It’s been a year of growth at Compiler, and we want to celebrate and share with our guests and listeners some of our favorite moments from the show. Thank you for all of the support, we’ll see you in 2024!

00:02 — Brent Simoneaux
All right. It's Brent here. We are closing out the year. It's December, and on Compiler, we've had a lot of really good times with you this year. We're going to rest up for a little bit, and we'll be back soon. But, to pass the time until then, and to ease everyone into these cool winter months if you're in the Northern Hemisphere, we wanted to share some of our favorite moments from this year. Take a little trip down memory lane. Some of the unexpected insights from our guests, engaging stories, laughs that we've had along the way. So, are you ready, Angela?

00:40 — Angela Andrews
I'm ready. Let's do this.

00:42 — Brent Simoneaux
All right. Let's go.

00:47 — Angela Andrews
This is Compiler, an original podcast from Red Hat. I'm Angela Andrews.

00:53 — Brent Simoneaux
And I'm Brent Simoneaux.

00:54 — Angela Andrews
We go beyond the buzzwords and jargon and simplify tech topics.

00:59 — Brent Simoneaux
Today, we're looking back at the best moments from this year.

01:07 — Angela Andrews
We have producers, Johan Philippine and Kim Huang, in the studio. Let's see what they have for us.

01:14 — Kim Huang
Johan, do you want to go first?

01:16 — Johan Philippine
Sure.

01:16 — Kim Huang
Because you had a lot of really great picks from the year and I want to hear what you have for us.

01:21 — Johan Philippine
Well, it was really difficult to pick because we've had such a great year. But I want to jump to our very first episode of 2023, which was The CTO and the Vision. Now, this one was one of my favorites of the whole year. I got to speak with our very own Chris Wright, our CTO here at Red Hat, and we were able to record a lot of candid guest tape.

01:42 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

01:42 — Johan Philippine
That gave a different perspective on the job and really shed a lot of light on what it's like to be a CTO, a lot of which was unexpected for me. It also launched a really great series.

01:54 — Johan Philippine
As part of the C-suite, the CTO spends a lot of face time with customers and with partners, and those communication skills really come in handy to figure out what they need and what they're curious about. But he also, like you're saying, he kind of needs to manage expectations a little bit.

02:10 — Chris Wright
It's true. So, it's not uncommon for me to have these conversations with customers that start out with a very open-ended question, like effectively, what's the world going to be like in five years? The honest answer to that is, in many ways, I just have no absolutely no idea. So, the fortune-teller aspect, boy, is it hard to tell the future. Now, you could recontextualize that. In five years, what will the enterprise look like? That's a lot easier to have an opinion around, because most of what the enterprise will look like in five years is what we're working on today. So that starts to build that bridge, and if we recalibrate the timelines, like when you say in five years, do you mean what new invention will exist, or how far should I be along the path of absorbing today's technology? Those are very different conversations, and in the latter, I'm much more of the cartographer, or helping them map out a path into the future, rather than just gazing into my crystal ball and explaining that I believe in 2027 we'll have autonomous flying vehicles.

03:16 — Angela Andrews
Well, we know that crystal ball isn't absolutely accurate, I mean, because if we're talking about looking into the future, we'd already be in flying cars by now. But that's an interesting take on it.

03:29 — Johan Philippine
Yeah.

03:29 — Angela Andrews
That is two different questions. I mean, where we are now has a huge impact on where we'll be in five years. It is the groundwork. But how far will we have been in these new emerging technologies? How much will we have progressed in these new burgeoning technologies? And, yeah. They are two different questions, and his answer is he has no idea. That's really the honest answer.

03:57 — Johan Philippine
Yeah.

03:57 — Angela Andrews
Because we can go back five years from now, and a lot of us, we knew what the technology could be, but we didn't have an idea about the possibilities, right?

04:07 — Johan Philippine
Mm-hmm.

04:07 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

04:07 — Angela Andrews
So, in five years from now, we're dealing with a lot of merging technologies, in Red Hat and other companies and other sectors around the technology space, and we have an idea because we have so much burgeoning technology now, but we have no idea what it's going to look like in five years.

04:25 — Johan Philippine
Right.

04:25 — Angela Andrews
And that's the interesting part of it. How do you decide where to place your bets?

04:31 — Johan Philippine
Mm-hmm.

04:32 — Kim Huang
So, less Nostradamus, more Magellan is what I'm picking up from it.

04:38 — Johan Philippine
Yeah, exactly.

04:38 — Angela Andrews
I hear that. Yes. I definitely hear that.

