This episode features an interview with Anjana Vakil, Software Engineer, Educator, and Freelance DevRel Consultant. Anjana’s passion for computational linguistics and software development led her to engineering and developer advocate roles at companies such as Mapbox, Observable, and Hasura. She also travels the world to speak about the joy of programming and advocate for a more equitable and ethical tech industry. In this episode, Cassidy and Zach sit down with Anjana to discuss burnout, developing a healthy relationship with work, and the novelty of flip phones.
This episode features an interview with Anjana Vakil, Software Engineer, Educator, and Freelance DevRel Consultant. Anjana’s passion for computational linguistics and software development led her to engineering and developer advocate roles at companies such as Mapbox, Observable, and Hasura. She also travels the world to speak about the joy of programming and advocate for a more equitable and ethical tech industry.
In this episode, Cassidy and Zach sit down with Anjana to discuss burnout, developing a healthy relationship with work, and the novelty of flip phones.
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Episode Timestamps:
(00:32): What Anjana is working on right now
(04:44): What Anjana’s day-to-day looks like
(07:42): What tools Anjana uses
(11:37): How Anjana got into the industry
(18:30): Rapid Fire Questions
(34:45): Random Segment Generator
(48:37): Cassidy’s Sage Advice
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“I like many people, I think, during the last few years, especially during the lockdown times, really set myself on a bullet train for burnout town. And so, now trying to figure out a more sustainable way to be working and still protecting that inner core, that little flame of creativity and curiosity that I think is so important to be able to continuously do really good work over the long term. But, it's so easy to neglect in the short term and let just sputter out.” – Anjana Vakil
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Links:
The Dev Morning Show (At Night) YouTube Page
Cassidy Williams: Hello everybody and welcome to The Dev Morning Show (At Night). My name is Cassidy Williams and I'm so excited to be back here with you today. And as always, I'm here with my wonderful co-host, Zach. Hey, Zach. Hey, Cass. We have a super awesome guest today. I am very excited to have Anjana Vakil on the show today.
She is a software engineer and educator. Anjana. Welcome to the show. Thank
Anjana Vakil: you so much for having me. I'm super excited to be.
Cassidy Williams: Anjana what are you working on right now?
Anjana Vakil: Yeah. Well, um, I am at the moment working, uh, freelance as a consultant and contractor. Mm-hmm. in the developer relations space. So mostly working on content and content strategies, so things like helping out startups, um, kind of figure out, uh, content that will.
help people understand how to use their tools, sample apps, blog posts, videos, things like that. Um, but to be honest, what I've been mostly working on this year, so I quit my full-time job about, I don't know, five, six months ago. Nice. And what I've been mostly working on is trying to work on like myself and mental health, recover from burnout, develop a healthier, that's so important.
Relationship to my work and. You know, not have that be so intricately tied up in my sense of self-worth and derive sense of, of value. And that's so worth from other things. So I've mostly been working on, I would say, um, let's say, uh, tangential problems to the developer space. . Yeah,
those are probably the most important problems though, to solve because of the, it is something that I think in the tech industry in general, we're kind of encouraged to intertwine ourselves with our work, uh, for better or for worse, so usually for worse, honestly.
And, and so working on that I think is so important and honestly, probably worth. Lots of podcasts and conference talks too. . Yeah. .
Yeah. Yeah. And it's also way harder than writing software. Yes. Let me tell you. Yeah. Or than writing, you know, blog posts or tutorials or workshops about software, um, or conference talks.
So, yeah, I don't know. It's a bit a challenge, uh, sort of trying to figure out, um, a new way of. Of thinking about that for me personally, because I think I've, um, you know, I like many people, I think during the, uh, last few years, especially during the lockdown times, mm-hmm. Um, really kind of set myself on a bullet train for Burnout town.
And, um, so, you know, now trying to figure out like a more sustainable way to be working and still kind of protecting. The, um, that like inner core, that little flame of creativity and, and curiosity that I think is so important to be able to like continuously do really good work over the long term. But it's so easy to neglect in the short term and let just sort of sputter out.
So yeah. Yeah, some of the stuff that's been on my mind recently .
Cassidy Williams: That's awesome though. Have you been liking freelancing?
Anjana Vakil: Yeah, I mean for me, um, I guess I've never been a person who's great at routine or at things kind of staying the same. Like I've changed careers several times. I've changed continents and countries several times.
Um, and I think I like having, having a lot of variety in my style of working. So some weeks will be really intense, some will be more relaxed. I can, you know, work, uh, I love traveling so I can kind of work my travels into. , uh, game plan and not just have to kind of relegate it to, uh, a couple weeks of vacation, that sort of thing.
So it's, uh, it's been working out for me so far, so I've been enjoying just sort of experimenting with it. But, um, yeah, I'm, I'm, you know, pretty new to living life that way, I guess. So still figuring out a lot of the, uh, The Dotting I and crossing ts and the legalities and insurance and all that fun stuff.
Oh gosh, . Yeah. That's a whole other, that's a whole other question. . Yeah, exactly. also something I've been working on,
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Cassidy Williams: Anjana, what does your day-to-day look like?
Especially cuz it sounds like there's so much variety in it.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah, exactly. It's, uh, it's really hard to say any, any particular day is not necessarily a typical day, but it'll be anything from, you know, sometimes, uh, now that in-person events have kind of been starting up again, um, I, you know, some, sometimes will.
at a conference all day, or sometimes I will be, um, working on yeah, a sample app for a client. Uh, and so coding all day, uh mm-hmm. or coding and collaborating with maybe somebody on their team. , or some days I will just be writing, or some days I will just be researching and other days I won't actually have anything crucial to do.
