Hi everyone. My name is Patrick Aquila and if
you're interested in chat GPT personal projects and working in
a team versus working by yourself, today's episode is for
you, joining me today is first night, he's a content creator
software engineer and he loves combining software and history
in software history. Fun little tip but he brought a
personal project that shoots him whenever he's not as productive,
as he wants to be. I'll put all his links to
socials in description below. Check him out.
And with that being said, enjoy the episode.
He showed something really cool in he made like a mock-up design
on paper. Got a video of it.
And before, then he already created a ball that was going to
reach stuff from this court and interpret it.
So he then just uploaded the picture to Discord and it pooped
out the HTML and JavaScript for like the mock-up website of it.
Yeah. And then he pasted it in like a
code snippet tool and it looked pretty decent looked exactly
like what he wanted and it even interpreted like his writing
because he has that he had like Okay click on this, make a joke
son I like that. That was pretty impressive,
actually. It's just going to continue to
get more and more impressive as we go because the way I see it
it's going to be more plugged into how developers use a.
I like I literally just made an entire video.
I haven't released it but I recorded it and completely
swapped my opinion on how it will affect programming jobs.
Yeah whereas first I'm like no just make programmers more
efficient but as I did more research on like knots, Me
personally, I think it's going to actually have a lot of these
programming jobs decline. Yeah, over time.
Yeah, look, which I can go into full detail on that, but that's
a whole bag of worms. Yeah, I can imagine.
I mean, that's what some of my colleagues.
They're like already. Now it can do a lot of, like,
powerful stuff, so if they keep improving this, if I don't know
what the number was, but if they like 100 X or time 10x, like,
increase the model in intelligence, that's already a
big increase in that way. And I've only used it because I
messed up one of my linting rules or something like that.
And I had to uppercase everything instead of camelcase
it. So I was like, yeah, I can't you
fix this for me. Yeah.
Especially all of those. Like if you need to change
something that's super redundant or repetitive, it can just do
it, just like that. But also like with refactoring
and whatnot and then just kind of getting you that more in
depth what I would call boilerplate code because instead
of just trying to start everything from scratch or what,
Have you just like you would use like, create react app to kind
of build out the yet boilerplate, if you would, but
it's more in depth than like traditional boiler plate?
Yeah. Chad, gbt and other tools, you
know, like opening a codex + G BT 4 is kind of what chat gbt
uses in order to formulate the code codex is also what's
behind. Go, copilot and whatnot and then
obviously these other companies are building their own version
of codecs and GPT. And that's what's like that's
what will allow you to be able to do those types of things.
You just think, I mean, you've definitely done more research on
this than I have. So I'm wondering what made you
change that perspective? Because I also think it's going
to be more. So, a productivity tool I can
see it being very powerful. Yeah.
But I don't know if it's going to make jobs obsolete.
I think it's going to evolve jobs into something else, but
you're saying it might actually replace a lot of things.
Also, Yes, because big and it's funny because what I found out
as I was doing the research or exact, like counterpoints to my
initial argument. So, where I think it's going to
come into play as like, what I mentioned earlier is how It's
going to be plugged into everything like your entire
workflow. Just think about what, how you
perform a task, as a software engineer it defers, but I'm
going to talk for my own personal experience, you know,
you start a Sprint. So, what happens when you start
a Sprint? Let's say it's two three weeks.
Print, your team gets together, you pull in the user stories.
Break those down into tasks, pull in other tasks.
Someone not from the backlog and everything.
Then you go through, all of them are titled.
So you have a broad understanding of what to do.
But what we did was Was go in to each individual one and give it
a description. More information about what
needs to be done for this task, right?
And then once you do that, okay? Everyone is assigned or chooses
the tasks that they are to work on next.
They pull it over 10 progress, it work on that do done, go to
the next and then they complete all of those tasks, over the two
three weeks print. Yeah.
So a lot of these tasks are, you know, Implement a feature fix a
bug or maybe even in their, you throw in like You know, fixing
code, smells code coverage, things of that nature, writing
tests, obviously you have to do all of that.
And the reason why I thought that it wasn't going to be like
taking or yeah, replacing programmers at all because
somebody needs to go in and Tell the AI what to write.
Yeah like, hey, we need to get this done, right?
They I right, Sid rights test forward and then the let's say
the junior developer does that and the junior developer looks
at the code, test, the code, you know, creates a feature branch
and then, what do they do after that, they once everything
works, then they submit a pull request and then it goes to
someone else or multiple other people for code review.
Make sure. Okay, this looks good or maybe
you need to change that or change this.
Well, if you're already determining at the beginning of
the Sprint, what needs to be done, which is basically the
same exact sentence that you would enter into the AI and
they, I would spit out code. Yeah.
And then they, I is going to write the test and if it's
already plugged in. So this is how I see it.
If inside your issue, tracking software project management
software, whatever, instead of assigning it to me, you'd assign
it to the AI and that's what triggers the AI to go ahead and
do it. And if it's already plugged
into, Do that. It'll be plugged into your first
control system, so then it will write the code, write the test
and then commit and push it, creating a new feature Branch to
then be pulled over or pushed, you know, as a pull request over
to the development Branch. That's how mine was structured
up. The development Branch, where
everyone's features on this printer going to that are
waiting for a code review. Anyway, so you already D, lay
out the description that the a I would need at the beginning of
the Sprint and you already need to review the code regardless of
whether a junior developer or whoever writes the code, as it
gets put into development Branch.
