Dan Ott
Front-end developer, and Org Maintainer at Virtual Coffee.
- dtott.com
- @danieltott on Twitter
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Matt McInnis a former Math Professor, and current data scientist, full-stack engineer, and founder, about his journey through tech as a self-taught engineer. He shares his insight into building personal projects and creating value in the projects you work on, even if those projects are just for you.
Links
- Malcolm Gladwell's Tipping Point
- Kidstreet
- Hacker Paradise
- Star Wars Force Trainer
About Matt McInnis
Matt is a full-stack developer (Rails+React) at Typist based in Toronto, Canada. Former artificial intelligence lead at IBM and Microsoft, mathematics professor at Centennial College and Saskatchewan Polytechnic. Matt really loves brunch.
- MattyMc on GitHub
- MattLovesMath on Twitter
- mattmcinnis on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In today's episode, Bekah and Dan talk to Meg Gutshall, a Ruby on Rails Developer, and community volunteer at Virtual Coffee. She shared all things Philly and some memorable stories of how she's supported others--including Bekah--in their journeys into tech. Meg talks about her Accountabilibuddies group at Virtual Coffee and how she chose Ruby after graduating from a full stack bootcamp.
Links
- Gritty
- freeCodeCamp
- Penn medicine
- jawn
- Meg's blog post on code and Spanish: The Little Things Matter
- Ruby for Good
- HumanEssentials.app
- CASA
- Philly Tech Week
About Meg
Meg is a Ruby on Rails developer with a passion for open source and tech for good. She's always smiling, continuously learning, and quick to strike up a conversation. She takes her advice with a grain of salt & a shot of tequila.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In today's episode, Dan and Bekah talk to Andrew Bush, a Mobile Engineer Specializing in React Native. One of the updates we've made to our site is to have tags on our members page to indicate what volunteer roles they have. Andrew is one of our Monthly Challenge team leads, and he shared with us his experiences helping to facilitate the challenges, keeping our community motivated, and the processes we go through. We also go into what it's like to be a mobile developer, and the learning path he's been on throughout his career.
About AndrewAndrew is a mobile developer specializing in React Native based out of Wisconsin in the US. He has been developing professionally for 3 years and has really found his passion in mobile apps and accessibility. Being legally blind himself, he recognizes the need for inclusion in software development so that EVERYONE can use the applications we create.
Outside of his professional life, Andrew is a dedicated amateur runner with a love for the sport that rivals his love of Swedish Fish candy. You can also find him participating as a co-lead of the Virtual Coffee monthly challenges where he strives to create engagement and growth combined with the feeling of an intimate community.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
A special live episode of the Virtual Coffee Podcast - Bekah and Dan meet for the first time in real life, and get to hang out with Kirk on Kirk Day! Also Dan fires Bekah (for the first time).
Watch the stream on YouTube!
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Roger Gentry, who has spent a lot of his career managing security and compliance for clients across the United States, about his passion for problem-solving and what to do when you get stuck. We're all going to run into frustrations during our tech journeys, but knowing how to navigate through them is one of the key skills you'll need.
About RogerRoger has managed the security and compliance for clients across the United States. Providing CTO/CSO level consulting to a variety of industries, Roger has worked with customers to achieve successful compliance certifications from PCI, ISO, SOC, and more.
http://r-o-g-e-r.com/
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Yolanda Haynes, a career changer who went from working as a certified occupational therapy assistant to a Software Engineer, about the importance of finding community during your learning journey, and remembering that you shouldn’t judge your journey based on anyone else’s; focus on the learning journey, absorbing what you can, and preparing yourself for your future.
Links:
- 100devs
- The Collab Lab
About Yolanda:
A career changer from working in healthcare as a COTA (certified occupational therapy assistant) to a Software Engineer.
