Hi everyone. My name is Patrick Akil and if you're interested in the tech trends nowadays, specifically in web development, this episode is for you. Joining me today is Lydia Hallie. Software engineer. And I love her drive and curiosity, figuring out all the fundamentals and using that as an educator to educate others.
We cover that, developer advocacy, AI in education, and much, much more. Enjoy beyond coding. What do you think nowadays for people that, like, come into either web development or tech as a whole? What is like the biggest bottleneck you think, or how would you start? You know, it's a good question. I mean, in web in general, there are so many different things you can choose from now, you know, like what languages like, am I going to go react and then am I going to go next year or remakes? I'm just going to go vanilla JavaScript. It's too much. It's it's too much. Yeah. I mean personally what I would definitely do is like, as I've always done, just go first into the fundamentals of JavaScript itself, because that's still like the main web language, of course.
And then see what like and then just dependent based on the product that you want to build. Because I feel like a lot of people are kind of moving to trend driven development, right. Like they just choose whatever's popular. And that's also nice because a lot of content creation is then around those languages or those tools. So you get a lot of, ideas and help with that. But I feel like especially when you're just beginning, you need to understand what the, I guess constraints are and what like the difficulties are with what you're working with.
So I honestly, I would just go like vanilla JavaScript or like choose a framework that's like as vanilla as possible and only then you kind of work your way up to like react and then Next.js and then server components, all that stuff. Yeah. But it's difficult because I always get asked questions from beginners, like where, where do I begin? There's so many things I'm like, honestly, I don't know, like I had it kind of easy back in 2015 when I started that. Yeah. It's difficult.
I've never heard the term trend driven development, but I like it. I think it's a good term. Yeah. So it's and it's definitely something I see have it in practice as well. Like I'm, I'm on a lot of Reddit to be honest. I learned a lot. I don't really discuss a lot.
Not read it. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Cause you shouldn't do that for your comments. Well, I love it. I mean, I give it compound to certain topics. It's like it's one of them.
Yeah. And I still see questions first of all on job hopping. But second of all, with AI, is it still feasible to come into this domain. And I see two camps, people that are just genuinely interested, that really want it, like do it from ground up, have either a traditional career path or educational path, or just out of interest.
And the other campus just kind of make a boatload of money, basically. Yeah. And, I don't think that's helpful. No, no, I fully agree. I feel like and it's such a shame. I often see that also on my Twitter, and I just really miss the time when people were actually, like, interested in what they're doing.
Like, I'm always like it. It's great. The tech makes so much money. I'm like, we're definitely very privileged that we're interested in a field that is so, like lucrative and so fun and like, we get to be so entrepreneurial with everything. But I just miss, like that.
People are genuinely interested in what they're doing and curious, like, I, I it's so easy to build a product now with AI and just get something out real quick or copy what other people are doing. Yeah, but it just to me it lacks so much like soul, like so much emotion. Like I just see the same content every time. And I'm like, if this is where the internet is going and like where websites and ideas are going, it's such like a, I don't know, very harmful trend. It is. Yeah.
And I just truly wish that more people so younger people were truly like curious again. And like, all right. So I have this issue where I'm working with this tool or I'm working within a browser, what is it that I'm actually working with or like, you know, JavaScript does it. And I'm just saying JavaScript now as a, as an example that whatever you're working with, like it interacts with these features or with those features, how does it do that? And like how is that implemented? And what did the creators think when they implemented that like, well, why is it there in the first place? Yeah, at least that's how I personally think about everything.
And maybe it's not like I'm sure it's not the most, not the most useful, but of course, it's not how you make the most money the quickest if you just kind of take the long route, like really researching something first and like going, trying to understand the fundamentals. But I still think it's worth it in the long run to like, really become an expert in that field. And then based on that, you can also, you know, if you're if you want to use AI, you can definitely improve your your prompts based on what you know. You know what to avoid in your prompt.
You know what specifics to ask for. What I might have to avoid, like building within your app. Yeah.
So yeah, it's, I really hope that more people I don't know. Yeah, it's. And not to be pessimistic, but like, I just like to say that's how I personally am. And every time I see that or like younger people that are just like, oh yeah, I created this app or this website within ten minutes and like, sure. But like, how long will it live? Like, can you maintain it? Do you know what it does? Do you know the security vulnerability is and I'm starting to sound like a boomer now. That's like super negative.