So I'll be, I don't know, driving around the Pacific Northwest, let's say camping . So, um, it's really kind of a, it's, it's a, it's a, you know, very chaotic and kind of meandering, uh, day to day. I would say week to week. It's really. Never the same, never a dull moment, I suppose. But, um, like I said, I've been trying to also kind of pace myself.
So what I've been trying to do is also take a little bit more time to just, um, kind of, you know, spend quiet time and not be, let's say, uh, on, as I think we, those of us who are in the dele space and spend a lot of time at events and conferences and talking to people, you know, it can be really fun, but it can also be.
Intense. And, um, I think, although I would say that I am an extrovert, I think the pandemic time seriously reduced my extrovert abilities, . And so now I've been also trying to find more time to just do kind of quiet things, be at home, um, and maybe, you know, read or, or research or things like that. So a lot, a little bit of everything, I guess.
Cassidy Williams: Yeah. That's awesome. Well, and as someone who's not an extrovert, but more of like an outgoing introvert, same. And so the having, being able to find those times in your day where you can just not be like, hi, I'm a presenter and here's this API where you can just kind of. be chill and quiet. Yeah. And do your thing is very
Anjana Vakil: important.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. , and like I said, you know, spending, I've been trying to also kind of, I am, I, I think tend towards overwork just naturally. Mm-hmm. . So I've also been trying to fight that. And so I've been trying to, um, also, you know, uh, tell myself that I don't need to be like pushing. More, right? Doing more projects, finding more work to do that sort of thing?
Uh, all the time. So for example, this month, end of the year, it's like this time of year where there's a lot happening. I'm trying to actively do less .
Cassidy Williams: Which is so important cuz there is that guilt voice where it's just like, you know, you could be coding right now, you could be doing something right now.
Mm. You gotta Yes. Push against it.
Zach Plata: Well, when you are doing your, uh, coding or writing or anything like that in your day-to-day, what kind of tools are you using?
Anjana Vakil: Well, um, yeah, I, I guess I mostly the last few years have been coding in JavaScript, so, um, doing a lot of React and next kind of app. So sort of using.
Stack, if we are calling it that, if I feel like that word is sort of outdated now, I don't know, . Anyway, that's wild. And . And if we're mean like tools in terms of, uh, ides and things like that, I, I'm not really, I'm, I'm not. , and maybe this is why I'm not a real programmer, but I don't have extremely strong opinions about the editors that I use, so that's okay.
Cassidy Williams: I think most real programmers don't .
Anjana Vakil: Exactly. I, uh, I, I love a, a, a former coworker of, by Eli Fitch used to have a site that was like, are you a real programmer? Go to this site to find out, and you go there. And it's like, yes, hell yes, definitely. Absolutely. So I love how absolutely. anywho. So, yeah. Um, you know, I, I guess I, I, uh, I use.
I don't know, the pretty standard VS code at this point in time. And I spend a lot of time in Zoom calls and Google meets mm-hmm. and various other video conferencing platforms doing, uh, you know, conference talks or um, or streams on, on Twitch, that sort of thing. So, you know, a little bit of, a little bit of a lot of things I guess.
And um, and I think. , perhaps one of the tools that I've been using more recently is a good old fashioned paper notebook to take notes on things. Wow. Yeah. So that's been exciting. ? Yes, my handwriting has definitely not gotten better through decades of mid unused, don't get me started , but, uh, yeah. Does that count?
Do pens and paper count? Yeah. That, that's probably like
Zach Plata: the first physical. Tool that someone has brought up in these podcasts. And
Cassidy Williams: I think, I think those physical tools are so important. Like they, they say that you actually learn information better if you hand write it rather than you type it and stuff.
Mm-hmm. . And so I've also been trying to use those more and just like a little, one of those little field notebooks and everything. And as I look at it, I'm like, I'm pretty sure my handwriting is at a second grader's level. . I touched a pen in a very long
Anjana Vakil: time. I remember all those. I remember being in kindergarten and we had to like drill, you know, the letters and things like the letter, like work on our penmanship and it's like, wow, that really all, uh,
I, I need that now out the window to, I go back to the, the big letters with the little dotted lines.
Cassidy Williams: So . Yeah. Practice your JS and all that.
Zach Plata: What is that called? Penmanship. Pen manage. Exactly. Except for adults 1 0 1. Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. that, that needs to be a course. Now ,
Cassidy Williams: honestly, I'd take that . It's necessary.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah. I have some friends that are into calligraphy. I feel like that's like, oh, to
Cassidy Williams: the extremes.
Anjana Vakil: That's the next level though. Now we're, now we're just doing art. Yeah, exactly. ,
Cassidy Williams: no, it's just now it's beautiful and a whole
Anjana Vakil: other thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So those are some of the tools, I guess, uh, I've been using.
But, uh, I think mostly I've been using. talking to people, my mouth.
Cassidy Williams: That's, that's a, that's a tool in itself. Ear,
Anjana Vakil: ear tools,
Cassidy Williams: I guess. Yeah. also, you're mentioning IDs made me realize today as of as of the day of this recording, Adam, the editor is officially sunsetted today. That's so sad, prince.
Anjana Vakil: Wow. I know.
Ugh. I used Adam for a long time. I really, I actually only relatively recently switched to VS. Code. I was really, I was like,
But, uh, I liked Adam. I mean, it had, you know, it got, it had some issues.
Cassidy Williams: It was great for its time.