- yhaynes.com
- @YolandaHaynes on GitHub
- @_YolandaHaynes on Twitter
- @yolanda-haynes on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Helen Griffin, a full-stack developer and founder, about how the tech industry changed during the time she was a founder, how what she’s learned as a founder has helped her to have a broader perspective about the tech industry, and what she’s doing with her companies Jovial and State of Developers to support developers in their career journeys.
Links
- The State of Developers
- Jovial
About Helen
Helen started her career as a web developer. Now, as a full-stack dev & founder, she enjoys helping developers build products & a life they love. Today, she spends her time building developer tools, like State of Developers & Jovial. Helen is on a campaign to help her peers recover from burnout.
- HelenJr.dev
- helengriffinjr on GitHub
- @helengriffinjr on Twitter
- @hgriffinjr on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Amy Shackles, a Senior Software Engineer at MURAL, about how she made her way from being a Psychology and Anthropology double major to being a Senior Software Engineer. She shares what’s made her experience at MURAL a great one and the importance of openness in communication.
Links
- amyshackles.com
- Amy's regular expression parser
- MDN article on regular expressions
About Amy
Amy is a Senior Software Engineer currently working at MURAL. She loves information, human interaction, solving problems, helping people, and cats - not in that order. She spends most of her free time lately learning Spanish, practicing calligraphy, singing, writing parody songs, and crocheting.
- amyshackles.com
- AmyShackles on GitHub
- @AmyShackles on Twitter
- @AmyShackles on DEV.to
- @AmyShackles on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Brian Rinaldi, a Developer Experience Engineer at LaunchDarkly with over 20 years of experience as a developer for the web, about how Developer Relationships has changed over the years and why need not just remote community experiences but also in-person opportunities. We talk about the value of different types of communities and how each is necessary to support developers.
Links
- LaunchDarkly
- CFE.dev
- TheJam.dev
- The Jamstack Book
Episode Sponsor
Attend and host virtual events for developers at Codementor Events!
About Brian
Brian Rinaldi is a Developer Experience Engineer at LaunchDarkly with over 20 years experience as a developer for the web. Brian is actively involved in the community running developer meetups via CFE.dev and Orlando Devs. He's the editor of the Jamstacked newsletter and co-author of The Jamstack Book from Manning.
- remotesynthesis.com
- remotesynth on GitHub
- @remotesynth on Twitter
- @brianrinaldi on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Kirk, Dan, and Bekah are back again to wrap up Season 4 of the podcast. We talk about Hacktoberfest and how proud we are of what our community did over the month of Hacktoberfest:
- 100 members signed up,
- 66 members merged at least 1 pr,
- 336 collectively we merged 336 PRs were merged by these members across 129 repos.
On the virtualcoffee.io site: 81 PRs merged, 50 were new member profiles, 31 others.
We talk about the monthly challenges, including already surpassing the monthly goal for blogging half way through November, and what we're looking forward to doing in the next 12 months.
Links
- Digital Ocean Hacktoberfest
- Bryan's Episode
- Todd Libby
- Abbey Perini
- Matt McInnis
- Prettier
- Jessica's Episode
- Audience or Community by Chris Brogan
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
- Kirk: @KirkCodes on Twitter, @tkshill on GitHub
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Dr. Maeling Murphy, a software engineer who recently transitioned into tech. Maeling shared the importance of connecting with potential employers to see if they would fit her values, how contributing to open source projects can help prepare you for your first job, and the value of developing the connection to community and being able to grow alongside others. Oh, and did we mention we talked a lot about Notion? She takes us through her notetaking journey and answers all our questions about finding the right approach.
About Maeling
Dr. Maeling Murphy is a software engineer who recently transitioned into tech, coming from an 8+ year entrepreneurial journey as a digital content creator and as a Ph.D. research scientist in Materials Science & Engineering.
Maeling identifies as a multi-passionate creative soul, finding expression through gardening, programming, brush-lettering and other mediums that cross her path.
She lets her love for exploration, learning and sharing with others lead her in all aspects of life and is enjoying this journey with her husband and son.