04:41 — Johan Philippine
Yeah. The other example that he gave in our conversation was back in the mid-2000s or whatever, no one really knew anything about the smartphone or what it was going to be or what it was going to do, and a lot of early adopters bought it just because it was the cool new thing, right? And then you couldn't have predicted the impact that it would have on our society and the rise of apps and social media and all the different things that arose out of this new invention, and how that changed the tech industry.

05:11 — Angela Andrews
And look at us now.

05:12 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

05:12 — Johan Philippine
Look at us now.

05:15 — Johan Philippine
Now, even when he makes sure that customers understand his role more of a cartographer rather than a fortune teller, a lot of them, they hear him as a CTO and they still expect a little bit too much from him.

05:30 — Chris Wright
All they expect me to know is everything that's in our portfolio, all the features, the roadmaps, the dates for deliverables, the commercial pricing models, et cetera, everything. If you take a look at our portfolio, there are white spaces where we might work with partners or just have no great solution. So there's everything that's in our portfolio, then it's everything that's not in our portfolio, and then it's all the emerging new ideas that aren't necessarily well-mapped to either of those. That's all. It's essentially everything, and it's a completely unrealistic expectation that any single person knows that much, because they also assume I'll know it down to a level of detail of lines of code, implementation details. And I've found that frustrating and even overwhelming at times.

06:21 — Kim Huang
Wow.

06:22 — Angela Andrews
Wow. Okay. So, he doesn't know all those things?

06:26 — Kim Huang
Oh my gosh.

06:28 — Johan Philippine
I just love how honest he was in that response, because I feel like a lot of people in the tech industry, they'll just put up this front of knowing everything.

06:38 — Angela Andrews
Everything.

06:40 — Johan Philippine
And trying to get that and use that in order to advance their own careers and everything, and Chris here just tells us how impossible that is, and how impossible that makes his job, and how it would, down the line, lead for disappointment for everyone. And, it's just so refreshing to be able to hear that.

06:59 — Angela Andrews
That's true.

06:59 — Kim Huang
It really is. It's, for me, it's comforting, because then I don't feel the pressure to know everything about my job.

07:07 — Brent Simoneaux
The wild thing about this episode for me was that I had a kid last year, late last year.

07:13 — Kim Huang
You did.

07:15 — Brent Simoneaux
And I was on parental leave when this episode came out, so I had no idea what the three of you were up to, and suddenly, on my phone, this new episode of Compiler comes out, right?

07:33 — Angela Andrews
With who?

07:33 — Kim Huang
Chris?

07:33 — Angela Andrews
Wait, with who on it?

07:36 — Brent Simoneaux
With Chris, right. And I just got to listen to it and enjoy it, and I have learned so much from all three of you and Chris. It was just such a different experience than I usually have with this show, because I'm usually in here looking at scripts and recording with all of you, and talking through episode ideas and stuff. It was just, it was really nice to have an outside perspective on this one.

07:59 — Angela Andrews
Yeah. Nice.

08:02 — Kim Huang
I want to introduce one of my picks now. We just talked about Chris Wright talking about being that single point person, that person who's like a living document, who knows everything, right? Being that single point person can be a lot. But for another person who is new to the company, who is new to the work in general, finding that point person is invaluable. On our first episode on legacy technology, Jessica Cherry told us about a guy named Paul and how important it is to pass on living history.

08:39 — Brent Simoneaux
Okay, so you get this box.

08:41 — Johan Philippine
You get this box.

08:43 — Brent Simoneaux
What do you do with it? How do you, what does Jessica—

08:47 — Angela Andrews
You try to log into it and see what's on it. What else are you supposed to do? Hopefully, they still have the credentials. Usually, they do. It's on a sticky note taped to the side of the server. Because again, no one knows what it does, so you have to log into it and see. You have to get the lay of the land. You have to understand exactly what is—

09:05 — Brent Simoneaux
How do you do that, though?

09:06 — Angela Andrews
You click around. Now, we can Google. We figure out, oh, what's this software called? Well, what does it do? Or, we look at the network traffic. Well, where's it going? Who's accessing it? Check the logs. What's happening on here? You have to get an idea of what other things are installed, if there's any services that depend on one another, how it all works, and you just try to make a map of what this thing is doing, and understand who its stakeholders are. Maybe you go talk to them. Maybe they have some idea, you know? You have to start somewhere, so the first thing you do is you log in.

09:47 — Brent Simoneaux
That can't be the only thing, though. Right, Johan?

09:48 — Johan Philippine
Yeah. I mean, if you're really, really lucky, you have a Paul.

09:57 — Jessica Cherry
Paul is your single point of failure. Paul knows everything. If Paul gets run over by a bus, you have a problem. I'm going to call the name out as Paul, because I had a Paul, right? You become friends with Paul, because Paul knows everything, and that makes your job a lot easier to hang out and be like, dude, can I just write notes and hang out with you for like fifteen minutes, please?