But,
Anjana Vakil: you know, I, yeah, I had a great.
Cassidy Williams: It, Adam, it happens. Goodnight, Adam. He'll, he'll be missed. Uh, kept in our speaking of, of things that have been in the industry in a while, what got you in the industry in the first place?
Anjana Vakil: Uh, yeah. Well, I guess as perhaps is a theme that is emerging, um, Amy Anding series of happenstance, coincidences, I guess is what got me into software. Um, used to teach English as a foreign language. I always really loved foreign languages and linguistics. And so, um, for a while I was teaching English as a foreign language and I got really interested in linguistics.
Uh, so the scientific study of language and applied linguistics to help people, uh, become more effective teachers or learners of languages. And I found out about the world. Computer assisted language learning or computer assisted, um, language teaching tools. So sort of like ed tech for the language learning world.
And I got really interested in that. And I found out about this field called Computational Linguistics, which is this big umbrella term that refers to a lot of things, but essentially anything at the intersection of computers and human languages. So it could be using computers. Scientifically study how language works and all different things about languages that one might want to study and sort of in an academic context using computational methods.
Or it could be doing things like applying. that science to language technology and applying, um, you know, things like machine learning to build natural language processing systems or speech recognition systems, or speech synthesis systems or, um, or using, uh, different tools to help. For example, I was interested in providing feedback to language learners so that they can yeah, get a little extra help and that teachers can have a little extra help in like giving people personalized.
Let's say pronunciation, training, feedback, that sort of thing. And so I went back to school and I did a master's degree in computational linguistics. And through that cool, I, um, really had to be doing, writing a lot of code for the research that I was trying to carry out and for various projects at, uh, in, in my, uh, work there.
And I found that I really loved writing. The code to build the thing that I needed for my research more than I actually liked doing the research and writing the papers and things like that. , so , ro ro. Um, so anyway, I got really interested in software development and I decided after, uh, finishing my master's to, um, try to get a foot in the door in the industry.
And so I found out about this amazing place called the Recur Center, which, uh, if folks haven't heard about, Go check out recur.com. It's amazing. It's a, it's really cool. It's a programming community, I would say. Um, but they're, well, it used to be kind of based in New York City and now it's virtual mostly, um, that runs a, what they call it as a, a programming retreat, like a writer's retreat, but for coders.
Uh, and so it's essentially a dedicated amount of time. It used to be three months when I went. Now, I think you can do it for six weeks too, where you go and you work on learning more about whatever. You are interested in, in the wide world of programming and computer science. So people work on all kinds of different stuff and it's all self-directed.
There are no classes, there's no teachers, no professors, no curriculum. Um, but it's this really supportive environment and community of people who are just. Super excited about learning new things, sharing their learning, helping each other learn. So lots of pairing, lots of, um, kind of knowledge sharing mini talks or, or workshops or things like that.
And so I would say the combination of that grad degree and computational linguistics, and then going to the recur center after that. It's really how I kind of, uh, started to get, uh, a tiny little foot in the door of the industry. And then professionally, um, my, my, my professional foot in the door was through the Outreachy internship program, which is another amazing thing if folks haven't heard of it.
Yeah. outreachy.org. This is an open source internship program where they offer paid. Remote internships for three months to, uh, people who are traditionally underrepresented or marginalized in, in the industry. And so it's really cool because you get to work with a mentor on a huge open source project like I interned at Mozilla, so working on some of the, the platform stuff for, um, For testing, uh, gco, the, the browser engine behind Firefox.
And, uh, there's all kinds of different projects and they're not even all coding related. Some of them are documentation or user research or all kinds of different stuff. So it's really cool and I, I, that is how, that was my first kind of full-time job or internship in the industry. And from there, um, I guess I started doing a lot of conference speaking and, uh, ended.
Through that internship and through a variety of conferences, kind of getting my first job or two in the industry, and so that's my. Origin story, I suppose. .
Cassidy Williams: Yeah. That is awesome. I feel like every really good developer I know has touched the recur center at some point. It's, it's such a cool program. The and, and I've always just been so impressed with how they're able to churn out such cool creativity and, and, and deep knowledge in certain subjects.
And, and the fact that you did that and Outreachy, which is also such a well regarded program. So awesome that that is what propelled you into the industry cuz that's such cool opportunities.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah, I was really lucky. I feel so lucky to have, um, kind of randomly discovered the reefer center , well back then it was called hacker school, but you know, on some, yeah.
3:00 AM internet rabbit hole that I was down just like finding. About this thing. And then once I was there, it was the community at the Reer Center that told me about Outreachy. Some people had participated in it before. Some people actually, my, the person who ended up being my mentor at Mozilla was also a Reer Center participant.
Oh. And so, you know, just the, the doors that being part of that community opened for me and for so many people that have been, , I, I consider myself very lucky to have been able to be part of that community. It's just really phenomenal. Um, so yeah, definitely anybody who's, you know, kind of curious or maybe looking to, to spend some time like expanding their horizons or, um, for, in my case, I was trying to fill in some gaps cuz I don't have a traditional computer science background.
So fill in some of the gaps in my, uh, understanding of, of some of. The layers of the computing world that I didn't understand yet, that sort of thing. Or a lot of people go to, to learn a new technology, a new language, or try something different than what they've been working in. Um, it's a really phenomenal place to do that and a really phenomenal community that just exposes you to so many different new ideas, technologies, um, opportunities.