- maelingmurphy on GitHub
- @maelingcodes on Twitter
- @maeling-murphy on LinkedIn
Links from the show:
- Harvard's CS50
- 100 days of code
- Virtual Coffee Demo Monthly Challenge
- Homeschool journal
- Github
- Learning Path log
- Karen's Notion for job searches
- Karen's Job Application Details Spreadsheet
- Frank's Notetaking System
- KeyValues: Find engineering teams that share your values
- Dan's Pinboard bookmarks
- Forem - Open source project that Nick Taylor helps maintain
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Jessica Wilkins, a self-taught developer and a staff author for the freeCodeCamp News publication. Jessica talks about how to get started with tech writing, how to differentiate between constructive criticism and negative feedback, and how to avoid gatekeeping by eliminating assumptions from your writing, avoiding terms and phrases like "it's so easy!", and sometimes adding prerequisites to your posts.
About Jessica Wilkins
Jessica Wilkins is a self taught developer and technical writer from Los Angeles, California.
In her previous career, she was a professional oboist, educator and owner of JDW Sheet Music.
Jessica's interest in programming came during the pandemic when she wanted to build the Black Excellence Music Project which celebrates black artists from the jazz and classical fields.
She now works part-time as a junior developer for a small tech company and is a staff author for the freeCodeCamp News publication.
- Dev.to profile
- @codergirl1991 on Twitter
- @jessica-wilkins-developer on LinkedIn
Links from the Show:
- Eastman School of Music
- Jessica's Lunch & Learn: How to grow your tech career through writing
- Freecodecamp news
- Freecodecamp forum
- Quincy Larson
- George Floyd murder
- The Black Excellence Music Project
- Github for it
- Virtual Coffee November Monthly Challenge
- Gatsby
- Voices of Gatsby: Fighting Back Against Imposter Syndrome
- How to Use Repl.it: a beginner's guide
- How to Use Codepen: a beginner's guide
- NodeMailer
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Bryan Healey, an entrepreneur, tech leader, data scientist / ML engineer, and biz developer. Bryan talks about gaining experience as an entrepreneur, how to get started in the start-up life, and how the entrepreneurial spirit has always been in his blood.
About Bryan Healey
Bryan Healey is an entrepreneur, tech leader, data scientist / ML engineer, and biz developer. He's helped create or grow several start-ups, raised money, and built/managed teams of varying sizes, small to large. Currently co-founder and CTO at Aiera.
- @Bryan_Healey on Twitter
- bryanhealey on LinkedIn
Links
- Aiera
- Jessi's VC Podcast episode
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week Bekah and Dan sat down with Suze Shardlow. Suze is an award winning community manager, coder, tech writer and tech event MC and she currently leads the developer community at Redis. We had a really interesting conversation with Suze! She's done a million different things throughout her life and her career and she shared with us how her experiences have informed her time as a software developer and a community leader.
Links
- 30-second-coding
- On being a published author
- redislabs on Twitch
- One of the top 100 women in tech in 2020
- Redis University
- Hacktoberfest
- Codeland
- global diversity CFP day
About Suze Shardlow
Suze Shardlow is a published tech author, developer community manager and event MC. Before retraining as a software engineer, she worked in marketing and management for 20 years in the engineering, technology, law enforcement, education and economic development sectors. Currently the head of developer community at Redis, Suze has won numerous awards including Rising Star In Tech 2021, TechWomen100 2020, Women In Software Power List 2020 and is a finalist in the Women In Tech Excellence Awards 2021.
- suze.dev
- @SuzeShardlow on Twitter
- @SuzeShardlow on GitHub
- SuzeShardlow on LinkedIn
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week we welcome Mark Noonan to the show to talk about how becoming a part of Civic Tech initiatives can help career changers to grow and help existing developers create opportunities for mentorship, support, and connection for those coming into tech.