So I thought the junior developer was going to be the
one that had to plug it into that workflow but it looks like
it's already been done. Yeah, and then all it needs to
do as it gets more and more advanced is have the ability to
plug into these systems. All of the tools that you use as
a software engineer, there will need to be some oversight but
all of these simple mundane tasks or I mean what does a
junior developer? Do everything that the senior
developer doesn't want to do? So I mean the senior developer
can already do it, But they just have, you know, it's more
efficient. Like they have bigger fish to
fry. It's more efficient for the
junior developer to do it and they focus on the big picture
over here. So why not just have the, a, I
write the code, they can write it just as good if not better,
especially within the next five years, then a junior developer.
Yeah, there is one slight like missing piece here.
And that is well, what happens when this senior Dev or whatever
leaves or retires, like typically, that's It's the
junior Davis who you work your way, the work, their way up into
that position, but maybe just like everything else.
The structure, the skill Gap will will rise for those types
of jobs or I really believe that the entire landscape.
For those types of jobs will drastically change because
senior devs and and people will still be using these tools as
well to help them out. It's just a lot of these project
management and those types of jobs to kind of maintain the
code base and put Did this written?
All of that will need to be done.
That's why I think it'll programming jobs will end up
declining over the next five, I'll say 10 years to be safe
because a lot of players have to come together.
However, GitHub already has like all of these tools together.
Well, I'll say Microsoft because they have vs code.
They have GitHub has all of their different types of like
issue, tracking a project management and see ICD, and
obviously Version Control. So it'll be interesting.
Interesting to see the more I research it, the more I think
that it's programmers, may not be a safe as I initially thought
it was supposed to say that. Yeah, I've never heard it laid
out like that but the way you lay it out, if it's plugged into
the workflow and it can get the information that it needs to to
develop a feature just like how a developer would then it's
essentially part of a team like it's just another team member
within that team except a big difference is That is then your
10x developer, or 100x, whatever you want to label it because
out, yeah. And it'll have to be plugged
into everything. Just like everything else is.
I mean what isn't connected inside your workflow today, like
like your entire first control system is connecting to your
IDE, all of your extensions and everything.
All the tools that you use or in your IDE and then your CI CD
gets automatically done and then gets pushed up to like
everything is basically all animated every manual piece it's
just all connected. Regardless so why wouldn't they?
I be Acted as well. I mean we already have
extensions and whatnot but I mean even more connected and
more in-depth just like I would be connected into the system,
the a.i. would be connected to the system and I'm obviously
using a eyes and more broad term but I think I think you get the
idea. Yeah.
Interesting the hard part for me is that then let's see, let's
say this happens and the trend of Junior developers not
necessarily doing those mundane tasks anymore.
But working more with the senior developers on complex stuff.
Fully that is then going to excel their learning curve, but
the problem is those mundane tasks, there still needs to be
an understanding of what is actually happening because as
soon as the AI messes up or make some steak and there's no like
human interaction or review process, then we really rely on
this piece of software, writing a piece of software, basically
with all the Box involved in there and that might be scary.
If your business is heavily reliant on that piece of
software, like most digital companies, nowadays are.
So it's going to bring NG I think a lot of risks involved in
there as well but still the possibilities from a
productivity point of view, I think are going to be
incredible. Then it's just going to evolve
what a program that doesn't think more on a day-to-day
basis. What?
A push back on that a little bit.
Why can't they? I use the same linters that we
use our code analysis software that we use.
And again when you when it submits a pull request, the code
has to be reviewed. Anyway.
Yeah. And I think it'll just get right
now obviously, you know. You can see what it could do.
It could do a lot of good things, but there needs to be
human intervention right now. But, you know, look at how much
it's progressed over the past five years and in the, and it's
kind of like a compound progression.
So I say it progressing even more in the next five years.
So that the saying, I don't know if it's already better coder
than me. Right?
I'm you know what? Coders too simple of a term of.
Yeah. Well, maybe better code in the
me but I think eventually it'll be a better source.
Software engineer than me. And that's what everything I
laid out and all the tools and all the workflow that that goes
into it. Interesting that's that yeah
that's what I find incredibly interesting.
I there still will be a market, there will be jobs open as
people leave, there will be more companies coming up and people
needing to fill those spots. But I could see like the whole
like a lot of developers may be kind of taken the role of like
software app market. Maintainer is like an orchestra
like that you like I mean it just orchestrator you just held
a string so if you look at like if I look at my own experience
when I started out like I didn't do computer science university
so I started it out in operations.
I did have some data science in college and whatnot but then
from that operations role I got my first developer job and it
was basically a junior developer role I sat with consultancies
who I now work at the same consultancy company.
Coincidentally, but their task was to, it's like, Transfers
much knowledge to me as they could because they were going to
off board. Basically, so I had a huge rat
bump in understanding of what we actually did and how to build on
top of that. But for me, I thought initially
so much about okay. I have this task exactly how you
described it that's going to be requirements.
That's going to be new features, new requests, you're going to
have to implement it. You're going to look at what we
have and how you do it. How do you make this thing
happen in the first place? And then, as I got more
experience with that, probably Mundane tasks less mundane
tasks, doesn't really matter. You get a better fundamental
understanding of how to do the things.
But then what you're describing, the essence, I think of a
software engineer and probably the contribution is going to be,
what are we doing in the first place?