But yeah, no, but it's just true. And of course, like, that's just the current state of AI. I'm sure that even maybe within two years from now, that's not even an issue like it's been improved so much already that you don't have to like it's, you know, secure and everything. I would love to see some research for people that, like, have either behavior or motivation for why they're in this field. Because also from this Reddit perspective, I see a lot of people that are genuinely not happy with their job.
Like, I also have friends that don't really do hands on tech work, but maybe are in the tech field, or like either in sales and still in tech companies or tech is like the core. Yeah, and not everyone is as happy, which is also. Yeah, I don't know, maybe that's me specifically.
Like I like being happy with what I do and not everyone needs to have that. But I do think it's a sad, sad trend, to be honest. Yeah, I think eventually, especially with the comfort you get within tech, is, you know, you can kind of work from home or like we don't have a very like physical job. It's absolutely it's selling.
So you kind of just get comfortable. It's like, you know, I'm unhappy. But I have all this like I have this salary. I have, you know, this comfort and you kind of and I noticed I started being like that as well. And I was like, no, like, I need to make sure that what I'm doing right now is truly what is best for my life and like where I want to be in life and my current kind of stage in life, I guess, like, I don't want to just end up stuck at a job that I am not really interested in, but like, of course it pays well and I has all these benefits. But then, you know, you become a risk averse kind of.
And I just coast. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And I don't like that. I think people waste a lot of their lives away just kind of being, comfortable. And it's not because I think a lot of people maybe get into tech with a good idea and like, with good intentions, and they're like, you know, I want to, like, actually build something and like, contribute something to the future. Yeah. But then eventually kind of as there in these maybe bigger organizations that kind of just slowly, slowly dims. But maybe it's just human progression that some organizations also want you to coast.
Like if there's not really a career progression path or people don't get promoted, that basically means that, yeah, the company is fine with you coasting. They want you to be in that position. They don't have any other open positions.
Yeah. So they're not worth it or just I don't know exactly why. Like I've never been in a huge, huge organization. But I have seen those trends for sure with the people I talked to. Yeah. And then yeah, I see like right now I don't want to coast.
Right. I can afford not to coast because I don't have any serious responsibilities. No kids, no house. Even.
I love the flexibility. Yeah. That also means I can take more risk, which is fun. Like you can reap the rewards of those risks.
And when the risks. I mean, when they hit you back, it's not as hard as other hit. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I'm in the exact same boat. That's also like I think your younger years, you should kind of spend just really trying many different things and being more like risky in that way, try to do the things that may feel wrong or feel like, oh, I'm just scared. Like, just get getting out of your comfort zone.
And then when you're older yet like when you have kids or any of the house, when you have all these other responsibilities, I feel like it's of course good to maybe join a, not necessarily join a bigger organization, but like, totally understand why you might prioritize, you know, like your family and all these responsibilities maybe above pure happiness. Yeah. I mean, preferably they're combined, but I feel like for that's often difficult to find. But yeah, like, I like seeing younger people at these, like, bigger companies.
Of course. Like, I think it's amazing. Like, I'm sure that the experience they get is great, but at the same time, I also see that you like, you become less entrepreneurial, I guess, like you don't dare to take as many more stability. Yeah. And, at the same time, that's amazing.
But I feel like, I don't know, I wish that more people really thought about, like, their own potential and their own life path and really kind of reflect, like, okay, am I truly happy or am I just following someone else's dream? Kind of. Because especially in tech, I feel like a lot of people kind of tend to want the same thing. And I'm like, surely not everyone can really think this way? Like, this is too, too much of the same type of dream, the same type of life. What same thing do you do? You mean when you say that? Well, it's more like just grinding nonstop to get a business. Maybe in crypto or in AI right now, and then, you know, like sell it to either a company or going to like an IPO.
Yeah, for the IPO. And it's and it's great. Like a that's a great goal. But I, I notice that it's not for everyone. And then you often meet these founders or the people that work at these companies. And they're just like so unhappy and like they're so unhealthy too.
And you can just see that they're not really following, like what their soul wants. Some of that makes sense. Yeah. So it's also really difficult to really like not I don't know if it has something to do with comparison or, just. Yeah, not not like trusting yourself.
I'm not sure. Yeah. But again, like, it's no criticism to anyone, but I feel like it's, it's important that people really meet themselves too. And you can always combine tech with stuff that you're actually interested in. Don't just try to be one of one of the many people that try to make it. And I, I wonder if because there is a trend towards more people burning out.