Mark talks about his experience with FreeCodeCamp as well as Code for Atlanta, and the $40,000 Hackathon his group won and donated to charity! He brings his experience as a career transitioner to the conversation and we look at how participating in Civic Tech can help you develop skills to be a better communicator and programmer. And you might hear a little bit about how we prefer our breakfast foods too 🥞
Links
- FreeCodeCamp
- Code for Atlanta
- Code for America
- Marta Hackathon
- Code for America Brigades
- People Making Progress
- @marktnoonan on Twitter
About Mark
Mark is a senior engineer at Cypress.io and is a co-organizer at Code for Atlanta. He also works as a program developer for People Making Progress, an Atlanta-based nonprofit serving adults with developmental disabilities at home, work, and in the community.
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
This week we welcome Jennifer Konikowski to the show to talk about being a woman in tech and building community for women in tech!
Jennifer brings her experience creating communities like Py Ladies Boston and Boston Ruby Women to the podcast, and talks about the value of learning to code even if you don't want to be a developer. She also talks about getting through toxic work environments, moving forward, and her hot takes on community and being a woman in tech.
About Jennifer
Jennifer has 10 years of experience as a software engineer, working in Ruby and Rails, Go, Swift, Scala, Rust, PHP, Javascript, Java, Perl, and Python. She was the founder and organizer of PyLadies Boston and a founding member of Boston Ruby Women. She currently resides in Pittsburgh and works remotely at Splice. She also really loves Negronis.
- jenniferkonikowski.com
- @jenkoni on Twitter
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
We're welcoming Todd Libby to give us an intro to accessibility and what it means to make the web equal. Todd, a professional web developer, designer, and accessibility advocate for 22 years, provides a plethora of resources that can help everyone to get started and talks about how to advocate for accessibility and equality on projects.
Show Notes:
- toddl.dev
- @toddlibby on Twitter
Things/People mentioned in the episode:
- Making A Strong Case for Accessibility by Todd Libby
- Front Page Express
- Designing with Web Standards
- Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)
- Cass Faris
- Chris DeMars
A11y Learning Resources:
- Introduction to Web Accessibility on edX
- WebAIM
- TPGi
Tools:
- WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool
- axe accessibility toolkit
- pa11y command line
- Bookmarklets by Ian Loyyd and Paul J Adams
- Microsoft a11y insights
- Firefox a11y devtools
- Lighthouse automated testing
- Contrast Ratio tool by Lea Verou
- Colour Contrast Analyser
Todd's steps for manual testing:
- Mouse only
- Keyboard only
- Squint test
- Screen readers
- Voice over in Safari
- NVDA or JAWS in Windows
- Orca on Linux
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor and episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
We welcome Jessi Shakarian to the show today to talk about her journey into UX/UI!
Jessi Shakarian got her start in tech as a developer, but also she loved everything that happened before it was time to build a website. She is currently a UX designer at DIA Design Guild in Los Angeles and a python developer interested in machine learning.
Jessi talks about how passion can be your motivation, and how valuable it is to be able to share what you're excited about: you aren't your tech stack. Sometimes finding that passion can lead you to new and interesting places like Jessi's change in focus from web dev to design.
- jessishakarian.com
- @jessishakarian on Twitter
- jessishakarian on PolyWork
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor an episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
Community Maintainer Kirk joins us (again) for our Season 3 wrap up! We review what Virtual Coffee did last year for Hacktoberfest, and talk about a lot of the exciting things we have coming up this year! We also shared some fun things from the last year at Virtual Coffee, like our Virtual Coffee Co-Working Room!
Links:
- Classic Sudoku
- Cracking the Cryptic
- @MarieAntons
- Tatiana Mac - selfdefined
- Quarto by Dominic Duffin
- Bekah's postpartum wellness app
- Virtual Coffee's GitHub Org
- Hacktoberfest on Digital Ocean
- shoutout to our Monthly Challenge team: Adam, Andrew, Aurelie, Chris, Courtney, Dominic, Kevin, Luis, Vanessa, and Yolanda!