Not necessarily how and especially why we're doing it
right that fundamental business understanding.
Does this add value in comparison to the other things
we can also do, maybe your productivity is going to be so
high that you can just try everything which would be an
ideal scenario. but I think the role is going to evolve more
towards that, just as, like, your kind of Junior to Media to
senior position also gets more complex with regards to what and
why Yeah, there's always going to be a need for somebody in
between like the end-user. Whoever needs that software that
app and the code or AI itself, just like, you know, there are
plenty of Freelancers who go about building Wix websites and
Squarespace websites, like the business owner, can absolutely
do that themselves but they ain't got the time to do that.
It makes more sense for them to deploy money in order to hire
somebody who can just, you know, Whip It Up.
Kind of maintain the website regardless of how they get that
website done. And then now they have a website
and they, you know, they don't have to worry about it.
So there's always going to be a need for like somebody or people
in between, but also to like look at like the bigger Vision
as well, but how many of you know, developers into team are
looking at the bigger vision? And how many are just kind of
like here, let me do this task. Let me do this task.
Look at some people, some people Love.
One where they look at, like, maybe they work on their own
projects and they love to be able to work with this and work
with that. Other people love to just be
told do this test. Do that task?
Thank you. Let me disappear at my computer
code. Don't have to worry about
anything and that's that they don't worry about the big
picture. They don't have to worry about
talking to the client or QA testing or anything like that,
they just focus on the tasks but the people who focus on the
task, It'll start off as using AI for productivity and again,
working all that out, but I do see a lot of that kind of almost
becoming obsolete. But I do, I do definitely
understand what you're talking about with the bigger picture
and in talking with, like, the end user or client or whoever?
Yeah. Well, for me is interesting, is
something you touched on in like, apps, like Squarespace or
even, I would say more local platforms that already have
like, building blocks and people can like click and drag and drop
and create An application because that, essentially, you
can do that with chatty, PT, and be even more flexible, because
you're not going to have the limitations of that platform,
right? If we're talking about low code,
there's always this like ramp up in productivity until you hit a
point where the platform you're using, doesn't do what you
wanted to do because you want something super custom.
You're obviously a snowflakes, are you want this thing and you
think it's going to add a lot of value and then you hit a wall
and then you're like oh we have to be like a custom building
block or a plug-in. And then at some point, you make
your own monstrosity. Study.
But the platform you're building on top of it is a backbone with
in your architecture. So you cannot get rid of it.
I don't think you're going to have the same issues with chat
GPT. It's probably flexible enough
to, then shift and be like, uh, have you thought of this or it's
going to give you multiple options.
So I think if you find yourself using those tools, Marlo code
related more, click and drag and drop build tools or even if you
are an organization that is building that right now for me,
that would be a huge red flag. What chat upt is kind of
providing or it will provide for the future.
Yeah. Yeah, that's the, I can agree
more. That, that's the main concern.
I mean, you research, whatever the hell you want, because
you're working now full time on content creation, and I think
that's really admirable judge if it is a hot one, so I get that,
you would research that. But I also saw that you do you
did few videos on Linux and even other stuff not like, how do you
decide on a topic to then do your research on to create
content for? Sometimes it's a hard one where
I'm trying to figure out like, what do I want my next video to
be? Or there's times like right now
where I have an entire list of videos I want to create, but I
go through, like the thing is, I go through different phases,
like, like most of the last year, not every video, but a lot
of videos were like project-based videos where I,
because I really wanted to get in and just code projects,
whether it be like a terminal website or a portfolio website,
or like a using Object detection and face tracking to get a Nerf
gun on a on a like a swivel arm. Yeah, to shoot me in the face
when I get distracted. That wasn't my favorite videos.
But uh, Some of these other videos like I right now, I'm
really liking the whole video essay thing.
I'm still trying to cater to a lot of my audience who may be
new programmers, or just want to know about like tools and things
about software, engineering, and things of that nature.
But a lot of what I have covered, a lot of that stuff
already. And since I'm not a current
software engineer like, you know, in a team of What Not my
knowledge is not growing, like it did when I was because I'm
just it's growing in like so, Developer space if you will
because I'm working on my own projects and you learn a lot
doing that as well. But right now, like I love
history. I love like computer science, so
Computer, Science History. Yeah.
That's why I made the like one of my recent videos like you
mentioned about Linux has the making of Linux and kind of like
the origin story of Linux and kind of where it is.
Today basically the entire story in between those two things and
then I have a handful of other ones like One, that's on the
chopping block or not. Chopping block one.
That's going to be next or the one after next is about the IBM
PC, which I think was like the first mainstream computer.
I don't know. I wrote I wrote the script a
little while ago, I have to go back and they'll probably get
I've to go back and edit that and that's kind of what I do is,
I dive deep into research. This one, I actually had helped
with the initial research. That's why I don't have all of
it, but all my other Yours is me doing all the research and
because I really enjoy that aspect.
I really love research. I love going down the rabbit
holes. I love being able to spend all
the time and to just learning about Linux or Alan turing's
1936 paper where he introduced the universal turing machine,
and kind of how that came about and kind of all these different
players and pieces that tie into everybody else's story.
It's just fascinating to me. So I love to do their research
and then I learned. So, So much more about it and
then I get to make a video about it.
Yeah, like that's just ideal for me.