10:19 — Angela Andrews
I have known a Paul. I have been a Paul. So—

10:25 — Brent Simoneaux
I have a Paul in my life right now, too.

10:28 — Jessica Cherry
They're invaluable. Don't let anything happen to them, because, yeah, you wouldn't know what to do.

10:34 — Brent Simoneaux
If my Paul ever leaves, we're done for. We're just done for.

10:41 — Jessica Cherry
Everybody should have a Paul.

10:42 — Johan Philippine
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Hopefully, the best case scenario, you have a Paul who will teach you about the black box and at some point down the line, you'll teach someone, and they'll teach the next person. It keeps the system alive and running and the business operating. But you're still kind of stuck with that hit by a bus problem. So what do you do when you don't have that unbroken chain of knowledge to pass on the sacred scrolls? Jessica has found that she can figure things out, much like Angela was just describing, though it'll probably take a bit more time and be much less pleasant.

11:19 — Jessica Cherry
Sometimes I just wander around and look at stuff. It's good to have the general interest of "what's going on here?" That has always been a little bit of my life, in general, where I'm all like, I wonder what happens if I touch this. And my mom will tell you, this poor girl just will fall into a lake to see if it's wet, right? And I am that person, where I'm like poke, poke, oh no, I blew it up. And then have to, which my buddy nicknamed me Armageddon for this very reason. I will blow stuff up and be like, huh, I'll figure it out, hold on, I'll bring it back. And that kind of skill set is useful.

11:56 — Kim Huang
So.

11:57 — Angela Andrews
Her nickname is Armageddon, okay.

11:59 — Kim Huang
Yes.

11:59 — Angela Andrews
She's fun at parties, I'm sure.

12:01 — Kim Huang
She is a very fun person. When we first started working on Legacies, Jessica Cherry was one of the people that someone else actually recommended. I talked to her about the show because she had so many interesting stories and insights, and so many things to share. And I got to talk to her, but I didn't actually get to do her interview because I think I was sick.

12:24 — Johan Philippine
Oh.

12:25 — Kim Huang
And I've never in my life, or at least never in the history of this show, been so, so sad to have missed out on interviewing someone for the show. I really, really, Jessica Cherry, I mean, you could just hear it in her voice.

12:42 — Angela Andrews
Mm-hmm.

12:42 — Kim Huang
She's just a very knowledgeable person, but she's also a person who's very practical, very down-to-earth, and very just a person who you want to talk to and you want to hang out with. I am so enamored of her, and I've never been so disappointed in my own immune system to not have been able to talk to her and actually do her interview. So, that's why I wanted to pick this.

13:06 — Johan Philippine
It was a lot of fun to talk to her for that amount of time.

13:09 — Kim Huang
Oh.

13:09 — Angela Andrews
Oh, go ahead and rub it in for her.

13:12 — Johan Philippine
I'm just going to rub it in, just a little bit, you know.

13:15 — Angela Andrews
Geez. You should have said it sucked. It was a terrible interview.

13:18 — Kim Huang
No.

13:18 — Angela Andrews
Don't make her feel bad already.

13:20 — Johan Philippine
Well, I wouldn't do a guest in like that. That's not.

13:21 — Kim Huang
There's no evidence to say.

13:21 — Angela Andrews
I know. She was amazing.

13:21 — Kim Huang
Yes.

13:21 — Angela Andrews
She was amazing.

13:21 — Kim Huang
No evidence to say that.

13:27 — Johan Philippine
The one big thing is that, and this happens for most of our episodes, is we have these really great, really long, really insightful conversations with all of our guests.

13:37 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah.

13:37 — Kim Huang
Yup.

13:37 — Johan Philippine
And so little of it makes into each episode.

13:40 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

13:41 — Johan Philippine
This is really just a little cherry on top of the interview.

13:44 — Brent Simoneaux
The Jessica Cherry?

13:47 — Kim Huang
I see what you did there.

13:48 — Johan Philippine
Yeah, there you go. Brent got it. Brent's picking up what I'm putting down.

13:49 — Brent Simoneaux
There it is.

13:51 — Kim Huang
I love it.

13:51 — Brent Simoneaux
This clip I think also really encapsulates Angela and I's relationship, which is basically Brent asking a really dumb question, "how do you know what's in the box?", and Angela being like—

14:05 — Angela Andrews
Google it?

14:05 — Brent Simoneaux
You log into the box, dummy.

14:09 — Kim Huang
Oh my gosh.