Yeah. And I wonder if this is a factor in that. Right. If you don't get fulfillment out of the work that you do day in, day out. Yeah. And if you have an unhealthy relationship and you work more than you're supposed to, let's say over and over again, I can see people trending towards burnout, right? Where you just get sick of what you're doing, basically.
And your body actually hits you back, basically. Yeah, yeah. Mentally you're still fine, but then physically you can't do anything or even the reverse. Yeah, I've never been into a burnout, but I do see this epidemic of people that just, I don't know, get burnt out. Yeah. It's very alarming. Yeah.
And I, I feel like a burnout is not so much about working a lot like I think that's often what people kind of confuse. But yeah, it's working on the wrong thing. It's working on something that you deep down, you know, is not meant for you. It's or like it doesn't truly make you happy. And then it's also so difficult to really look at the future in an optimistic way where you're like, oh, right now I'm building, you know, the future that I want to create.
If you're currently not taking those steps to build that future, yeah, I, I see that a lot as well. But it's so difficult to, to realize when you're starting to get into a burnout and that you're not just like, like it's good to feel uncomfortable with the tasks that you're doing. Yeah. So, like, you also need to learn the difference between that feeling of like, okay, I'm feeling uncomfortable because it's difficult and I don't like difficult things or because it's truly just something that I'm really not interested in.
But then also, initially, you might not be interested in it because you don't understand it enough. Like that's often what I think. Like on the surface it looks really boring and I kind of research it more like, oh, that's actually really fast. It's neat. Yeah. So, yeah, it's a bit of both. I think it's it's difficult to learn how to avoid a burnout.
But yeah, it's it's so important I agree. Yeah. I'm very curious recently from your perspective of developer advocate or developer relations, because I have a friend who's a colleague I've known him for, oh, close to two months. No, close to two years. Two months would have been, like quite short. But in any case, he joined this company and he was always creating videos about specific technology, and that was something he did in his personal time.
But in his free time, he was really enthusiastic about this technology, even though he had never used it in production for business specifically. I don't I also don't think it matters. But in the end, that company eventually reached out to him and said, do you want to work for us? Right. The things that you do, we would love for you to do more of. So he basically got his dream job, something that he was doing in his free time. He now gets to do full time. Yeah, he hasn't done so yet.
But I do feel like for me, career path wise, developer advocacy seems very interesting. And I also think that as people get more productive with technologies, developers are always going to become an audience. So a person that is responsible also educating developers in that aspect can be very interesting as a career path. But for me, I have no clue what you do day to day.
I talk to him and I'm like, are you going to create videos all day long? And he's like, I talk to people. Some people, that's what they do. I say like understanding engineer.
More like or is he an actual like now he is. But his title is going to become developer advocate civically. But it's like the most vague job that you can have.
Like, yeah, if my previous job ever. So I was then also like developer advocate, but like my whole team consisted of people that did so many different things, like we were a team, but we kind of weren't because everyone, which is doing something completely different. Okay. You know, like some people worked on documentation, others worked on organizing meetups and others created videos. Others were on Twitter like, you know, it's it's so broad.
So, yeah, the term like whenever people say, I'm a developer advocate, like I, you need to be more specific. Like, yes, exactly. Yeah, I know personally kind of how I also kind of got into into that. So I first started as a full time software engineering, and in my free time I made, kind of content on the stuff that I dealt with on a daily basis that I felt like wasn't talked about enough. I mean, it was talked about enough, but it was written or documented in a way that just didn't really fit with my, like, how I learn things. Or like, I guess every time I work with a technology or anything in life, really, I just create this really weird visual picture in my head. It's it's difficult to explain, but I think I learned stuff slightly different than most people. Yeah.
So I wanted to almost recreate that. And then. Yeah, I shared that a lot on Twitter and on medium and on Instagram, and then people liked it and I was like, okay, perfect. Because like, apparently I'm not the only weird one that tries to approach things that you should not, you know. Yeah. And that felt good. But yeah, so I like I only wrote about the stuff that I dealt with during my daily job, and that was great because it was kind of my, like, writing and creating those things was kind of my, yeah. Like my free time. Like, I could relax.
I could kind of at the end of the day, I could organize it in my head by writing about it and by like, kind of. Yeah, like answering the questions that I had during the day. And yeah, that kind of progressed. And then I got into like I did that full time then eventually back in 2021.