Sponsor Virtual Coffee!
Your support is incredibly valuable to us. Direct financial support will help us to continue serving the Virtual Coffee community.
Please visit our sponsorship page on GitHub for more information - you can even sponsor and episode of the podcast!
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
The Virtual Coffee Podcast is produced by Dan Ott and Bekah Hawrot Weigel and edited by Dan Ott.
In this episode, Dan and Bekah talk to Aurelie Verrot, a Software Engineer from the San Francisco Bay Area, who's originally from France, about the importance of relationships in team-building--whether as part of the learning process or in a work environment--and the benefits of being able to work from home. She talks about the importance of clear communication, creating boundaries, and maintaining flexibility as key habits to build.
Aurelie Verrot
Aurelie Verrot is a software engineer from the San Francisco Bay Area, originally from France. After moving to the US and taking care of her children for 4 years, she decided to make a career change in 2019 to work in tech. She started her first dev job in May as a Software Engineer working mostly with Ruby on Rails.
- Twitter: LiliVerrot
- GitHub: aurelieverrot
- LinkedIn: aurelieverrot
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In this episode, Dan and Bekah are joined by Mike Rogers. Mike has had a long and successful career, but at one point he realized he no longer felt good or satisfied with where he was as a developer. He shared with us what he did to change course, and how he has learned to approach tending his career almost like a garden.
About Mike
Mike Rogers is a Ruby developer from the UK. He made the chat bots for Virtual Coffee, has an awesome Ruby Event Calendar, and loves Docker.
- mikerogers.io
- Twitter: mikerogers0
- GitHub: MikeRogers0
- YouTube: MikeRogers0
Links to things mentioned in the episode:
- Mike's YouTube: MikeRogers0
- Where’s _why? - What happened when one of the world’s most unusual, and beloved, computer programmers disappeared.
- Mike's Business Times cover
- Meditation Minis podcast: meditationminis.com
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In this episode, Dan and Bekah talk to Ray Deck, a trained data scientist, occasional angel investor, and software entrepreneur, about finding the right career path through growth, learning, and motivation. We talk about the importance of trust and listening, and Ray drops a bunch of great resources to help everyone find their own path.
About Ray
Ray is a trained data scientist, occasional angel investor, and software entrepreneur. His 25-year career spans industries from law to finance. Most recently, Ray is the founder of Sustained Ventures, a software product studio where he also publishes essays on technology and markets.
Ray's thoughts can be followed at sustainedventures.com/essays, and his less-thoughtful self is on Twitter @ray_deck.
Favorite nonfiction books:
- Bekah's pick: Beauty in the Broken Places by Allison Pataki
- Bekah's second pick: Scattered Minds by Dr. Gabor Maté
- Dan's pick: Shit, Actually by Lindy West
- Ray's pick: The Visual Display of Quantitative Information by Edwarde Tufte
Links to things mentioned in the episode:
- Start With Why by Simon Sinek
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey
- The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness by Stephen R. Covey
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah talk to Kevin, a senior software consultant at Test Double and a coding career coach at his company Tap into Tech, about some of the most common challenges early-career developers face getting into tech and offers practical advice for working through those problems. We dive into visualization, personal support, and ways to change the interview process in tech.
Kevin Truong is a senior software consultant at Test Double and a coding career coach at his company Tap into Tech. Previously a coding boot camp instructor and mentor, Kevin realized that boot camps were missing a lot of information when it came to the final steps of getting hired. With his years of experience, he has developed a program where he has coached dozens of early career devs on how to improve their results on getting a tech job.