So that's kind of where I'm at now and how I come about with
some of those content ideas is whatever I mentioned and you can
see it there on my channel, whatever, I'm interested at the
time. I try to keep it towards, you
know, computer science, and software engineering.
Sometimes it'll trickle out, but whatever interested at the time
within that, or went to work on at the time with it and that or
something new that I learned, I want to share it and I tried my
best to make a good video. About it.
Yeah, and that's really, that's really how I come up with those
ideas. Yeah, there's a lot of, there's
a lot of similarities with podcast topics.
I have in there I try and be like somewhere in between but
the name is Broad enough for me to do anything virtually.
So I have to yeah. Have to contain the kind of the
topics what I think still makes sense within the boundaries.
I set myself. Yeah you do feel like you Trend
outwards towards that I want to zoom in on kind of the
relationship you have then with programming because you just
like me were Before you started to go content, creation
full-time, you are a programmer at a company.
And as you mentioned, you worked in Sprint's you did you picked
up your featured requests and you created features for that.
And I do that as well. But I'd like, I do consultancy
95% of the time. I wouldn't say that software
development 95% of the time but it's a huge chunk of my time
insofar that when I'm not working.
I don't want to pick up a keyboard and make my own
projects anymore like the Nerf gun example, shooting you in the
ass that that to me. Hilarious and I would, I would
love to do that, but then I'm like, when like I've lost kind
of my touch or my drive, to build those personal projects
because I do that, that's my day-to-day.
Basically, have you seen that evolved since you've gone for
Content creation, full-time content creation?
Yeah, absolutely. Where it could because when I
was working, so here's the thing.
But I was so when I was working full-time as a software
engineer, there was also the aspect that I did have the
YouTube channel as well. So that was also so more work on
top of it, but even if I didn't have that, After coding for six
hours a day. Yeah you know it's eight hour
workday but we're expected to do six hours worth of tasks because
on the tasks you do you estimate the time?
Maybe a one hour test 12-hour Testament, three-hour test,
that's six hours of tests. And that's what I have to get
done that day after I do, even during doing that, I'm like,
man, I'm about fried. Like, I've made videos and talk
to people about how like four hours of like deep coating, not
like research, like we talked about in Something or, you know,
kind of mundane easy coding. But, like, decoding problem,
solving that type of stuff, four hours is about my limit per day.
Six hours was insane. The last thing I want to do is
come home and code even more because there's other things
that I enjoyed doing and not only that but my brain is like
fried melted at the end of the day.
Yeah, fried completely. So I just kind of didn't really
code that much. when I was working as a software engineer
on my own projects, but after I did.
Now I didn't tell like initially when I left that job at and
mentioned on my YouTube channel because I knew I knew, luckily I
had enough Insight that I was going to want to take it easy.
I'd been working way too much for like the previous like three
to four years overall just like working and then coming home for
like hang out and dinner for like 23 hours and then going
back to work until like 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. and then getting up at
7 a.m. and again at 8 a.m. the next morning and doing it all
again. I'm like, all right.
My whole goal is to try to be able to work for myself.
Be able to build what I want. Make the videos that I want.
I know I'm going to want to be able to like chill for a little
bit, so that's what I did. So I didn't initially start me,
just coating my own projects. I'm like, let's take a little
bit of a break from coding. Yeah.
And that's what I did until So that was 2019.
And then in 2020, I started working on like some machine
learning stuff, like rebuilding Tetris, and building a neural
net and doing a lot of research in in that and building a neural
net. Not even a library building, my
own neural net in order to beat Tetris.
Yeah, or beat Tetris is kind of an interesting turn by get like
a million points in Tetris. And then I build a few other
games after that. And then Kind of step back
because I wanted to be able to make more content and then in 20
20 21 I made some projects I did but then in 2022 I made a
handful of projects like the ones we were just talking about.
So the more I'm able to work on my own projects.
The more I enjoy coding. Yes, I feel like again it was
funny as that's not true for everybody.
Like we're talking about earlier, some people just want
to get tasks and just want to be able to do those tasks and not
worry about the bigger picture. See, I like looking at the
entire thing and building the entire thing myself.
And, and at that point, I'm good.
So it definitely changed from when I was a software engineer
to now, where, you know, full-time content creator, if
you will from personal projects to not working on Surprise eggs
to really enjoying the personal projects.
There are always those, you know, hard Parts where it's
annoying and you're like this sucks and I can I just stop it,
but you're so far in. Sometimes you do just like bail
on it, I'll come back to it and you never do.
But, you know, there's always going to be that.
But what's the expression? Anything worthwhile is never
easy or something like that. So that's kind of what you have
to keep in mind for some of these things.
Like you, whenever you hit a barrier that Does mean you just
quit you just kind of try to figure out how to work your way
through that barrier in order to get that done because that's
like that's like that gratification.
Yeah once you get through that barrier and once you complete
that project that you set out to complete, oh man, I feel so
good. That's what makes coding
exciting. So yeah, for sure, I mean, from
a sense of like ownership perspective, also, these are
your projects, right? And usually, when you're working
on a client or a company, you're working for someone else or
software and sure you can feel Ownership of that.
But at the end of the day, some important decisions you might
not get to make. Now that is different, when
you're working on your own projects, you can be like I want
to do this because it's going to be mine and this is what I want
right now, this is my yeah uh and I want to scratch it and by
creating whatever I want to create and that's going to be
different when you're working in a team.