But what I found the most difficult is that I had to be in creative mode like full time. And I couldn't do that because, like, I'm not a very creative person. Like I'm definitely more logical. So like, I like creating content like the what I'm doing now, like educating in my free time, like next to engineering, because otherwise I get no inspiration and I, I kind of burn out.
Well, not fully, of course, but like, I'm starting to burn out. If I have to be in this creative mode, you lose the passion. Yeah. So I feel like a lot of people that want to get into developer advocacy, you need to kind of understand that, okay? Make sure that you can also still do a lot of engineering on the side if that was your full time job previously, because it's for at least personally, like I can only of course speak from personal experience, but I found the creative work so much more difficult than engineering. Like, I'd much rather just kind of be in my comfort zone in my code base than having to, like, write stuff in a certain way that need that everyone needs to understand, that needs to be technically accurate, that needs to flow. Well, I don't know, like, yeah, you need to be a specific type of person to be better at developer advocacy than engineering.
But like, of course, like, just, again, take the risks, like, do it, see if it fits and then, yeah, see what happens. But personally, I found it way more difficult to do. I can see that.
I can say, like, I'm going to give it training soon. And so the content of that, I know it because I've done it before, I've done it last year and the year before that. But this year I try to kind of a new career path, like I'm a CB as a consultancy, as a consultant, I now I'm a product manager role since January, so I haven't actually done a lot of hands on work. And then I'm like, man, if I give this training right now, it's fine because I feel like I know a lot of the internals. I look about what is new, I'll update the material, but if it's going to be in a year or two and I still am in this product manager role, I feel like I'm going to be like a fraud.
Like, I haven't worked with this in production for so long, and then I do educate others and that feels kind of odd to me. Yeah. So also from your perspective, then if you're full time only creating content about material on what people should use, maybe in production or in a project, and you don't actually do that with engineering experience yourself, I could see that you burn out from that perspective and also just creatively, at some point your mind is blank, like you need new inspiration. Yeah, no, but that is exactly that. And I felt so bad sometimes because like, I spoke at conferences or something and people would come to me and ask questions about what I was talking about. I'm like, truly, I don't know, because like, I haven't worked with it in like a product or like a production environment in like a year and everything move so fast within that technology that I couldn't help them.
Even though I was talking about it. I was like, this feels strange. Like I should understand better what I'm talking about. And like, if this was my own content, I would have never dare to do that because, like, I always want to make sure that whatever I'm saying is 100% true and like it's from my own, like, experience.
But yeah. So either you need to then like code in your free time, which is fine. Like that's fun, but it's.
Yeah. Like, it's so there, there's just so much on your plate then to really kind of, combine that, I've got your original question. This is, no, no worries. I am I am interested though, because this, this responsibility of things being, let's say, 100% accurate. That does sound a bit. I want to say perfect.
How do you say that in English? Like a perfectionist mindset. Yeah. Is that still possible in in creating content because some mistakes will happen. Oh yeah. No I right the worst. No.
I really I suffer from it and I use the word suffer like it's the worse because I don't want to make any mistake in what I do. I mean, I make mistakes, like, I'm not saying that anything I do is perfect, but I'm so cautious. And every time that I. Because I can't because there are so much content out there that is just inaccurate. And I feel like it kind of accumulates where it's like you don't understand the topic, then you watch or read something that is also slightly off, or it's just simplified in a way that is just too simple.
So then you are confused, but then you think you get it, but actually you're still confused because you still don't really get it because people explain it the wrong way, and then those people share their experiences the wrong way because they understood it the wrong way. Like, I don't know, you kind of built this big misunderstanding. Yes, exactly. So to me, I like with I mean, I don't have a big following, but a decent one, and I feel like it's a big responsibility to make sure that I don't contribute to any, like, confusion or that at least I can be some source of truth.
That's not like a specification or the official documentation. Just. And I can only base it on like my own frustration that I sometimes feel with certain content. And also, I think everyone approaches this differently, but personally, what I really like to do is go into the deepest details possible, like just go as in-depth as I can whenever I learn something new, and then after I know the actual fundamentals, I can then simplify it. But if I read someone else's simplification, you know that has already gone through their own brain processes that are, you know, like they have their own filters and their own, like, I don't know, emotional state attached to it that might not align with mine. So it's not accurate.
Sorry. I have a really hard time like phrasing this. Yeah. It's already distilled content. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And, yeah, that's why I feel like it's so important that people are a bit more curious and do more research, because I feel like everyone can definitely get to that stage with like, okay, understand the real fundamentals. So then try to simplify it. And that's also a skill that you got to learn.