Links:
- Kevin's Twitter: @TheKevinTruong
- Kevin's LinkedIn: thekevintruong
- Tap into Tech
- Test Double
- thekevintruong.com
- Loom
- Dustin McCaffree Upwork/Loom Tweet
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah talk to Joan Marie Verba, a web developer, former astronomy teacher, and prolific science fiction writer, about her early days in tech using Fortran, and how refusal to accommodate her allergies has prevented her from having a lifelong career in tech. She shares the story of her recent job offer that actually turned out to be a scam that's being investigated by the FBI. But she's not done searching for her next place in tech. She's pushing past the challenges until she finds that next job.
Joan Marie Verba earned a bachelor of physics degree from the University of Minnesota and attended the graduate school of astronomy at Indiana University, where she was an associate instructor of astronomy for one year. She has worked as a computer programmer and as an editor. She currently works as a writer, a publisher, and a web developer.
- Website: http://joanmarieverba.com
- Blog: http://joanmarieverba.info
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/joanmarieverba
- Web developer portfolio: http://joanmarieverba.co.technology
- Projects page: http://joanmarieverba.name
- UX page: http://joanmarieverba.net
In this episode, Dan and Bekah talk to Ayu about the impact of community, being a prolific blogger, and the very real challenge of burnout. Ayu's openness about the challenges of being a mom on the self-taught track into tech, isolation, and fears of not being good enough are the stories that we don't share enough of. Because when we share, we can all work through them together. Thank you, Ayu, for reminding us that it's ok to not be ok.
About Ayu Adiati
Originally from Indonesia and now based in The Netherlands, Ayu Adiati is a self-taught Frontend Developer & Technical Blogger. She’s on her way to break into tech from being a stay-at-home-mom of now a 4 years old daughter.
When Ayu is not coding, you can find her with the DLSR camera on her hands, cuddling with her daughter, or enjoying her iced macchiato latte.
- Blog
- DEV
- CodeNewbie
- Hashnode
Links mentioned in the episode:
- Lesson Learned: Massive Burnout In Learning Web Development
- Ayu's twitter thread about struggling with learning to code
- Free Code Camp - web responsive design certification
- Ayu's CodeNewbie Community Spotlight
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
On this episode of the podcast, we talk to Abbey Perini, a full-stack web developer, about the impact building in public has had on her developer journey, what her experience as a recruiting admin taught her as she sent out 160 applications before landing her dev role, and how rehearsing before an interview can make a big impact.
Links mentioned in the episode:
- Github: https://github.com/abbeyperini
- Indeed job rate checker
- Abbey's posts mentioned:
- CSS Animated Button with Offset Border
- Sheba Counter: How To Reload a Page Whenever a User Makes a Change with React/Redux
- Toggle Dark Mode in React
- Knitting as Programming
- Practicing Confidence for the Job Search
About Abbey:Abbey Perini is many things - a metro Atlanta native, a person of many hobbies, and a full-stack web developer. Currently ramping up in her first development role, she loves blogging about stupid Discord bots, animated CSS buttons, and other fun and useful things about programming. You can find her work and ways to connect with her at abbeyperini.dev
- https://abbeyperini.dev
- https://twitter.com/AbbeyPerini
- https://github.com/abbeyperini
- https://dev.to/abbeyperini
Virtual Coffee:
- Virtual Coffee: virtualcoffee.io
- Podcast Contact: podcast@virtualcoffee.io
- Bekah: dev.to/bekahhw, Twitter: https://twitter.com/bekahhw, Instagram: bekahhw
- Dan: dtott.com, Twitter: @danieltott
In this episode of the podcast Bekah and Dan talk to Jono Yeong, a senior software engineer originally from Australia, but currently based in Seattle, USA, about how digital gardening leaves room for growth, allows you to develop what you enjoy, and is an investment in communication skills. We also talk about learning Elixir, the process he goes through as he's learning something new, and how he brings learning new things to what he's doing with Rails. Bonus: he even walks us through how to do a proper Tim Tam slam.