14:10 — Angela Andrews
That's just the practical side of me. You have to look. You don't just know. You have to kind of look around. But if you've been in the Jessica Cherry shoes, or the Paul shoes, or the Angela shoes, you would know that already.

14:26 — Brent Simoneaux
It's something. I'm super risk-averse, too, so I'm like, if there's a box that I shouldn't be in, I'm not touching that box. I'm not going in the box.

14:35 — Angela Andrews
Oh, no. I'm going in.

14:35 — Kim Huang
Oh my gosh. Coming up after the break: why titles matter when pitching and presenting at a tech conference, and the one word technologists use to both communicate needs and respect others' boundaries. Stay tuned.

15:02 — Kim Huang
I want to introduce, this is one of my picks, I want to introduce Francisco Tisiot, or reintroduce Francisco Tisiot, to our listeners. He spoke with us for one of our summer series episodes on tech conferences, which—

15:17 — Angela Andrews
Loved this one.

15:18 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah, me too. This is one of my favorites.

15:20 — Kim Huang
Yeah. We really got a lot of positive responses about this episode, in particular. I'm going to kind of keep it a secret as to why I picked it until after.

15:28 — Angela Andrews
Okay.

15:28 — Kim Huang
I'm going to let you all kind of listen to it, kind of relive it, let our listeners kind of hear it, and then I will come in and say exactly why I picked this clip.

15:37 — Brent Simoneaux
Okay.

15:37 — Kim Huang
But let's listen in on Francisco talking about abstracts and also how to write them and what are some are things that are crucial to have in an abstract.

15:50 — Francisco Tisiot
So, the abstract's job is to convince people that they should absolutely listen to your talk. Not all the abstracts will be successful. You will get some of them accepted. You will get some of them rejected. But the main thing is that if you don't write any abstracts, there are no chances to go and speak in public. So, I started writing about how you can build what I think is a successful abstract, or something that is more likely to be accepted at conferences.

16:25 — Kim Huang
So, let's talk about that for a bit. Both here and in his blog, he says that there's no foolproof formula for writing an abstract that is going to guarantee success, right? Even he has dealt with rejection in that regard.

16:42 — Angela Andrews
Oh, I'm sure.

16:42 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

16:43 — Angela Andrews
Well, one, I can't wait to read the blog post, because I'm really interested in what he thinks about that, and the other thing is, rejection is a part of the game. Think about it. If a conference has 60 sessions and 700 submissions are submitted, that's a lot of rejection. But you really can't take it personally. I think having that mindset, it's almost like a numbers game. It's a lottery. You just have to do your best to put your best foot forward, and maybe you'll be at the top of the heap. But you're right, you have to deal with it. I think everyone who's ever presented has had to deal with some sort of rejection like that.

17:24 — Kim Huang
Yes.

17:24 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah, the abstract is a very strange genre. You have to do a lot of work in a very little space, and I think sometimes we want formulas. Sometimes we want, if I just do X, Y, and Z, then it will be a great abstract. That's what we want, but that's just not reality, because communication is so much more of an art than a science.

17:54 — Angela Andrews
That's true.

17:55 — Kim Huang
I do want to get into the finer points.

17:57 — Angela Andrews
Okay.

17:57 — Kim Huang
Because there are some things here, and most of them won't surprise anyone here, but they're all good things to remember.

18:09 — Kim Huang
So, first off, the title, right? Please keep it simple and clear, right? People know what they're getting into when they read the title. A funny title does show off your personal style, but you should also kind of be careful to demonstrate what the attendee will learn from the session. You always want to kind of make that the emphasis. And also, obviously, it goes without saying, every event has their own guidelines. Please pay attention to those as well.

18:38 — Brent Simoneaux
If you think about how the audience is going to encounter that title.

18:44 — Angela Andrews
Yup.

18:44 — Brent Simoneaux
It's really important. So context matters here.

18:47 — Angela Andrews
Indeed.

18:47 — Brent Simoneaux
It's going to be on a conference website.

18:50 — Angela Andrews
Yup.

18:50 — Brent Simoneaux
It's going to be on the conference app, if they have one. It will be perhaps, if it's a smaller conference, in a booklet, and people are going to be scrolling and scrolling and scrolling.

19:04 — Angela Andrews
Yes.

19:04 — Brent Simoneaux
Through so many titles. It's almost like a sea of titles in some ways, so—

19:09 — Angela Andrews
It is.

19:11 — Brent Simoneaux
I think that's something to remember.

19:12 — Kim Huang
It is.

19:13 — Angela Andrews
It's a title wave.

19:14 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

19:15 — Brent Simoneaux
Did you say title wave?

19:20 — Kim Huang
Oh my gosh.

19:20 — Johan Philippine
She sure did.