But when you can really explain a topic well, you know like explain it like I'm five but it's also technically accurate. Like that's so difficult. But it's so important that you can do that. Absolutely. But just make sure that you don't explain the wrong thing to the five year old. Yeah. Because that's what a lot of that's what I see a lot of time now.
And it's it's yeah, kind of annoying that people pick up on that, like, this trend of people creating content and not really understanding. Like, I think it's good if you create content also as part of your learning journey, you ask for feedback. You're like, okay, I'm not perfect. This is what I put out. And you want that feedback to incorporate back into your educational path. Yeah, I really like that. But then also, especially with AI, I had seen this tool, first of all for productivity, but also from an educational perspective.
And like you're saying, if it's ground, the fundamentals are based on the content that everyone else creates because we don't know the input. Then factually it can also be inaccurate. And then if people that start out use this tool to boost their educational path and the fundamentals are inaccurate, that's going to be very strange because we have people that think then the world works like X, Y, and Z and it doesn't.
It's like A, B and C. Yeah, no, but I see that all the time because like I often so I don't use AI for any of my content, but I do use it sometimes for like smaller like that would have been a Google search. But then I use AI, but whenever I ask it more like sometimes just for fun, I ask a like write an essay on this topic and it is so factually incorrect. Then it's yeah, like you said, I know the type of articles or the type of content that it bases a response on, and it can phrase it in such a way that it seems to make so much sense, like ChatGPT specifically, especially now with the oh one preview. That it's so difficult to kind of question the response because it seems to have like arguments like, you know, supporting that claim.
Yeah, yeah. You're like, no, those arguments are factually wrong. So the more like now, now I can see that because I know the fundament. So I can see that it's wrong, but I can. Yeah. It's so easy if you don't know that to just fall for that.
Like I'm sure that I would do the same thing when I ask it about plants or something, you know, like something I don't know anything about. And it will explain something to me like that sounds, yes, convincing, which probably is not even true. But yeah, it's so yeah, it's very trippy because now, yeah, you have a big group of people that are convinced it works a certain way when it doesn't.
And yeah, try to convince people that AI is wrong and then that you're right. It's Yeah, it's difficult. I think high quality content always wins. But then it's the question of visibility, right? How do you get the the people or the people that need to find that education towards the quality that is, in the end, factually accurate? We have the documentation of the people that create certain technologies.
But even then, I mean, it's first line of education, I would say, but it doesn't work for everyone. Yeah. So then people pick up on the and create, I say, distilled content specifically for either what they would want in an educational path or what they think an audience would want. Yeah. And then that gets distilled. And if we then also have an AI layer on top of that, it's even more distilled content, like, I don't know how to fix this, but I also don't want to say, don't use AI because it it will accelerate your learning if it is factually accurate. Yeah.
I mean, now it's sometimes helps when I just say like add your source and then I see the sources and I'm like, oh, this is just from someone's medium blog for ten years ago. Like, that's not a good source. So now especially with JavaScript or anything web development, I'm always just use the HTML spec or the JavaScript spec, or like the W3C group that makes all these web API so that it can only use the actual specification. And even then it's sometimes still I guess it's called hallucination or no, like loose. Announcer. But like it's. Yeah, again, it's easier to know what you add or what to ask for if you know what components go into something.
Like if I'm asking about a promise execution, I don't know, in JavaScript. Like I need to understand that it needs to add something about the task user or the promise job to you. Or like all these, you know, the then handlers are a promise object internally.
Because otherwise it might just it always oversimplifies it. Like never asks like imagine you have a stack of pancakes and then like a promise is like the sirup. I'm like, dude, no, like, I know what's going on. I don't want to do this. It always does that.
So, like, yeah, you need to, yeah, I think, I guess it's called, like, prompt engineering. Like, you can become a better prompt engineer when you know a technology really well or like a specific part of your field really well. In our case, technology, but sounds for everyone.
And you know what's to ask. Better don't explain it with pancake terminology, because I always have to be like, don't use analogies. Don't pretend like I'm a child. Like aim it at like expert developers. Yeah, you need to be so specific to not dumb it down.
Yeah, yeah. Interesting. We started this episode with okay, how would I start if I'm either new in the field and you mentioned fundamentals of JavaScript in one of them, to start off, which I agree with. And it's something I probably underestimated myself.