About Jono:
A senior software engineer originally from Australia, currently based in Seattle, USA. He's primarily a back-end developer but is enjoying re-entering the crazy world of front-end development. Loves giving back to communities and empowering others on their developer journeys. Without such a supportive community he wouldn't be where he is today. Hash browns are his guilty pleasure food.
Twitter - https://twitter.com/JonoYeong
Website - https://www.jonathanyeong.com
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/jonathanyeong
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah wrap up season two by talking about what they've learned about community building over the last year and some lessons they've learned along the way. They talk about Virtual Coffee's mission to support its members, and how Virtual Coffee's unique approach presents both challenges and opportunities when it comes to finding tools and guidance as the community grows.
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah talk with Sara McCombs. Sara is a software engineer and team lead at Aiera, and also one of the original organizers, and a current Community Maintainer, at Virtual Coffee. Sara shared her thoughts on how to think and talk about transferable skills, leveraging past experience to differentiate yourself, and the importance of embracing that past experience as part of your journey and strengths. She also talked about the impact of career changes, promotions, and overcoming self-doubt.
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah talk with Nerando Johnson, a full stack developer looking for his next job, about running freeCodeCamp meetups in Atlanta, learning through hackathons (including that one time his team won the hackathon and donated the $40,000 in winnings to charity) and how his next endeavor should be socialization as a service for tech events. We also talk about the importance of having a solid support system and we laugh...a lot.
In this episode of the podcast, we talk to Courtney Landau, a software engineer currently working at an early-stage startup in the Education Technology space. We talked about her experience with being quiet in tech with the constant push for self-marketing and how she learns new things. We also dive into her experience as a mentor, speaker, lightning talk team member, and the other roles she's played as part of Virtual Coffee.
In this episode of the podcast, we talk to Tom Cudd, a systems architect and 20-year veteran in technology. We talked about his experiences with DevOps and how it has changed over the years, about psychological safety: what it means to Tom, and how important it is to build in to your team and workflows, and about the dangers of "hero culture" in the workplace.
In this episode of the podcast, we talk to Debra-Kaye Elliott, a self-taught frontend developer making her way through Frontend Masters Web Development Bootcamp, about what it's like to be on the self-taught developer journey, how she navigates imposter syndrome, and the lessons she's learned a long the way. She talks about the impact of being able to learn with support, choosing the resources that work best for you, and how blogging has been a part of her journey.
Debra-Kaye Elliott is a Front End Developer going through a bootcamp, who's adding community-learning to her learning process. She's a career changer from the administrative field and always wanted to be in tech.
In this episode, Dan and Bekah talk to Glen McCallum, a Software engineer from Victoria, Canada who manages a team of 8 engineers for the 2nd largest independent book distributor in the US, about his unexpected career journey, the hard decisions he's had to make, and using open-source software with his artificial pancreas. Glen also talks about his near-death experience in his first IT job and the decision to move from Independent Contributor to Management.
Glen McCallum is a Software engineer from Victoria, Canada. For the past 7 years he's been doing backend development in C# and SQL. Earlier, he did projects in Java and Rails. He's always learning, currently exploring big data with hadoop, python, and spark. Day-to-day he manages a team of 8 engineers for the 2nd largest independent book distributor in the United States.
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah talk with Lucia Cercie, a Software Engineer, mom, and Arizona transplant, about the importance of having a growth-mindset, asking questions, and pair programming. We also talk about the power of community and feeling comfortable asking questions and asking for help. When she's not coding, Lucia likes to make her baby laugh.
Lucia Cerchie is a software engineer from Phoenix, AZ. She spends a lot of time orbiting outside her comfort zone and when she's not coding, she likes to make her baby laugh.
In this episode of the Virtual Coffee podcast, Dan and Bekah talk to Gant Laborde, an owner of Infinite Red, mentor, adjunct professor, published author, and award-winning speaker, about overcoming challenges, being authentic, and finding your voice. They share some of the struggles they've faced, talk about how practice can lead to growth, and the importance of recognizing your body's signals in the process.