We're going to project on something else.
Like you have to find. I feel like different drivers
different motivations for me. A big drivers, always like
impact on customers and delivering value.
All you with the things that we build, and it doesn't
necessarily have to be me, can be the output of the team.
And, however, I contribute to that output, like I find
enjoyment in and that is where my value lies as well, but I can
see that at some point if you move on from this thing and you
go off on your own that you might find enjoyment in the
neuron projects as well. Like, I think right now for me,
just like you previously. When I'm done, I want to do
other stuff just because I don't get the opportunity to do so,
but if you have The freedom to pick up whatever you want
whenever you want to and even come back when things get tough
and you need a little time break.
I think on a regular job those time breaks, you don't have or
they don't offer them to you, but when you're off on your own,
you do have that which also, but they're go ahead.
But there is like a huge upside to working with a team and
working on a bigger project cause you're working on
something that you can never work on by yourself.
Like some of these, you know, the I was working on Enterprise
application mainly for my last job and that is something I'm
never going to build by myself. You know what I mean?
Like I was so used to so I did full stack.
So I did like, you know, like typescript on the front end job
on the back and I also do like some database and SQL stuff and
whatnot, but the with Java in Spring like that's that was my
expertise if you will not saying I'm an expert in it.
But for my skill level, that's what I was bested.
And Then I like look at some of these personal projects and
there are like Management systems and things that are good
to build with spring. But there are there are so many
other better tools out there for the smaller projects.
Yeah. Van what I knew best which kind
of was unfortunate because then I had to learn all this
technology and all these other Frameworks and all this and then
it will not but not only that when you work on a big in a team
and this is one reason why I do really like like tools like jack
chat GPT is because it kind of gives me a another head to
bounce ideas off of. Yeah, like to remember you work
in it, it's a team member. So when you worked in a team at
least, especially for me, I had two amazing developers who I
worked under and, you know, it's funny as a lie, how a lot of
people are like, oh yeah, I'll developers, you know, they use
Google and stack Overflow and this and that.
I'm sure they did too but it seemed like their head was
stackoverflow. Like everything was downloaded
in it and they just, I'm like, hey, I'm facing this problem.
That problem. And this, and that I've tried
this, I've tried that, and I like, oh yeah, you just have to
do this this and that I'm like, Trying to do this and that, and
then I do it. And then sure enough, that's
exactly what I needed to do. And they knew it off the top of
their head. I'm like, that's insane.
That is something that I absolutely Miss, not just with
him, helping me out. But then mentoring me and kind
of guiding me along and how much you can learn from somebody like
like them plus the camaraderie of everyone working on the same
thing. There are things that I miss
about that, but not enough to go back, but it definitely is
something that that. Yeah.
There are pros and cons to everything.
Exact, those are definitely some of the pros.
Yeah, I mean, especially the way you describe it.
I have those people in my team now and I feel like if I didn't
have those people in my team, I would feel an itch to kind of
move towards a team where I did have that, right?
Because I feel like you can offer that to someone else and
someone else can offer that to you.
But if you lose that then kind of the value of being in that
team, diminishes to some point because exactly as you
mentioned, I know, probably of my company, a lot of people that
can offer To me in different various domains, right?
Because tank is as broad as it can be right now.
It's going to get even broader and it's going to get a little
bit more complex with new technologies that get introduced
introduced. Which also means people are
going to have their speciality things that they really know to
a tee. And when you need to really
figure out something with regards to that speciality, you
can try and do as much research or get as much experience as you
can by yourself. But it's going to be a long long
road ahead and the easiest thing That's also some advice.
Someone gave me. If it takes you like four or
five hours to research and you can figure it out.
Usually, if you just put your head down, get to working and
try and figure this thing out. Try every solution in the book,
you you will figure it out. Usually it's just going to take
this Soul so long, whereas if you can just ask one simple
question for the guy that you probably know knows the answer
or you can do it together and it saves you hours on hours.
They say always ask always get to that and get to that person
asked that question and get it done together because
productivity was you're going to be more effective doing that and
you're probably going to learn just as much but it's so hard
because it didn't you feel like. Yep.
Oh why am I even here? If he already knows the answer
and I'm just like, what's the point?
Like it's so hard sometimes to ask that question because you're
like Then I'm just showing how little I actually know about
this where he knows it off the top of his head.
And I could sit over here and spend three or four hours of
research and still not figure it out.
Yeah. So there's also that like that's
just such a mental game with trying to you should ask
solutely. I always tell people to ask
questions. Implementing that.
Well it's a little bit more difficult than said yeah.
So yeah, I mean, it depends on. The environment, right?
And for me it's easy because I laid out, I came from
operations, got into a junior developer role.
And the expectation of me was, I don't know anything because this
is my first time gig. So then me asking for me, it was
obvious that I didn't know for them.
It was obvious that I might not know.
So I asked every question, the book I was like, what about
this? And what about that?
And when they didn't know, we would figure it out together and
I didn't feel opposed to asking those questions, but I do
recognize that if the environment is different and
when people say, ah, Why don't you know that and you get
remarks like that that can be really disheartening in that
asking a follow-up question or asking questions at all.
But then I would say that might not be the environment for you
to kind of gain knowledge in and growing because the environment
needs to be. I mean it would be Progressive
but it should allow you to grow and ask questions if it's not
the case, then it's not the environment for you.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
I agree with that. But there still is, at least for
me. Maybe it's a pride thing.