I jumped right into react. I want it to be productive, be practical, get stuff done. And then when I was less effective, well, I thought I should be effective. That's when I was like, okay, something's wrong. And I stepped back and I looked and and educated myself on fundamentals more and more. Yeah, but this trend of frameworks and people creating their own frameworks, and I think we we have quite a lot of technology.
If you jump in web development nowadays, even on the back end. Now I saw Deno 2.0. We have fun.
We have node and they all are on this kind of competition spectrum with each other. Yeah, introducing new features. And I think it's a good thing. I think it's a healthy thing.
Competition breeds success at the end of the day. But the companies also need to make money. So at the end of the day, they have their own kind of business system and they might host a certain solution on the cloud for you. And that's what you then pay for. Yeah. I don't know if we need all of that, to be honest. Like I can do a lot with just vanilla JavaScript. Yeah.
And I'm curious from your perspective, like, do we need all these solutions? We have a lot of them and they are there for people to make money, but also they alleviate some problems. Not all though. Well, need is a bad word, I think. I mean, they definitely make things easier for a lot of people. But I again, especially with like stuff like hosting, I mean, I often use reseller stuff for hosting, but I also understand how I would set this up myself in Cloudflare or in AWS. Like that's also what I worked with many years in, like DevOps.
So I feel like before I get into hosting, understand or not even hosting also with like bun and and all these runtimes. Yeah. Understand the issue that they're trying to solve. Why do we have runtimes. What do runtimes do. What does Bunn have that Deno or note doesn't and vice versa.
And also with hosting like why would I use reseller Netlify or go straight to Cloudflare AWS like again be curious. Like what are the problems that they're solving? What is their solution? What is their roadmap? What's their pricing? All these things and yeah, definitely first try to just set it up yourself. You don't have to go to production with it, but then you definitely understand what goes into a hosting provider, just as an example. Yeah. Because then you can like also like when you're starting to or when you're part of a company, you need to like kind of convince your manager to maybe, you know, use certain tools or, you know, take certain approaches and you need to be able to kind of explain yourself. But if you're just like, well, I saw it on Twitter and a lot of people are using it and there's a lot of community support that's not going to win over many people.
And also in a lot of cases, it might be cheaper to just self-hosted, but then you need to know the risks, like, okay, well, DDoS attacks, all these things. Like you need to understand what are the potential risks to hosting and to web development in general. You know, like, what are these hosting providers maybe helping me with it? I would otherwise have to set up myself. Like, to me, it's just so obvious.
Like, first just try it yourself. Like, you're not stupid. You can do it like it's.
It's difficult, but challenge yourself like it's. That's fun. And sure, your initial approach may not be great, but that's. Yeah, you learn from it. And only then. And also like you need to suffer first before you can truly appreciate like what other people have done for you. And so I like I'm like, thank God ever so exists.
Or like all these other hosting providers exist because otherwise you just take it for granted. And then like if some if one of these providers goes out and you're just, you know, you have a 500 every time because they get attacked or whatever, and you're just stuck. Like, I also don't like the feeling that I put all my control into someone else's hands. I always want to make sure that in case something happens, I can always just take over.
Yeah, I don't. It might not always be possible. I love this notion of you have to suffer first to appreciate what? What like, isn't it? It's true, though it'd be hilarious if you get, like, a cloud course and they're like, okay, let's start with the fundamentals. You have this piece of metal, you installed this offer. I would love that.
Yeah, I would love like a course it goes into like server architecture, hard work. Like I want to go to the actual like electron level. Like how does memory work, you know, and then we go all the way up from there. But I'm the opposite. Like I do want to be effective, but then at some point it becomes a problem because as you say, like if I have to take control, I have to take control. And then all those UN security
insecurities and uncertainties come with it. And then I have to figure things out. I don't know currently. I mean, I know conceptually if I use the cloud, what it does in a data center, but I've never done that myself. I don't think I have to.
I do think it would be helpful from a knowledge perspective, but from a curiosity standpoint, I don't have that for that specific technology. Yeah, I have it for other things, and if I were to have it for everything, I don't think I would get anything done because we have quite a broad like landscape of things you can go deep in. Yeah. And then it's a matter of picking your poison, I guess. Like which one do you want to focus on and which one do you want to take ownership of? That's also what I like, though, because we have a lot of different people that get enthusiastic about a lot of different things.
