Decoded

Brittney Ball proves that your past doesn’t define your future. Six years ago, she was a single mom living in a shelter. Now, the self-taught developer is a Documentation Engineer at Meta (formerly Facebook), as well as a keynote speaker and mentor. In this episode of Decoded, host Sydney Lai learns from Brittney what inspired her to teach herself to code and how her career path took her to Meta. They also discuss what makes up a great documentation team and the importance of an inclusive learning environment in the developer community.Other talking points include:The role of documentation in educating developers and helping them continue on their learning journeyThe differences and similarities between internal and external documentationThe growing prominence of self-taught developers and how the community can better cater to them

As developers, there’s always something for us to learn. Formal education provides a great foundation, but what we learn from our community of fellow developers is what really helps us grow. In this episode of Decoded, host Sydney Lai is joined by Ali Diamond, a Developer Advocate at New Relic who has started a unique learning community on her Twitch stream. Ali shares what it's like to learn in public with other developers, what she’s learned from growing her online community, and what it means to be authentic in such a public space.Other talking points include:Why developers are starting to use platforms like Twitch for communal learningThe benefits of “learning by watching” in the moment versus learning through keynotes, seminars, and other formal learning environmentsWhy learning to build in public can be a double-edged sword

It's no secret that software developers have a love-hate relationship with legacy code. On the one hand, it can be frustrating to work with outdated code that doesn't follow modern conventions. On the other hand, it's often gratifying to successfully update and improve a legacy codebase. Regardless of how you feel about legacy code, supporting it is an important part of any developer's job.In this episode of Decoded, host Sydney Lai is joined by Joe Eames, CEO of Thinkster, an online full-stack development education group that provides a single source of learning for front- and back-end web development. They discuss what developers should keep top-of-mind when working with legacy code and how to properly support that code to provide modern experiences to end-users.Other talking points include:Joe’s history in the software development space and how Thinkster came to beThe importance of communal learning for creativity and innovationJoe’s recollection of how the software development scene has grown over the past 30 years.The role of the internet in future OS development for emerging developers.

Every technology user has struggled with notifications — getting too many of them, getting ones we don’t care about, or watching our email inboxes and other communication channels overrun by them. Troy Goode knew this experience all too well, so he started Courier, which makes it simpler to build notification templates and manage channels so that companies can send thoughtful and personalized notifications in whatever ways users want to be reached.In this episode of Decoded, host Sydney Lai talks with Troy about the considerations and processes around building notifications. Talking points include:Troy’s experience as a developer before founding CourierThe entirely new role notifications play in user experienceHow notification infrastructures have evolved over the past several yearsBest practices for developing notifications that get attention without annoying users

Video integration is quickly becoming an integral part of web design. It's no longer just about embedding a video in your site with YouTube or Vimeo, but about how you can use video to improve the user experience, increase conversion rates, and engage with viewers.Kwindla Hultman Kramer is a technology developer, engineering lead, and startup company executive. As the CEO of Daily.co, his goal is to help developers build the best possible video experiences, with ease and scalability.In this episode of Decoded, our host Sydney Lai talks with Kwindla about the challenges and opportunities of video for today’s developers. They also explore the different ways you can make use of video integrations in your software development process.Other talking points include:Why video integration development is so difficultHow current developer trends limit or influence decisions around video integrationImplications of developing video within web browsers versus web applications