It could be a thing. I want to prove my worth to, you
know, make sure like you know, they're getting what they.
Maybe it could also, you know, one of those developers
everyone. My team was kind of the owner of
the company so maybe that also has something to do with it but
they were always so helpful. Yeah.
Never like you know talk down or anything like that.
They just always helped regardless of what question but
they're still. I want to figure this out.
I On to be the one to, to get it done and that like that makes
not only me feel better. Like, what I say earlier that's
like what coding is all about is like going through that barrier
yourself and figuring out yourself.
But at the end of the day, you are part of a team, you're there
to get work done. So you do need to have like
efficiency and productivity in mind which also brings up.
Another interesting point, about the whole like working on my own
projects versus working, you know, for someone else. you
know, as software Engineers that The the ability to go down a
rabbit hole. And like I said, I love research
and learn all of this stuff. You can't do that when you're
let. Like if it's a one-hour task or
to our task, you can't you can't spend four or five hours like
learning everything you can about it.
So like the next time it comes up, you know, the answer to it
or like you know where to look or you know more about it just
in general like, you know, there's a little bit of time to
research but and then it's time to To implement and it has to
fit into that, you know, wanted to our window however, long that
test. It could go over, right?
Some tasks, you may get done quicker so you can do a lot that
time to other tasks but that's something that is always kind of
tricky because you want the developer working in your
software engineering team to be as smart as possible.
But you also want them to be as efficient as possible and it's
kind of like a double-edged sword where we'll in smart as
possible. They will research everything
and learn everything is efficient as possible.
They won't. They'll, you know, do some of
the things that we talked about here.
Yeah, implement It's interesting.
Yeah, Implement interesting. I mean that was one of the
points I was going to touch on because like working in a team
with time constraints. You always have time constraints
for some reason and it makes sense because yeah, business is
spending money. I just by virtue of paying
salaries being operational costs, they want value.
And if you're in a team, if you're creating software the
software that you're creating, hopefully if the business case
is solid is going to create value for the company which
means there's going to be time constraints and there will
always be a balance of. Alright, what is my personal?
Gain how much personal knowledge, do I gain from this?
And what is my contribution, towards the team output, right?
It cannot be any other way because you have to balance
that. Exactly, as you mention, if you
research for a day, people can be like or you could have just
done this on this and then it would have been done right?
Then like yeah there's going to be those conversations but for
me then if you love researching and I know you do right now,
don't you have like a challenge in researching too much as well?
Because at some point, you still want to create the content that
you want. Create or are you like one of
those people that don't doesn't put those boundaries on
themselves because at the end of the day their boundaries you put
on yourself. Yeah.
I don't put strict boundaries, I don't like set of this should
take this many hours or whatever, but I do have a
schedule in mind. Like I want to upload a video a
week, or I do want to get, you know, I have to get these things
done this week, regardless of what I do, what day it just
needs to get done this week. So Not necessarily strong like
tight boundaries even though that again, would be more
efficient. Yeah, I feel like it kind of
puts a pressure on me that I don't need exactly.
Don't want. And I'd rather just be able to
kind of go with the flow and have fun doing it.
Like, if it takes, literally, if it takes me into like twice the
amount of time but I enjoy that time.
I don't see the issue. No, not if they have to make
money and I have to make content, and I have to, you
know, I have to get things done. I understand that.
There's more benefit to me personally and overall, and I
think it even comes across in my videos, as well.
When I'm super like interested in a topic and I'm talking about
that topic. Whereas, as opposed to me just
churning out a video or if we were to talk about coding, me
just churning out a project. There are some instances where,
like, with coding and coding some of the stuff for the video.
See, that's what takes a lot longer than even just
Researching like on Linux for the making of Linux video
because the programming it there's research involved,
there's also implementing involved and then there's like
the scripting of all because I have to tie in a story and
making it entertaining video about it.
So there's a lot of that and I do try to expedite that a little
bit but I never give myself like tight time.
Constraints other than if I'm working with a sponsor then
we'll have like a deadline but I ensure that that deadline gives
me more. Time then.
I think I need ya. So I like that alone.
I tried. I don't want to be rushed.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I mean, so the string you can
put on yourself if you like one, uphold a schedule and I feel
like I have that with the podcast because I want to are
weakly, but it's something I decided to do and it's something
I want to uphold and it doesn't have the amount of strain that
it stresses me out. Like, I can, I would probably
miss an episode if it needs to happen, if there's an emergency,
if I get sick or whatnot hasn't happened yet, and you put in the
work to make sure Sure, it doesn't happen.
But I get that if you allow yourself to just enjoy what this
process and the leading up to the thing that you're going to
create, it's going to be so much more sustainable, right?
Because if you have tight deadline after deadline and the
only person putting those deadlines on, you is yourself.
That is going to be innate stress and for some reason
you're putting that on yourself, that's not going to be
sustainable. Because content creation,
especially working not within a team, but you are the team.
It needs to be sustainable for the long run.
Because it's not going to change unless you want it to.
Yeah, and I've tried to take this practices into because I do
kind of have a team now, because I do have a couple editors.
And again, I with the IBM PC, I did bring in someone to help
with the research in the scripting.