19:21 — Kim Huang
Oh. Another really great thing to remember, and I'm glad you brought this up, Brent, is the digital aspect of it.

19:26 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah.

19:26 — Kim Huang
From a digital perspective, because there's so many different places and areas where the title of your abstract can appear—

19:33 — Brent Simoneaux
Yup.

19:34 — Angela Andrews
Yes.

19:34 — Kim Huang
It may appear truncated.

19:36 — Brent Simoneaux
Oh, yeah.

19:36 — Kim Huang
So, you have to kind of keep that in mind, kind of like a little UX that you're keeping in mind.

19:41 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah.

19:41 — Kim Huang
Where, if this person's looking at it on a mobile phone, is my title going to be fully read or is it going to be truncated or cut short? So that is something to keep in mind.

19:51 — Angela Andrews
Simple and clear. If you have a really long, lofty title, something may get lost in translation.

19:58 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

19:58 — Angela Andrews
You just think about it. We're in the middle of conference season, and I'm looking at conferences, and I'm trying to figure out, well, where will I spend my time? And again, if it's not grabbing you, if it's not in your wheelhouse, if it's not clear, there's so many things that can come into play where, wow, this won't catch someone's attention. All of these things are true, and just because, for all of our listeners, just because your abstract is not accepted doesn't mean it's not great. It's just not that particular fit. And Johan mentioned this. We've been having little conversations about submitting abstracts, where it might not just be a fit for this particular conference, but it would fit amazing somewhere else. So you might have to take your show on the road. Who knows?

20:54 — Johan Philippine
Yeah. All that work you've put together in writing the abstract, putting the title together, and you've taken the work to also make the presentation, that doesn't necessarily need to go to waste, right?

21:05 — Angela Andrews
Exactly.

21:06 — Kim Huang
So, does anybody want to hazard a guess as to why I picked this?

21:10 — Angela Andrews
Yes.

21:11 — Brent Simoneaux
I do know that you recently spoke at a conference.

21:15 — Kim Huang
I did. I did.

21:17 — Angela Andrews
Oh.

21:17 — Kim Huang
Yes, and the conference was wonderful. I learned a lot. My talk, when it came to be my talk, my talk was in the afternoon. Talk was great. I feel like I put it together really well. Abstract was pretty good. And this is the part where, if an audio editor could go through and do the boo-do-do-do-do where I'm saying, "Oh, the title needs to be optimized, it needs to be done really well to catch people's attention," you can go back to boo-do-do-do, current day, present day.

21:52 — Brent Simoneaux
What did you do, Kim, with your title?

21:54 — Angela Andrews
Uh oh.

21:57 — Kim Huang
I did not put a lot of energy into my title.

22:00 — Brent Simoneaux
What?

22:01 — Kim Huang
I didn't make it very clear, and I paid for it because the interest in my talk was not as much as I thought it would be. It was already at a time of the day when people are very tired and winding down, and then on top of that, it wasn't very clear as to what my talk was going to be about from the title itself. So, I paid for that. I worked on this episode and I said, in my voice, that titles are important, and I didn't follow my own advice. So, that is why I am picking this as one of my best moments, because it's something that I didn't follow it and it came back to haunt me. That's why I wanted to talk about it.

22:41 — Angela Andrews
Okay, listeners, don't be Kim.

22:43 — Kim Huang
Don't be like me. Make sure that your title is put together. Have your friends read it, have other people read it. Don't be like me. Don't do what I did. Definitely prepare and do your best.

22:56 — Angela Andrews
Well, I think we've all learned a little bit from this episode. I mean, I know I did, so much so that I submitted to a conference.

23:06 — Brent Simoneaux
Oh.

23:06 — Angela Andrews
Just recently.

23:08 — Brent Simoneaux
Do you know the results yet?

23:09 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

23:09 — Angela Andrews
No, not yet.

23:10 — Kim Huang
Oh.

23:10 — Angela Andrews
I have plenty of time to find out if they've accepted it, but this episode, I put a link to it in my slide deck so other folks could know Francisco's great ideas and all of the great feedback that we gave about making a good abstract. So hopefully, it goes far and a lot of folks can learn from it. So, I'm happy no matter what.

23:36 — Kim Huang
Did Angela's talk get accepted? Find out. Check us out on social media on Instagram, X, and LinkedIn.

23:48 — Angela Andrews
Check us in 2024.

23:48 — Johan Philippine
One thing I'd like to mention here that I don't know that we actually covered in the episode is that there can be a lot of time between.

23:54 — Kim Huang
Oh, yeah.

23:55 — Angela Andrews
Oh my gosh.

23:55 — Johan Philippine
When you submit the abstract.