Yeah, and that's why I love this tech field. People can go anywhere, right? If you're sick of software engineering, you might become a developer advocate, right? You might be really enthusiastic about education or the people aspect might just really, really suit you. And then you become a people manager from an engineering perspective. Yeah, you can leverage whatever knowledge you have in a specific domain.
Take that with you to the next domain. But for me, indeed, like you mentioned, curiosity and drive and passion, that should be at the forefront. And that can always change. Yeah, but as long as you have that, then you're fine in this field. If you don't have that, I don't think you're going to survive, to be honest.
No, no. Or like. Well, yeah. Or unless you're maybe part of a bigger company. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. But I feel like that's not a fun way to live.
Like, it's just part of, like, being a human to be curious. And I feel like once that dies, you know, that you've done something wrong, but it's still fixable. But, like, try to try to avoid that. Do you see yourself kind of on this path of educating others in the future as well, or what like interests you, which you've never tried? Yeah, I'm having like a quarter life crisis right now. I don't know, do you like I'm 26 now and it's like, okay, okay, 30s are coming. I guess that's a proper quarter life. Yeah, yeah.
So hopefully, maybe it's my midlife. I know, who knows, but, Yeah. No, I don't know. Like, it's still my passion is still in software engineering I love that it's my my safe space is in the IDE.
But I get the most I get satisfaction out of helping people. Like, it's after I've felt like I've helped people. I can, like, go to bed, feel like, okay, I've done something today, and I don't always get that with, like, software engineering alone. Maybe unless I work on a project that I truly believe in. So maybe I just need to find that, like, I just really want to focus on stuff that is like, actually cool. That actually interests me.
But in the meantime, yeah, I love to help people out, but it's difficult, as I said, to do that full time because I would have to be kind of in that creative mind full time. And that's what burns me out. So I kind of need to find the right balance. There.
And I'm also not sure if that's like a good, like, long term thing, especially with AI coming. I feel like a lot of the educational stuff will not be a thing anymore in a couple of years. So, yeah, it's kind of, I guess, preparing for that era. Yeah. And, but yeah, it's difficult.
I'm not sure. I have no idea what I'm doing or what I'm going to do. Well, see, I've kind of always lived my life that way, but just see what life has for me and, see what feels right. Yeah. I'm.
I'm in the same camp, though. I don't think it matters too, too much. But I love thinking about it because there are a lot of options. At the end of the day. Yeah, if what you're doing fulfills you now, then there's no reason to switch. But if you have an inkling of something like that, you might also enjoy it.
That's usually what I think of for me is really developer advocacy. But then I, I get these conversations and I'm like, yeah, what I really enjoy full time, full, full time. Well, what do you think? You might enjoy it. Like I love doing podcasting. I love creating videos. I love creating educational content.
But like for what? Like what do you get from it? Or like, what do you think people get from it? Like, what's the reason that you enjoy it? I don't know, I just I think it's in the same line as what you mentioned. It's helping people, right? Either with specific moments. Yeah. Or you phrase it in a way. You communicate in a way that it just clicks. Because I feel like everyone learns in a different way. And you might see similarities, but there's still specifics there.
Yeah. The way you explain it or the way you communicate things with the insights that you can bring, can be very valuable. And insights are not just the only thing right.
You have to communicate it properly as well. Yeah, that I really enjoy those moments. That's why I'm now on a full time assignment and I still do trainings. I still do educational content. Yeah, but I like to do it full time. Sometimes I edit and I'm like, yeah, that'd be really cool.
But then I don't know in practice if that's actually going to play out like that, just try it. You won't know until you try. Otherwise it's like a regret. But now it's really, I think what you mentioned as well. Right now I'm, I'm not coasting. But it is comfort, right.
Because I can do everything if I don't want to be a product manager in the next assignment, I can try out something else. And it's still kind of a safe space. Yeah, but right now you're in a part of life where, as you said, many responsibilities. There's no escaping. No. There's excuses. That's very fair.
Yeah, yeah, I have a lot to think of now. Yes, exactly. Yeah, yeah. I really enjoyed this conversation, I must say. Is there anything you're still missing that you would like to share before we round off? Oh, I can't think of any. I'm sure that on my drive home I'm like, oh, I should have said and I can't think of any.
You're never going to escape that now. Awesome. Then we're going to rounded off here. I'm going to put all Lydia's socials in the description below, reach out to her, let her know what you think of this episode, and we'll see you on the next one. I'm coding.
2024-10-30