Although, I do love that portion of it, so it was just kind of
like a test. I'm not sure if I may continue
doing that, I always like make my own script after all the
research, but just kind of to consolidate all the resources
into one place to make my job. Easier more efficient, I do try
to be more lenient where hey, I have a deadline here, but I'm
trying to give you as much time as possible in between, it's not
like, hey, I need this in two days, unless I do, then I'll be
like, hey, you know, maybe I'll compensate you differently, you
know, pay you more and for expedited edit or something like
that, but that's something. I also try to keep in mind when
I have people a part of my team because I know how I like To
work. Yeah, not everyone likes to not
Everyone likes to work that way. I had assumed but I do want to
make sure that everyone you know who I work with is getting what
they need is in like sponsors. You know, they needed it on a
certain day. I try to make sure I adhere to
that but also that the people working on it, myself included.
Enjoy the process and are just doing it just to do it.
Yeah. Yeah.
I can I can see how it can be challenging as well and I'm
going to take this podcast. As an example, I just got Runway
to edit this episode through an agency and the agency helps
makes Ronnie in the back. He's doing the production
usually and he's also going to edit the episodes.
Now, there's not much editing involved other than this is
where we start. This is where we end some audio
synchronization, some leveling that's it.
But I've done this for like the last 60, 70 episodes because
another person used to do that and he's no longer involved in
the podcast but I think it's going to be an interesting
dynamic. Because if you have done this
process for a long long time, just like you have with video
and content creation and scripting, when it comes to the
essence of your videos and someone else gets involved, you
don't want to lose that sense of authenticity, right?
And I'm 100% sure my pockets going to be fine because there's
not a lot of editing involved, but when it comes to things that
are a bit more complex, complex edits research involved
information, that is going to be in there.
I do feel like that can be an interesting Dynamic working.
Then in a team where as you were previously working by yourself,
Elf. If it is very hard because a lot
of obviously I make videos about computer science and software
engineering, but how many editors no computer science and
software engineering. So if I'm referencing like a
certain type of terminal, like how will they know what to add
or from talking about some sort of like architecture, how are
they going to know what visuals to add in there?
So I did find myself like going deep into like the script in.
Basically, I go. You and I Source all of the
resources this image maybe recreate this type of diagram.
Add this here, show this video or this image because it's
applicable to what I'm talking about.
And that's how I've kind of found to make everything so
smooth. It's not where I can just record
something and then send it off and it'll come back with maybe
one or two edits afterwards, it needs more guidance because the
knowledge Gap is is different. It's not like just like a like a
like a podcasts or like a daily Vlog.
Even we're like what's going on like the videos?
About what's going on in the video.
Like, you can obviously see what's entertaining when needs
to be talked about, what may need to be cut out and kind of
keep it chopped up like that. But when it comes to you're
talking about something technical.
Yeah you need a break down that barrier.
So the editor, or the team member can actually do their job
and that is something that I had to kind of figure out along the
way. Yeah, I can imagine.
So you need that, like, technical domain knowledge, the
thing that you're talking about, yeah, if there's an acronym in
there and it's going to pronounce than all the way the
make it can be so many options. If someone doesn't know,
Anything then they're going to be like, man, this is a tough
one. What image should I had with
regards to that? Have you ever thought of like
workflows being established as a good Pro in working as a team?
Because you mentioned the workflow at the very beginning
of this episode working in Sprint's, picking up things or
describing things in tasks and I'm picking them up, putting
them up for pull, request, reviewing that and that's how it
gets implemented in production. That's more of an established
workflow in a software engineering team.
And show you have different variations in people are
experimenting, but I recognized what you were saying.
I could understand 100% of it because it's been one of my work
flows. Also in the past.
Now, if you more so trailblazing and doing things that other
people are not doing, also in control yourself and you bring
in other people, you're going to have to establish a different
way of working and that way of working is going to be
completely custom which means it's going to have to have a lot
of time and iterations before you can actually be effective in
that way as well. Yeah, and it's a fine balance
between trying to see what other people are doing that are
related to your field. Because they're, you know, there
are other you plenty of YouTubers, have their own teams,
their own editors and and whatnot.
But it's almost like each one. Does it differently?
And then of course with mine I can't copy there's because of
what we just talked about with the technical barrier.
So I need to do it a specific way and I create my content in a
particular way that I like to enjoy like there are some
YouTubers who basically have the entire Our script written for
them, they are only the talent they talk to the camera and then
they send it off like a script writer and editor communicate
with like b-roll and this edit and whatever needs to be done
and then they go from there. Like they're just the talent but
I like to be more involved. I like to do the research.
I need to break down that barrier to the editor and it
wasn't something that I had seen done before.
So I'm trying to take bits and pieces from the software
engineering side Kind of keep things organized because the
thing about like project management software issue,
tracking is that everything is centralized.
You can see what each person is working on, when they're working
on it. So like, we're not working on
the same task at the same time and that is a very good thing
that needs to be implemented across all teams, like,
everywhere, some form of that. So you know what, everyone's
working on a any given time and it just makes for better
cohesion. But that's it.
I pulled some of those pieces and then try to look at some of
these other like YouTube teams or consecration teams or even
Film Production like documentary makers.
Like I just tried to pull for everywhere but the end of the
day like I can do as much polling and research and trying
to figure things out ahead of time as possible.
You don't really learn until you start doing exam once you do.
You're like oh that doesn't work for me or that does work for me
or maybe I need to do this a little bit different like I said
I figured out that I need to Source all the stuff and break
down the technical barrier. Those are the things that you
kind of figure out as you go along.