23:56 — Brent Simoneaux
100%.

23:57 — Kim Huang
It was a long time.

23:57 — Johan Philippine
And when it actually gets accepted. It can be months.

23:59 — Angela Andrews
Tell them, Johan.

24:00 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

24:00 — Brent Simoneaux
Also, a lot can change in those months, too.

24:06 — Angela Andrews
We know that.

24:06 — Kim Huang
Yes. Yes.

24:06 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah.

24:06 — Johan Philippine
So, I know it can be difficult to wait that long and to have that anticipation of oh, did I get accepted or not, but sometimes that's just the nature of the game, right?

24:14 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

24:14 — Johan Philippine
Because they have so many abstracts to get through and make their decisions, and weigh one thing against another. It can be a really long process.

24:21 — Angela Andrews
It's months.

24:22 — Johan Philippine
So, if you do submit—

24:24 — Brent Simoneaux
Buckle up.

24:25 — Johan Philippine
Know that it's going to be a long haul, at least for the very big conferences, I guess.

24:28 — Angela Andrews
Yeah.

24:29 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah. This has happened to me before, where it's like, I'll forget that I submitted an abstract.

24:34 — Angela Andrews
And now you got to do the work.

24:38 — Brent Simoneaux
Or I'll remember and then I'm like, oh.

24:39 — Johan Philippine
Uh-huh.

24:40 — Kim Huang
Oh, wow.

24:40 — Brent Simoneaux
Now I've got to put together a presentation now.

24:40 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

24:40 — Angela Andrews
Oh my gosh.

24:45 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah. But then, it's also happened to me where I'm like, I'm a different person six months later or whatever.

24:51 — Angela Andrews
How about that?

24:52 — Brent Simoneaux
And the thing that I was really excited about six months ago when I wrote this abstract, I've already moved on. I'm on to some other new topic or thing that I'm really excited about and I got to dig back in to what did I even write?

25:07 — Angela Andrews
The upside. So, I get what you're saying. We could have moved on, want to talk about and learn other new things. But, for someone submitting to a conference that maybe they want to talk about something that's sort of a stretch goal, well now you've given yourself this really nice cushion to kind of master said topic and practice it and pull it all together, and then if you get selected, then you can really fine-tune, and then when you get up there to present, think about all the months of work that you've put into this topic that you wanted to master. You're now the teacher. You're sharing your knowledge and information with other folks. So, it can be not a bad thing.

25:54 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah, yeah.

25:54 — Angela Andrews
It's not on top of mind, but it's also, could be a blessing for someone who's putting themselves out there to talk about something else.

26:03 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

26:04 — Johan Philippine
Absolutely.

26:06 — Kim Huang
Well, Johan. I'm going to kick it to you because you have the final pick.

26:12 — Johan Philippine
So, for my final pick, I selected a clip from a guest who we actually had on twice this year.

26:20 — Angela Andrews
Okay.

26:21 — Johan Philippine
So, if you've been following along, you'll know that this is Jose Vicente Nunez in the episode, Adventures in Automation.

26:28 — Brent Simoneaux
Yup.

26:29 — Kim Huang
Good.

26:29 — Johan Philippine
I really love this episode because it's got a really good mix of humor and helpful information, with guests whose expertise span the whole gamut of where our audience might be, or where they might be headed in their own learning experience, and it's just another one of those episodes where I went into it thinking that it was going to go a certain way, that the interviews were going to get at the certain type of response, and the end product was so very different than what I initially thought that it just changed the whole episode. And, I think it changed it in a much better way. And, this happens all the time, but—

27:06 — Angela Andrews
I love that.

27:08 — Johan Philippine
So, what does it mean to take your time, right? You talked about testing your scripts, adjusting them, and then testing them again and again until you're confident beyond a reasonable doubt that the update's going to roll out the way you want it to, right? That it's going to be smooth. That way, you're not going to break a large chunk of your hardware and you're going to keep your infrastructure running. And for that really expensive piece of hardware, that FPGA card that's like $20,000, sometimes it's okay to do things by hand. Now, another way to minimize things going wrong is to keep the scripts simple, and have them do one single job, and that's not always as easy as it seems because it can be tempting to add functionality to a script, and there can also be pressure from other teams to add functions, as well. Now, over the years and over his career, Jose has had to learn an important skill. Jose

27:57 — Vicente Nunez
I learned how to say no. So it's like, can you add this feature to put this data into a database? No. Can you add this feature to launch another container? No. What we can do? We can do this. But you don't need to change the tool. Keep the tool simple, and anything that you want to put on top of that, we can do it.

28:16 — Brent Simoneaux
All right, let's all say it together. No. Jose

28:17 — Vicente Nunez
No.