Jobs. They also have job placement services, so that's what's really awesome about it. And yeah, cannot recommend more highly both of those programs. Recur Center and Outreachy. I
Cassidy Williams: love that. Well, it is now time for our rapid fire questions.
We are going to ask you questions rapidly, . Okay? So we all have domain names or project ideas that we're squatting on. What are some of yours?
Anjana Vakil: So I'm actually not too much of a domain squatter. Um, good for you. But I re , but I recently discovered that.rocks is a tld, a top level domain, so that's really tempting.
So I think I registered something like derell.rocks or something like that, which I thought to be. . I don't know. I haven't, I haven't done zero zero work or even real thinking about this, but I thought it could be a nice place for folks to find out more about what Deval is and um, see if, you know, opportunities in working in developer relations might be of interest to them.
Cuz I think it's something that a lot of folks, you know, have maybe heard of but don't really know what it is. And, uh, yeah, so that's one thought
Cassidy Williams: we. and hey, getting the domain name is the first step to everything. So
Anjana Vakil: that's the biggest step. The first and longest step. . Yeah. Sits there for six years.
Zach Plata: All right. Uh, what is the most recent thing you over-optimized?
Anjana Vakil: The most recent thing, I over-optimized, uh, probably a, I think a sample app that I was working on for a client. That it was really just a, a toy app. Kind of illustrate. Certain directory structures and things like that. It wasn't necessarily meant to be anything that people would use.
And it definitely wasn't meant to be anything that people would use and like care about the performance of, um, because it was really just an example. But nevertheless made some performance optimizations, that really, you know, not crucial to the purposes of that particular piece of toy software, but, uh, Sometimes
Cassidy Williams: It's so satisfying when you do have that though, and you're just like, oh yeah, it doesn't matter. But yes, it has hardware acceleration,
Anjana Vakil: but now it's faster and it doesn't matter. Faster. , look. Look at that Lighthouse
Cassidy Williams: score. . . What is your golden rule for coding or working in general? .
Anjana Vakil: Mm. Um, I guess my golden rule or a golden rule I try to, to keep in mind is, , I guess you could say empathy or something like that, like thinking about, mm-hmm.
thinking about, okay, who's gonna be, if I'm writing this code right. Who's gonna be reading it? Is it gonna be me in three months or three hours? And I have no idea what I was doing. And I need to make it very clear to myself, is it gonna be somebody who's never seen any of this code base before and is just sort of like, look landing on this piece of code?
And like, do they need to be able to understand what it's happening? Like what is, what's going on with that? What are they trying to do with it? Um, is this going to be something that Yeah, like. Does the person who's gonna be using this code, am I thinking through like what they care about it? Does it matter if it's performant?
Does it matter if it's, um, you know, not repetitive or if it's reusing or if it's using a different pattern than something else in the code base? Like, is that gonna be confusing to somebody new who's coming in to the team and trying to get on board? So I guess just like trying to put myself in other people's shoes.
Future me's shoes sometimes. And um, and uh, and, and have empathy for what that experience is gonna be like. And of course for, for the users also, whether they're developers or not, trying to have ex uh, empathy for what that is gonna feel like when you're going through this thing. Cuz it's more important what experience people have after I write this code.
Then really the experience that I have while writing it so I can feel as good as I want about, however, whatever code I wrote. But if it makes somebody else feel bad, that's. . Yeah.
Cassidy Williams: And if it's not legible or something, that's exactly, yeah. So real.
Anjana Vakil: Mm-hmm. . If it has, you know, variable names only I could possibly understand, you know, , uh, and again, that's just present me, who knows what's gonna be retained in the old now getting down the line,
Cassidy Williams: the, the whole Future me concept is very real.
Cuz there are times where you're just like, what was I doing? Yeah. , no, you gotta deal with that. You wrote that. Yeah.
Zach Plata: Yeah. . . Yeah. Cool. All right. What's your favorite? It depends. Question?
Anjana Vakil: Hmm. Uh, I think a lot. I used to get asked a lot, you know, what programming language should I learn or should I learn? What programming paradigm should I learn?
Should I learn functional programming, or should I do o p, or you know, should I learn Python or JavaScript or rust or whatever it is? And I really think there is not a solid. Universal answer to that question. I think it's always dependent on what you're trying to do, what you're interested in doing, what you maybe already.
know and want to leverage or maybe what you already know and want to try something different and expand your mental map of programming, that sort of thing. So I, I always find that question hard to answer, . Yeah.
Cassidy Williams: It's so real. It's, yeah. , there's just so many, it, it leads you to asking more questions. Mm-hmm.
Yes. Than actually answering mm-hmm. the question itself.
Anjana Vakil: Mm-hmm. . Maybe we need like a, like a Buzzfeed style like quiz or something? Yeah. To match you with your perfect programming language. ,
Cassidy Williams: what is the oldest piece of tech you still own?
Anjana Vakil: Ooh, so. How about old show and tell, shall we? Yes. , I love show and phones.
Yes. I realized I don't, I don't know if I, like, I, I, I just don't throw out my old phones. I never, I always feel guilty and overwhelmed trying to figure out how to recycle them properly, whatever. And so I just put them in a drawer. and then forget about them until it's time to move. And then I move and I'm like, oh no, I have this drawer full of phones.
I guess it's coming with me . So, so I have all of these old phones, including check this little guy out. This is flip phone. Oh my word. That still works by the way. Um, from, I don't know, it must have been like 20. Sometime like 2010 to 2012 ish, I would say. Wow. But like this thing has, there's apps on here, . I had forgotten that this was a thing, but before smartphones, you know, you'd have like little email apps and yeah, there's even Twitter on this thing, which I think is just, oh my gosh.
