Episodes

Ed Barnard - Ed is the author of the Leanpub book From Capone to Cray: Where Computers Really Came From. In this interview, Ed talks about his background and career, learning important lessons for software development by climbing a mountain, Elizebeth Friedman and prohibition-era codebreaking, the origins of the NSA, his book, and at the end, they talk a little bit about his experience as a self-published author.

Giles Turnbull - Giles is the author of the Leanpub book The agile comms handbook: How to clearly, creatively work in the open. In this interview, Giles talks about his background and career, being the first internet correspondent for the Press Association around the time of the dotcom boom, playing a role in the development of the important GOV.UK project, and the importance of open communication in organizations.

Nicola Lindgren - Nicola is the author of the Leanpub book Starting Your Software Testing Career. In this interview, Nicola talks about her background and how she got into a career in software testing, moving to Sweden, how software testing is analogous to a job interview, the importance of meetups and mentors, different types of software testing, her book, and at the end, about her experience writing and self-publishing a book.

Matt Provost - Matt is the author of the Leanpub book Rust From the Ground Up: Real World CLI Programming in Rust. In this interview, Matt talks about his background, how he started his career in tech, moving to new countries, working for Weta Digital on the tech side for the production of Avatar and other movies, his book, and at the end, they talk a little bit about his experience as a self-published author.

Jared Knowles - Jared is co-author of the book Education Data Done Right: Lessons from the Trenches of Applied Data Science. In this interview, Jared talks about his background and career, his early interest in education policy, founding Civilytics, writing a Ph.D. and working full time in the public sector simultaneously, early warning systems for student outcomes and recent changes in education technology and practices, standardized testing, and books.

Pablo Bermejo - Pablo is the author of the Leanpub book Building Software Platforms: A guide to SaaS transition with AWS. In this interview, Pablo talks about his background and career, how he first became interested in programming, about hiring and remote work, "build patterns" and "buy patterns", his book, and at the end, they talk a little bit about his experience as a self-published author.

Special Guest: Emily Crookston - Emily is a ghostwriter and book content specialist who works under the brand The Pocket PhD. In this interview, Emily talks about her background, getting a Ph.D in philosophy and the tough choice to leave academia, starting her own business, how to price your services, adapting to the pandemic, ghostwriting, creating content on LinkedIn, and about the importance of experimenting with your writing practices and habits.

Dmitry Vostokov - Dmitry is the author of Encyclopedia of Crash Dump Analysis Patterns: Detecting Abnormal Software Structure and Behavior in Computer Memory. In this interview, Dmitry talks about his first experiences with programming in the Soviet Union, studying and working during the country's transition to democracy, moving to Ireland, his book, and at the end, they talk about his experience as an author.

Janet Gregory - Janet is the co-author of the Leanpub book Agile Testing Condensed. In this interview, Janet talks about her background, travelling and living in other countries, starting a second career in programming, software testing and consulting, her book, and at the end, they talk a little bit about her experience as both a traditionally-published and a self-published author.

Special Guest: Carol J. Michel - Carol is a speaker and podcaster and author of award-winning self-published gardening books. In this interview, Carol talks about her background and career, how she got into gardening, blogging and self-publishing, and her recent popular post on How to Market Your Book Without Social Media.

Lisa Crispin - Lisa is co-author of the Leanpub book Agile Testing Condensed. In this interview, Lisa talks about her background, donkeys, the importance of psychological safety for developing high-quality software, her books, conventional publishing and self-publishing, arranging translations of a self-published book into multiple languages, and at the end, they talk a little bit about her experience as a self-published author.

Lena is the author of the Leanpub book Would Heu-Risk it? Tools, traps and weapons for Software Testing. In this interview, Lena talks about her background, her career, switching to a focus on software testing and the particular nature of the challenge testing presents, shifting a team to fully remote work during the pandemic, her book, and at the end, they talk a little bit about her experience as a self-published author.

Ajdin Imsirovic - Ajdin is the author of the Leanpub book A Better Way To Learn JavaScript: Save Yourself From 1000 Hours of Trial and Error Experiences! In this interview, Ajdin talks about his background, learning English in part from listening to music, his approach to writing, and the pros and cons of conventional publishing and self-publishing.

Roy Keyes - Roy is the author of the Leanpub book Hiring Data Scientists and Machine Learning Engineers: A Practical Guide. In this interview, Roy talks about his background, computation and medical physics, data science and the challenges people in the industry face both in hiring and in getting hired, and at the end, they talk a little bit about his experience as a self-published author.

Charles is the author of the Leanpub book Functional Programming Made Easier: A Step-by-Step Guide. In this interview, Charles talks about his background and career, remote work, how programming can be like dreaming, writing screenplays, his book and his approach to teaching programming, and at the end, they talk a little bit about his experience as a self-published author.

Michael is co-founder of the UK-based book publisher Canelo. In this interview, Michael talks about his background, his early career experience at a prestigious literary agency, digital publishing, curation, tech, and power, and his experience launching and building a successful publishing startup.

In this interview, Jana talks about her background and career, the nature and importance of community building and organizing events, the huge impact of the pandemic on her team's work and how they pivoted to digital events, her book, and at the end, they talk a little bit about her experience as a self-published author.