28:17 — Angela Andrews
No.

28:17 — Brent Simoneaux
No.

28:20 — Angela Andrews
Okay. No. It's a complete sentence. It gets your point across. And, it is okay to lead with no, because not every request that you get requires your attention, or not your immediate attention. So, is it okay to say no. Learn how to say no and be comfortable in it, because it may save you in the long run. Because you can always come back and say yes. It's hard to come back from saying yes to a no. So, think about that.

28:51 — Johan Philippine
Yeah. If you start with that simple script and you start adding things to it, it's harder to remove those features than it is to add them later on.

28:59 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah.

28:59 — Johan Philippine
That's a great point.

29:00 — Angela Andrews
So we're talking about automation, and there's this famous automation instructor, and one of the words, this phrase he always says is, keep it simple. Complexity kills productivity. And, I believe that wholeheartedly. You want to do things in modular, small, little piecemeal things. You don't want to go messing up a whole lot at once, because it's really harder to undo something that is complex. And it's really harder for someone else to come behind you and understand what you did when it's so complex. So, yeah. I am all for putting the brakes on.

29:40 — Brent Simoneaux
Well, it sounds like there's a lot of benefit to simplicity here, right?

29:44 — Kim Huang
For sure.

29:45 — Brent Simoneaux
I think that it's not because you don't want to. It's not like you're lazy and don't want to do more work, right? It's because it has all these really great effects.

29:56 — Johan Philippine
Yeah, and keeping it simple makes it easier for the thing to just work, and just to keep working, and you're minimizing the surface area for problems to occur, either now or later on. Saying no is really great for keeping it simple. And those simple scripts? Well, they can last a lot longer than you might imagine. Jose

30:15 — Vicente Nunez
You will be surprised. I've seen pieces of code that are 20 years old and they're still kicking, Perl especially. Oh my god. These guys, I'm telling you. If there's a catastrophe, like an asteroid hits the Earth or something like that, you will see the roaches and the Perl scripts taking over. Probably those will be the only two things that will survive because they're so resilient.

30:36 — Angela Andrews
That was the perfect visual. Perl will never die. Neither will cockroaches. That has already been established.

30:45 — Brent Simoneaux
Yeah.

30:45 — Angela Andrews
How funny is that?

30:47 — Johan Philippine
That's great. I love talking to him.

30:50 — Kim Huang
I love that clip.

30:51 — Brent Simoneaux
I had forgotten about the roaches.

30:52 — Angela Andrews
This was so funny.

30:52 — Brent Simoneaux
The Perl scripts.

30:52 — Kim Huang
Oh, I love it.

31:00 — Angela Andrews
What a fun episode.

31:01 — Kim Huang
Yes. I definitely love that episode. I wasn't surprised at all when Johan chose it.

31:05 — Angela Andrews
Oh, you picked a good one. This was one definitely that I'm glad you put it in the end of year, because it has all the things. It has all the elements of a great story, and it was funny, and our guest was so cool, and he has a slogan: no. You can't top that.

31:24 — Kim Huang
Yes. Just say no.

31:26 — Angela Andrews
We should all be like Jose.

31:28 — Brent Simoneaux
This is another one of those where I'm intensely jealous of you, Johan and Kim, that you get to talk to these guests.

31:39 — Angela Andrews
All the people.

31:39 — Brent Simoneaux
A little behind the scenes. Angela and I, we don't do any of these interviews.

31:42 — Angela Andrews
That's right.

31:42 — Brent Simoneaux
We don't even hear any of the guest tape.

31:45 — Kim Huang
What?

31:45 — Brent Simoneaux
Before we get into the studio, and Kim and Johan go have all these really fascinating conversations, and then Angela and I, we're hearing it for the first time with all of you listeners.

31:57 — Angela Andrews
Yes.

31:58 — Brent Simoneaux
So it's like, I'm realizing again and again, in listening to all these episodes, that you might have the best job ever, because you get to go just talk to these really smart, wonderful people.

32:11 — Angela Andrews
You got to interview this guy.

32:14 — Johan Philippine
Twice.

32:14 — Kim Huang
Twice, yes.

32:16 — Angela Andrews
And now there's that.

32:18 — Johan Philippine
He was kind enough to come back, yeah.

32:19 — Kim Huang
What was the original episode that he was in, Johan? It was for Re:Role, but I don't remember which one it was.

32:25 — Johan Philippine
It was the Sysadmin episode.

32:27 — Kim Huang
It was the Sysadmin episode. That's right.

32:27 — Angela Andrews
Oh, that's right. Okay.

32:27 — Kim Huang
Yeah.