Hilarious. So that's fun. And Rico, oh my gosh. Sticker stickers. Of course. My gosh. Yeah. But that's not even the oldest phone I own. So fun little pandemic project I did early, uh, lockdown era. . I built , a landline, like C through . Oh
Cassidy Williams: my word, . Yes. Phone
Anjana Vakil: that I, I went on eBay and bought from the nineties, a like diy, build your own phone kit that was marketed to children in the nineties.
And like the kids on the box had the whole, you know, the mushroom cut and the like brightly striped. Sweaters and everything, and this is like, it's like see through and you had to assemble. They give you all the little, yeah, keys for the pad and everything and the, and the, you know, different components for the speaker and microphone and everything.
And so that was a fun little pandemic project. and I actually did have this hooked up to a landline for about five minutes, but no longer now it's just a paperweight, incredible . So yeah, nineties landline phone I think is probably the oldest piece of tech. I.
Cassidy Williams: Well, and those kinds of, those kinds of phones too.
Like, like you said, they still work. They last mm-hmm. , uh, uh, I feel like now we're in this time, this is turning into a rant this time of like planned deprecation, where, where, like your phone is probably gonna last two years, three years, but then after the five year mark, it's not gonna be supported anymore or anything like that.
But then you pull out a phone from 2010 from the. And it'll work just fine. Yeah. This
Anjana Vakil: thing started right up. It's amazing.
Cassidy Williams: Um, yeah. Should be, and the battery lasts like a month.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah. And that's the thing I, I've been really, I'm sort of on the other side of the spectrum of, I never, I, I don't get new phones or computers often.
I try like if it's, if it's still working, even if it's all slow or what have you. Yeah. Still working. So literally until today, My personal laptop for the last 10 years has been a 2012 MacBook error That is still, honestly going pretty strong. Uh, it's just starting to, you know, it's not, it's not, um, can't really chug along up all of the hills that we ask it to in, uh, in the modern era, but honestly, perfectly reasonable and decent laptop that.
They made to last 10 years ago, so yeah. Yes. I wish that all devices were still made that way. That would be nice.
Cassidy Williams: Agree. That's honestly how I got into mechanical keyboards so much. Mm-hmm. because they last, you can use a mechanical keyboard from the eighties. and it'll work just fine.
Anjana Vakil: Nice. Hmm. So what's the oldest keyboard you have?
Cassidy Williams: Well, unfortunately I have spent too much money. , I've, I've built a lot of my keyboards and so I think, I think a lot of them like the, the one that is like the oldest, but it, it, because it uses old tech, but it, I definitely have like the modern twist on it. I think it was originally built and designed that way in like 95.
Or something, 1995. But, uh, I have like all the modern connectors and everything, so it feels like cheating.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah. Still. But it'll, you'll allow it. We'll allow it .
Cassidy Williams: It gets
Anjana Vakil: awesome. Done. Yeah.
Zach Plata: Yeah. All right. Um, have you written a piece of cringey code, and if so, what was the last piece of cringey code you wrote?
Anjana Vakil: Oh gosh. I mean, I'm, I'm sure most of the code I write can be cringed at by someone in some circumstance. Um, I definitely have written code that would, I would go back and, and kind of cringe at, like, I, it's not recent, but I remember when I was at the Recur Center, I was learning JavaScript for the first time and I wrote a, um, just a little, uh, game of Life implementation.
So the Game of Life is a sort of cellular opt automata. Game, I guess is a word you could use for it. It's sort of a way that you have little cells or pixels that are either black or white and they kind of evolve over generations to, they look like they're moving themselves according to these roles.
What have a, anyway, Conway's Game of Life. Y'all can look it up. The way that I implemented this, not knowing any better at the time, was, um, making, I had an adjustable so you could change the size of the board and, uh, I was creating. individual, like I don't know if they were divs or whatever, DOM nodes for every single little cell in this thing.
So as you and I was touching them on every iteration. Game to update them. Mm-hmm. . So you can imagine what happened as you increase the size. It would just like grind to a halt. basically . Um, and so, you know, now I, now I know better. Um, and I would probably, you know, like thinking about that, I'm like, eh, that wasn't the best.
But I guess I, you know, part of, like I said, I'm, I'm really trying to work on kind of better relationships with, I don't know, myself and my work and that sort of thing. So I'm trying not to feel so cringey about it and I'm trying to feel more like, you know, I made something happen with the tools that were available to me at the time, the skills and the knowledge that I had.
Yeah, yeah. And now I've learned more. So good for me, you know, so I'm trying to be a little bit less cringey and a little bit more, uh, I don't know. Uh, it's a growth, empathetic to my past self that she was doing a good job with what she had at the time. So , she did her best. She did her best. .
Cassidy Williams: Yeah. It, there was a phrase that I saw recently, and I'm gonna botch it, but it was something like, the stuff that you do today is a before and there's going to be an after at some point.
Mm-hmm. . And if you keep think. Thinking of your work that way. It's, it's kind of like you will improve and someday you're going to be at like that after point and you'll be like, oh, do you remember that before? Do you remember that old piece of code I wrote or that thing that I drew or my handwriting at that point?
And, and that's, that's how. That's, that's how you progress. And, and, and it's good to think of it that way when you're struggling with something or trying something new and get frustrated with it or something.
Anjana Vakil: Exactly, yeah. And I think it's really important to have that kind of like compassion for, especially for yourself, especially as you're learning, you know, because, and I think that's something that we, we, I don't know.