And the same thing is something I say like with people because I
have a lot of Newport New programmers or computer science
students who watch my content. Yeah and that's what I say.
It's like there's a reason why tutorial hell is a thing.
You're just being told to do something and you do it.
You're not actually like critically thinking.
You're not actually doing the like you're coding.
Yeah. By your information on a
keyboard but you're not. Not programming.
If you will, you know, if you want to try to distinguish those
two terms like coding, it is like typing.
Whereas like programming is writing a story, you're not
writing the story, you're being told what to type.
So until you actually write that story is, is when you really
learn. And when you figure those things
out, I think, just trial and error, not trying to be as
efficient as possible. And and whatnot is, is kind of a
good thing, yeah. Because I have a problem of like
analysis, paralysis, I'm working.
I want to build this project but now I spend the next days at
least. Try to figure out.
Oh well, what framework? What language?
What framework, what? And when your new what tools do
I use? Like, I don't even know what
ided is. I don't know what and all of
these things. Should I use this extension and
that formatting and whatever, like just get started and figure
that stuff around the way along the way and it's easier said
that done again, but it is what Needs to be done.
Yeah, I like that a lot. I mean, it's it's something I've
learned early on that. My like, I would call it modus
operandi. What I prefer is to experience
through experiencing and I'm not like you, I like the research
but to a certain degree because at some point I'm like I wish I
just already had this knowledge because then I can work on.
There is meeting the value, right?
And I do find myself really enjoying researching certain
topics, but at some point I feel like I need to add value.
They need to, like, produce something experience.
What it is to do this, in my use case, and in my context, because
otherwise, I'm just one of those people that really knows the
theory but then kind of fails in practicality in that way.
Yeah, there is, that's how I really felt.
Especially like, you know what, I when I graduated from computer
science, that's kind of what I felt.
It's like I learned a lot of theory.
I did learn a lot of programming, but there, Was like
a imbalance to it but there is that need for the understanding
of theory and fundamentals and whatnot.
So then you can take any language or framework ER issue
and figure out how to get it done because you do understand
like those core principles in that Foundation.
Yeah. And what you said about like
providing value reminds me of something I wanted to say
earlier when we were talking about, like, between working in
teams, like something big and just working on something for
yourself, is that when I was in high school, I worked
Landscaping. And like we would go to houses
or apartment complexes or whatever.
So when I say landscape, I don't really mean lawn care.
I mean, like we did the entire landscape and every single tree
and plant and garden and whatever that you see.
That's what we did. All of the mulch, all of the
dirt, all of everything, even to the point of some liked are
terraforming, is that the right word where you like move Earth,
things even to the point of salty, okay?
Even to the point of something like that and I always, Loved
passing by the houses and places that I did and regardless of who
I'm with them, like I did that yard over there.
Yeah, I did that flower bed over there.
I did, all I did that. It's, there's something about
being able to say that you worked on something that can be
appreciated by. So many different people.
Like there's something there. Whereas when you work on
something like for yourself me, luckily I have like the outlet
of being able to share it on YouTube.
People get to see it over there but maybe not necessarily.
Use the software that I built like the you know, the Nerf gun
and the face thing. Like obviously that's not
something that like, people are going to see.
Like I even took it apart, it was mainly because I thought it
was a fun project and I want to make the video.
People can enjoy the video but not a software.
So there is something about like that value-add to somebody's
life whether just be looking at a pretty Landscaping as they
drive by or you know me working on a team at Netflix and say,
hey When I'm sitting watching Netflix with somebody, I
actually implemented that feature.
They're like, that's cool. I like those things, whereas
that's, that is something that I don't really get that much
nowadays. Yeah, it's the, it's the sense
of fulfillment, right? If you work your ass off, Blood,
Sweat and Tears, and then you have some result doesn't even
matter what it is. You want to show it to people
and be like, listen, I worked my ass off for this.
Look at it. This is the result and it
doesn't matter what it is, like just having that conversation.
And if the opposite person is a real good friend, a real good
person, they'll be like that's amazing.
And it will make you feel out of this world basically I recognize
that 100%. Yeah absolutely.
Now so that is another definite like upside to to working on
something that you know other people will enjoy.
Yeah cool man. I've really enjoyed this
conversation. It took a completely different
spin than I imagined. It would like some episodes do
it but this was a lot of fun man.
Thank you so much for coming on before we leave off.
Is there anything? You'd still like to share with
our audience? Mmm.
No. Just most of your audience would
be what software Engineers of what skill level if I look at
the demographics there between like 18 and 34 which is a big
demographic and I have no clue what like help they have.
But I would assume they're somewhere involved in creating
software if that's a software engineer or a product owner or
designer. Okay, well this this may be
coming late in the episode. Some people are already worried
about what I said earlier, but Trying to scare people with
saying that I think AI will cause programming jobs to
decline that don't don't don't get scared.
You have the ability to learn things if you can learn coding
so you'll be fine. Don't worry about it.
At the very end the very area while they're sweating.
The entire stack. Nothing's Gonna clip already
applied to Y jobs while listening cool.
I'm gonna round it off here. Thank you so much for coming on
Forest. I'm gonna put all forests
socials in the description below.
Check him out first night and I'm no, you came from our show.
And with that being said, thank you for listening.
We'll see you on the next one.