32:27 — Angela Andrews
I remember that now.

32:27 — Johan Philippine
It's Sysadmin and The Script, I think.

32:28 — Kim Huang
That's right. Yup. So that was the last of the picks from this year. What do we think?

32:41 — Angela Andrews
I don't know how you could pick just four, but you did a great job narrowing it down. Did you go back and listen to a lot of tape? That had to be hard. We had some really good episodes this year.

32:53 — Kim Huang
Yeah. I mean, all of our guests, and if you've ever been a guest on Compiler and you're listening, first of all, thank you so much.

32:59 — Angela Andrews
Indeed.

33:00 — Kim Huang
For giving us your time, your energy, sharing your stories, your insights with us. It really means a lot, not just for us being able to do this job that we love, but also, it teaches us. Johan and I learn a lot from these conversations that we then go forward into our own lives and our own working lives and our own relationships. We implement the things that we learn, and we're constantly talking to these, like Brent said, really smart people. And, it's just, it's irresistible to kind of follow their advice and their insights because they're just so strong and they're so grounded.

33:36 — Brent Simoneaux
Unless you're writing a title for a talk.

33:38 — Kim Huang
Unless you're writing a title for a talk.

33:39 — Angela Andrews
Because then.

33:42 — Brent Simoneaux
I'm sorry. It was too easy.

33:44 — Kim Huang
Yes, yes, yes. Lessons learned are powerful, even lessons learned through failure, right? So, but, yeah. It's just great. I did go through quite a few episodes to kind of pick the ones that I chose. I feel like Johan, I feel like you were, when I saw the ones that you picked, I was not surprised at all. I feel like you definitely, I could see that those two were your favorite picks from the year.

34:12 — Johan Philippine
Yeah. My process I guess was a little bit different. I didn't listen to all of the episodes we went through this year, but I did go through them one by one and kind of just remembered the really poignant moments that kind of stuck out to me, and I was like oh, yeah. These are the two that, on top of all the others, are the ones that I really want to revisit because they're the ones that kind of spoke to me the most.

34:36 — Angela Andrews
Yeah. I should start a Compiler journal, where next year, when we circle back and someone says, "oh, Angela, which episodes do you want to do our year in review?" "Well, let me just pull this up."

34:51 — Brent Simoneaux
Dear journal—

34:51 — Kim Huang
Dear diary—

34:52 — Angela Andrews
Exactly. I just, I love Compiler, and you all do such a great job with these topics and these guests, and you make it what it is, and I know folks have a great time listening because I hear back from people that tell me just how much they enjoy this podcast. It's so much fun.

35:14 — Kim Huang
Well, do we want to sign off for the holidays?

35:18 — Angela Andrews
Yes.

35:18 — Kim Huang
Wherever you are in the world, I hope that you are well and that you are safe, and that you have a great time doing whatever it is that you love. Hopefully, not working.

35:32 — Brent Simoneaux
And, in the new year, you might not hear much from me for a while. I am moving to Europe, and I'm also going to be working on some other projects with this team, so there's more to come there.

35:47 — Angela Andrews
Yes. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for an amazing 2023. Let us know what you thought about this episode. All of our episodes, we would love to hear it. You can hit us up on social media at Red Hat everywhere, using the #CompilerPodcast. Thank you so much, and here's to an amazing 2024.

36:15 — Brent Simoneaux
And, that does it for this episode of Compiler.

36:19 — Angela Andrews
Today's episode was produced by Kim Huang, Johan Philippine, and Caroline Creaghead.

36:25 — Brent Simoneaux
A big thank you to, well, to you. Thank you for supporting the show this year, and every year.

36:34 — Angela Andrews
Victoria Lawton is our unbroken chain of knowledge. Sometimes she blows things up, but she always brings them back.

36:42 — Brent Simoneaux
Our audio engineer is Christian Prohom. Special thanks to Shawn Cole. Our theme song was composed by Mary Ancheta.

36:51 — Angela Andrews
Our audio team includes Leigh Day, Stephanie Wonderlick, Mike Esser, Nick Burns, Aaron Williamson, Karen King, Jared Oates, Rachel Ertel, Devin Pope, Mike Compton, Ocean Matthews, Paige Johnson, Alex Traboulsi, and Mira Cyril.

37:09 — Brent Simoneaux
If you liked today's episode, please follow us. Rate the show, leave a review, share it with someone you know. It really does help us out.

37:17 — Angela Andrews
Until next time. Have a good one, everybody.

37:20 — Brent Simoneaux
Happy new year.

37:21 — Angela Andrews
We'll see you next year.

37:22 — Brent Simoneaux
Happy new year.

37:23 — Angela Andrews
Yup.