I, I see a lot of folks that are kind of at senior or higher level sort of get, um, I don't know, more and more, , what's the word? Resistant maybe to like, looking like they don't know something or they don't know the answer. Um, yeah. To something. Or they, or they, you know, got called out or got, uh, got caught out and said something that was wrong and what have you.
Because I feel like we build up this idea that like we have to be these infallible. beacons of rightness, I don't know. And um, and I, it's not true. You know, like we all make mistakes all the time. Mm-hmm. , we all like our, at the entire industry does things that are super questionable, where we're like all putting our heads together and decide this is a good idea.
And, you know, then decades later we're like, well, that was. That was unfortunate. Cause should we have done that , but, um, but you know, we're, we're all, we're all trying, at least I hope we're trying to do our best with what we have. And, uh, I think, yeah, I think it's really good if we can be just more compassionate to ourselves and to each other that, you know.
if something isn't optimal, that's just like room for growth and room for learning and not necessarily shame. Shame, yes.
Cassidy Williams: So
Anjana Vakil: love,
Cassidy Williams: not feeling shame. .
Anjana Vakil: It's a challenge
Cassidy Williams: sometimes is. Yeah, true. What is your favorite programming? Pun. Hmm.
Anjana Vakil: This is a hard one. I love puns. So good. You know, I feel like puns are just, it's a way of life, really.
Um, I was trying to think of a good one. So, okay, so I like functional programming. So how about, um, okay. What is a functional programmer's favorite meal? What.
Currying is a functional programming concept anyway. Um, Haskell Curry is like the, any any, yeah, that's a good, that's a good one. I like that. Or you, you could do like, what's the best thing about breaking up with a functional programmer? What? Getting closure. . I love it. I'm so sorry. I
love
Cassidy Williams: it here. I dunno if you know this one.
What's a functional programmer's favorite animal? . What a lamb. Duh.
Anjana Vakil: Amazing. Oh my gosh. Amazing. I'm gonna have to steal that one. Take it. Take
Cassidy Williams: it. Love it.
Zach Plata: Nice. And then surround this all out. What is your most emoji?
Anjana Vakil: Ooh. Um, probably. Some kind of tie between the upside down face. Mm, mm-hmm. , because I feel like I'm just . That's a great one. Relatable. It really captures my mental state a lot of the time.
And, um, and the, uh, the like raised hands that I use as like a high five mm of things. Yeah. You know, the two, the two hands
Cassidy Williams: with little, it was like a celebrate or something like that. Yeah. I
Anjana Vakil: don't, I don't really know what that's like supposed to be, but I use it as like high five. Yeah, probably. That's a good one.
And then I also use the, uh, smiling face with tear a lot.
Cassidy Williams: Ah, the new ones are pretty good. The smiling face with tear and like the melty face. Oh,
Anjana Vakil: the melty face is good. I need to, I actually need to, you know, up that in the rotation more. That's a really good one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good. Some, definitely some credit.
Good job. Need to code standards people. I don't, yeah. .
Cassidy Williams: All right. It is time for the random segment generator.
We're going to ask you some random things, and the first random segment is talk and ship. What is something that is overrated or underrated in the tech community in your. .
Anjana Vakil: Oh my gosh. How much time do we have ?
Cassidy Williams: Um, spicy. One .
Anjana Vakil: I, I think, uh, I think something that is super overrated in the tech and like computing world is, I, I don't know how to phrase this, but I guess like heroes or people just sort of solo Yes.
Hero balling and like doing the thing all by themselves. Like somebody. I don't know. I've seen this so many times. We've all had, you know, some colleague Will, will sort of, will be debating how to solve a problem or something and then somebody will just like go home over the weekend, write a whole new solution that's like totally different and come in on Monday and plunk it down and now the whole team sort of has to get on board, you know, that kind of thing.
Or, or we have so much, there's a lot of hero worship in the industry right around these big names and sudden these big. And Yeah, definitely. And um, and, uh, there's sort of this even historically, right? Like these, these big name computer scientists that sort of we see as being the kind of be all, end all.
And I don't know, I think that we really need to acknowledge that software. I think of software as kind of an extension of language. Like it's a way for us to communicate with each other. Yeah, I think there's a break. I, I don't, I wanna say it. Sick, p or some book like that, like structure, an interpretation of computer programs.
Um, there's a quote like that programs are only incidentally meant for computers to run. They're primarily meant for humans to read. Mm-hmm. and kind of reason about mm-hmm. . Um, so the idea that that coding is really a social and collaborative task and like computing is really just an extension of, of.
Kind of interrelation as human beings and how we collaborate in a complex society, I think is something that's not appreciated enough in, in the tech world. And so I think like our, all of our interdependencies, our interrelationships, our our, um, , for example, the willingness to ask for help or say you don't know something, yes.
Or say that, you know, you could use a hand. That sort of thing is something I think we could all be doing a lot better or a lot more. And, um, I think in order to do that, we'd ha we're gonna have to give up some of our, our hero worship if we wanna go down a more sustainable and collaborative and I think like better or path in terms of innovation and progress as a, as a.
Community as a whole, so, yeah. Yeah. And
Zach Plata: especially since you brought up that hundred percent . Yeah. When you brought up the whole thing about seniors, you know, trying to look like, you know, they, they know everything and, you know, they don't want to like slip up or anything. I think it's so important to, uh, have that, for them to, you know, show that you're like, okay, I'm, I'm not this hero.