In this episode of the podcast, Dan and Bekah switch things up. Since it's last episode of season one, they share a bit about their origin stories, when their paths connected, and how that led to where Virtual Coffee is today. They talk about the challenges of the last year, how Virtual Coffee has been a light during dark times, and how growing can be painful, but also the process that allows you to become more than you could've imagined. And they also drop some of their favorite Virtual Coffee moments of the last year.
In this episode, Dan and Bekah talk to Kirk Shillingford, a software developer (and Community Maintainer at Virtual Coffee), who has been "haphazardly writing code for about seven years," about the importance of making mistakes and the growth that comes with it. We also talk about empathy being a key indicator of a senior developer and the importance of having a supportive community.
In this episode, we talk to Colleen Schnettler about the challenges of being a woman in the workplace, the benefits of working for yourself, and building her own SaaS business. Colleen is a Ruby on Rails consultant, who recently launched her first product--simple file upload--a career changer, and a mom. Colleen talks about how difficult it is to learn to code; it will take time and commitment, but when you get there, it will all be worth it.
In this episode, we talk to Drew Clements about the challenges junior developers face, learning through building Protege.dev, and the importance of community support. Drew is a career transitioner, father of two, and full-time developer who spends his spare time building Protege.dev, the platform curated with remote jobs for junior developers. We also talk about approaches to problem-solving, when to ask questions, and using live-streaming as an accountability tool.
In this episode, Bekah and Dan talk about mental health with Cameron Bardell, an iOS developer in the healthcare industry, and Rahat Chowdhury, a mental health start-up founder. We talk about how sometimes building a product to meet our own needs is a great place to start and the importance of prioritizing mental health, especially in a fast-paced industry like tech. We walk through our own experiences, how mental health recovery isn't linear, and how different approaches to mental health technology create support for more people.
In this episode, Vic talks about Indie Hacking and gives us his take on when to ship, what to focus on, and the value of diverse opinions in your community. He also talks about treating life as a lot of drafts and about building things that you're passionate about as well as things that others find valuable. He cautions against the danger of survivorship bias, recognizing that it's difficult to find a path in indie hacking and that many of the popular voices have worked through challenges and no longer effectively represent how difficult it is to create a product that's successful.
In this episode, Dan and Bekah welcome Tori to talk about her journey through the interview process that included about 53 interviews, 430 applications, and a pandemic offer that ultimately led to her being ghosted by the company. She gives her tips and tricks, including recognizing that interviews are a two-way street; you should also be interviewing the companies that are interviewing you. She talks about the problems of technical interviewing, how she's hopeful that the industry can make changes, and how the job she ultimately landed has been a great experience, starting with the interview.
In this episode, Marie Antons talks with Dan, Bekah, and Kirk about how she went from being a chef to a junior developer. With more and more developers coming into tech from non-traditional backgrounds, Marie shares her own unique story and how taking her past experience as a chef allowed her to understand coding in her own way. There are ingredients and steps to follow with recipes, and similarly, as you learn to code, you'll find what you need to get your code to work and the process you need to take to get there. She also talks about the challenges of coming into her first job from a bootcamp, and what she wishes she would've known before starting that job.
Dan and Bekah welcome Nick Taylor (Senior Software Engineer at Forem/DEV) to talk about his journey into tech, open source, and the importance of community.
This is the Virtual Coffee Podcast, hosted by Bekah Hawrot Weigel and Dan Ott. You'll find interviews with members of our community to learn more about their stories, who they are, how they found Virtual Coffee, and how it has influenced their lives as developers. We want to bring everything that's special about Virtual Coffee, the intimacy and the friendships we’ve built, and share that with everyone through the podcast. We’re always growing and learning together as a group, and there’s something really special about being able to do that knowing that you’ll have the full support of the community around you. And that’s what this podcast is about too.