Like, work with other junior devs show that like, oh, it's okay, you know, even though I'm at this level. Um, you know, I still need help all the time and, you know, it's okay to slip up and, um, the whole growth thing. Yeah. Um, just, just good to
Anjana Vakil: show. Yeah, exactly. And, um, I was, I was talking about this, uh, to someone else recently too, but, um, the notion of being.
Uh, I think like a self-made developer or self-made, you know, it's like a self-taught developer, you know, I, uh, don't have a traditional background and so a lot of folks that I know that also don't have traditional backgrounds, a lot of folks describe themselves as self-taught, but I feel like we're no, we're all, we're all teaching each other.
If, even if I learned from books like the first. The first lines of Python or whatever. I, I wrote, um, I learned from one of those books, headfirst programming, something like that. But somebody wrote those books. I dunno if it was Kathy, Sarah, or that, you know, that that crew, like somebody wrote that book and spent a lot of time breaking it down in ways that it, then I could find it and learn from it.
Or, you know, um, a lot of folks learn from watching conference talks. Those take a lot of work or a lot of. Learn from blog posts. Those take so much work, you know, or even just open source code that you find on the internet and you're reading, you know, like someone went to the effort of putting that up there, making it available, trying to use legible, , variable names, et cetera, so that you could learn from it.
So I feel like we need to reframe that as somehow, like, I don't know if the phrase might be like community taught or um, or something like that, but I think it's, I think really acknowledging that we're all in this together and we're. Ideally building each other up as we go. Like, exactly like you said, z I think that's, um, super important that, that, you know, we really acknowledge that none of us has it all figured out and we're all learning and ideally sharing knowledge with each other all the
Zach Plata: time.
All right. Moving on to the next segment. We've got merch conflict. So what is a merch conflict that you had either through work or your personal life that you've dealt with in the past and, um, how you overcame it? Ooh. I
Anjana Vakil: mean, are we talking literal merge conflicts or are we like, I mean, do all of my failed relationships count?
I don't . Oh, .
Zach Plata: I mean, yeah. We've, we've had people talk about, you know, like code merge conflicts, but also, you know, like teen merge conflicts. Yeah, exactly. Personal,
Anjana Vakil: yeah. Yeah. Well, I think, uh, the merge conflict that I am still trying to figure out is, uh, the, the merging of kind of my, um, Life as an engineer, let's say, or you know, my, my engagement in tech world, et cetera.
And my um,
existence as a human in a wider context and in the world that we live in that is so large and complex. And so sort of, again, trying to figure out a healthy way to kind of be a human and, uh, person in tech at the same time, , um, is, is something that I'm still working on, I would say. And I think developer relations is like itself, kind of an eternal merge conflict in some ways now that I think about it.
Because you're really trying to pull together all of these disparate, um, skillset sets and, and goals and, uh, stakeholders and perspectives, and pull it into tangible things that will deliver. Good experiences for the people in the community that are working with them or learning from them. And also make the people at the company that, uh, is trying to do dere, you know, feel good about it and happy and yes.
So there's just a lot of, there's a lot of, uh, gluing together, I would say. And so that's, uh, yeah, that's the other kind of the, the, the other eternal merge conflict that is a work in progress, I would say. But then regular merge conflict. Oh yeah. Have them all the. Like every time I branch, basically, constantly
So yeah, and I'm, I guess I'm a very, I don't know if there's, I, I, I'm not, I don't really try to worry too much about getting those, um, conflicts resolved super quickly. I usually take my time and just go through and sometimes end up rewriting code that I wrote on the original branch,
Cassidy Williams: that sort thing.
Sometimes I just reone the
Anjana Vakil: repo . Sometimes I just blow everything away and start from scratch. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, love that. I also have a lot of like dead end branches, I feel like in most of my repos. Yes. I don't know what the, if there's like a good term for that, but, um, the, the UN merged unloved
Cassidy Williams: children.
Yeah. The stumps. Stumps.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah, exactly. .
Cassidy Williams: All right. And our last segment is launched Lightly Crash Darkly as an homage to our lovely sponsor. What is your best advice for someone starting off in the software development world right now?
Anjana Vakil: Don't. No, just kidding. Um, . Just kidding.
Cassidy Williams: Look. Um, , .
Anjana Vakil: I, I always, uh, give, I think the, the number one piece of advice I always give to people who are interested in breaking into the industry or have decided to break in and are try, or like in that initial stage, which is not a fun stage, um, is community.
I think it's really, really important. Like I said, you know, it's really. Hard, if not impossible to go it alone. So even if your community is, is through let's say, blog posts or blog bloggers that you'd like to read or um, or videos, YouTube channels that you like to watch, what have you, that's a form of community.
But I think especially, I mean, for me, in-person, community is really valuable or at least some kind of active community that, that you feel is, is a place where you're welcome or you're safe where you. be a learner. And that can be okay. You can be asking questions, you can be asking for help. You can be, um, you know, sharing your struggles as well as your victories.
Like, I think that that is the number one most important thing to kind of continuing that journey because it makes it so much easier to get through those inevitable, really difficult moments when you just feel. , you're never gonna get it. Or this industry doesn't want you. Mm-hmm. or you don't belong. And having a community of people who are like, yeah, been there or going through it right now, let's talk about it.
Let's vent, let's put our heads together, let's practice, let's interview prep together. That sort of thing. Super, super valuable. So for me, when I was getting detect, that was the recur center. , so that's a pretty good one if you wanna try that one out. Yeah. ,
Cassidy Williams: there's so many good ones out there, and, and I think you're so right, like you're more likely to be, to stay in any industry or any place if you have a community, just for someone to say like, how's your day going?
Or to just check on you if you haven't been talking as much as you usually do, or when you're struggling or, or things like that. It's so important just to kind of keep your head afloat sometimes. , the code is bucking you down or something else. More serious.
Anjana Vakil: Yeah, exactly. And I think like, maybe only slightly second to that, the other thing, it's, I think it's really important to like prioritize your community and I also think it's really important to prioritize and protect.
I almost wanna say your curiosity. Um, yeah. Mm-hmm. , because you know, I think a lot of the time you feel like. , and this goes back to the, it depends question, right? Of like, what language should I be learning? Whatever. It's, a lot of times when you're getting into the software industry, it feels like, oh, like I should be learning this new hotness, or I should be learning like this language because that's where all the jobs are.
Or I should be doing this type of programming because that's what all the influencers are talking about, you know? Um, but really like that is, and don't, don't be like me, don't take that bullet train to burn out town like that is the way. If you just do what you think you're supposed to do, instead of what you're actually excited about or interested in or just whatever you're like cur, like, huh, why does that work that way?
Like, let me pull that thread a little bit. Um, I think protecting that curiosity is, is really, really important. And so, um, especially if you have a community that's gonna help you do that and help encourage you to do that, um, instead of, you know, ignoring the things you're curious about and doing what you think is gonna be most, uh, I don't know externally.
Validated or, or beneficial. Right. Um, yeah. Don't, don't do that. Listen, listen to those of us who don't do that. Been down that path. Don't do it. .
Zach Plata: So what are you excited about right now in the software development industry and world right now? Yeah.
Anjana Vakil: Well, like I said, I'm, you know, I'm still recovering from burnout, so I'm still trying to kind of fight my way back to like protecting that little curious spark, right?
Being excited . So yeah. Being excited. Exactly. But, um, I will say that I am excited to see. I'm excited to see that element of, I guess, empathy sort of play out in what I think the developer experience world is sort of having Now it feels like I wasn't in tech when, um, I don't know. Let's say, uh, you know, user.
interfaces and user experience kind of as a sub-discipline became kind of more codified. But I think maybe we're in a phase where like developer experience is something that we're starting to understand better and starting to. Take less as just like, well, I'm a developer and this feels good to me. So , that must be a good developer experience for everybody.
You know, I think we're starting to understand a little bit more that, no, you know, people have different needs and preferences and backgrounds and there are different contexts and we need to think about it methodologically, and we need to, um, You know, have kind of be more strategic about how we're approaching the questions of what makes a good experience for developers.
And so, as you know, developer tools, ecosystems are exploding and we have so many more folks that have DX or dev experience in their title. I think that's just gonna get. Better. And I think we're collectively gonna get better at understanding that. So I'm excited to see what we learn about that. And, um, I'm hoping, you know, I know there's like, for, there's a lot of really great research, um, in academic fields and whatnot, like that could be brought in to more industry best practices mm-hmm.
that sort of thing. So curious to see what happens there and, uh, what we learn about kind of the universal truths of developer experience. If there are. . Who's to say? So , who knows? That's truth. Yeah. . Yeah. That's one thing that I think is, is interesting and um, yeah, I think it's, I think it's gonna be a interesting, uh, show to watch.
So it was some popcorn. Yeah. and be part
Cassidy Williams: of hopefully . I love a Yeah, no, I love that. And agree completely. All right, well it is that time of the show. It is time for Cassidy's Sage advice
and I'm Cas. Honestly, the, we've gotten so many amazing tidbits from Angenette throughout the show today, but I think the main one that I really wanna drive home to you is you are not your work. And there's, there's so many things in your life and so many things and all of our lives that is not just the code that you're writing or the ticket that you're working on, or the meeting that you're in or, or something.
And so, When it gets particularly stressful and challenging, try not to let it get you down because that will get you on that same bullet train to burn out. Bill. Nobody wants to be there, cuz that is a very, very rough place to be in because when you get there, You become apathetic about your work and you don't enjoy it as much anymore, and you avoid it as much as you can and you end up getting more stressed and it's a cycle on stuff.
And so remember, you are not your work. Try to have that separation and give yourself the space to not feel guilty every single time you're taking a break for video games or TV or what have you. That being said, Zach and Anjana, thank you so much for being on the show. Yeah. Thank
Anjana Vakil: you so, so nice being here with y'all.
Thank you for having me.
Cassidy Williams: Anjana, where can people find you on the internet? And do you have anything you wanna plug?
Anjana Vakil: Well, I think I've already plugged my main two things as Recur Center and Outreachy. Please go check those things out, . Um, but uh, yeah, for me, I, well, I haven't really been around on Twitter super recently, but I am still on Twitter.
I'm janiel. I guess that's the main place, uh, that I engage with. And, uh, I tend to pop up at the occasional conference here and there. Um, but. Anja VA on Twitter. And definitely if either of those programs sound interesting to you, Eureka Center or Outreachy, go do it now. ,
Cassidy Williams: this is worth it. And once again, because making podcasts is expensive.
This show is brought to you by LaunchDarkly. LaunchDarkly Toggles Peaks of 20 trillion feature flags each day, and that number continues to grow, and you should use. You can head over to launchdarkly.com and learn about how. Thank you for making this show possible. LaunchDarkly, I've been Cassidy Williams.
You can find me at Cassidy, c a s s i d o o on most things. And I'm CTO over at Contenda.
Zach Plata: And I'm Zach. And I'm a DevRel at Rive. And you can find me on Twitter at zachplata.
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