Every interview we do is such an exciting and unique experience.  Patrick and I had great pleasure in hosting Andy and Dave, authors of "The Pragmatic Programmer".  We pick their brains on a variety of topics including rapid prototyping, the 10x engineer, tech leadership, and how to get your first coding job.  Their new book, "The Pragmatic Programmer: 20th Anniversary Edition" comes out today!  I hope that this interview inspires you all to grab their new book; it will definitely be a book-of-the-show for me.

        Show notes: https://www.programmingthrowdown.com/2019/09/episode-93-journey-to-programming.html

A Journey to Programming Mastery

Programming Throwdown educates Computer Scientists and Software Engineers on a cavalcade of programming and tech topics. Every show will cover a new programming language, so listeners will be able to speak intelligently about any programming language.

Tech News

Technology

Education

Training

Language Courses

Higher Education

K-12

Educational Technology

News

How To

172: Transformers and Large Language Models

 
 Intro topic: Is WFH actually WFC?

 News/Links:

Falsehoods Junior Developers Believe about Becoming Seniorhttps://vadimkravcenko.com/shorts/falsehoods-junior-developers-believe-about-becoming-senior/Pure PursuitTutorial with python code: https://wiki.purduesigbots.com/software/control-algorithms/basic-pure-pursuit Video example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYR7mmcwT2w PID without a PHDhttps://www.wescottdesign.com/articles/pid/pidWithoutAPhd.pdfGoogle releases Gemmahttps://blog.google/technology/developers/gemma-open-models/


 Book of the ShowPatrick: The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan (Wheel of Time)https://amzn.to/3uEhg6vJason: How to Make a Video Game All By Yourselfhttps://amzn.to/3UZtP7b
 Patreon Plug https://www.patreon.com/programmingthrowdown?ty=h 
 Tool of the ShowPatrick: Stadia Controller Wifi to Bluetooth Unlockhttps://stadia.google.com/controller/index_en_US.htmlJason: FUSE and SSHFShttps://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-sshfs-to-mount-remote-file-systems-over-ssh


 Topic: Transformers and Large Language Models

How neural networks store informationLatent variablesTransformersEncoders & DecodersAttention LayersHistoryRNNVanishing Gradient ProblemLSTMShort term (gradient explodes), Long term (gradient vanishes)Differentiable algebraKey-Query-ValueSelf AttentionSelf-Supervised Learning & Forward ModelsHuman FeedbackReinforcement Learning from Human FeedbackDirect Policy Optimization (Pairwise Ranking)
 


  ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★


172: Transformers and Large Language Models

Intro topic: Monitor setups

 News/Links:

BlueScuti, Willis, beats Tetrishttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuJ5UuknsHUPalWorld accused of being an AI Producthttps://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2024/01/22/palworld-accused-of-using-genai-with-no-evidence-so-far/?sh=26a9651b42394 Billion if-statements to determine if a number is even or oddhttps://andreasjhkarlsson.github.io/jekyll/update/2023/12/27/4-billion-if-statements.htmlSeamless M4Thttps://ai.meta.com/blog/seamless-m4t/


 Book of the ShowPatrick:Foundation by Isaac Asimovhttps://amzn.to/3SrmgnPJason: Propaganda by Edward Bernayshttps://amzn.to/47JUCXJ
 Patreon Plug https://www.patreon.com/programmingthrowdown?ty=h 
 Tool of the ShowPatrick: The Room Gamehttps://www.fireproofgames.com/games/the-roomJason:Incredibuildhttps://www.incredibuild.com/


 Topic: Compilers and Interpreters (Request by Jessica W.)

Machine CodeArchitecture SpecificAssemblySingle vs Two Pass CompilerHigh level LanguagesIntermediate RepresentationJVM ByteCode vs Machine Code for portabilityScripting/InterpretersJITProfile Guided OptimizationResourceshttps://www.craftinginterpreters.com/https://nandgame.com/Turing Complete

  ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★


171: Compilers and Interpreters

Predictions:
Jason VR for WorkLowering AI training cost/ improved efficiencyRISC-V takeoff
 PatrickAi claim of AGIAi peer reviewerAi Video GeneratorMore space vehicles reaching orbitEarly career, finding role at FAANG, liaising vs shipping code. Startup? 3 part. 1. How and when current hype for AI will end? 2. Shape of the show 3. Upcoming in tech What are essential programmer knowledge items? CS Student, how to organize life and goals? What purpose life should serve? What kind of programmer were you in college? Happy Holidays!

  ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★


170: 2023 Holiday Special Live

Intro topic: Testing your car battery

 News/Links:

Tech Layoffs still going onhttps://www.sfchronicle.com/tech/article/google-layoffs-california-companies-18465600.php Real-time dreamy Cloudscapes with Volumetric Raymarchinghttps://blog.maximeheckel.com/posts/real-time-cloudscapes-with-volumetric-raymarching/Robot Rascalshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot_Rascals Meta Quest 3 https://www.theverge.com/23906313/meta-quest-3-review-vr-mixed-reality-headset

Book of the ShowPatrick:HyperLogLog Paperhttps://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en//pubs/archive/40671.pdf Jason: Eureka! NVIDIA Research Breakthrough Puts New Spin on Robot Learning https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2023/10/20/eureka-robotics-research/ Patreon Plug https://www.patreon.com/programmingthrowdown?ty=h 
 Tool of the ShowPatrick: Techtonica: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1457320/Techtonica/ Jason:ESP32 development board: https://amzn.to/3Qpmb20 WEMOS
 Topic: HyperLogLog

MotivationCardinality CountingLinearCountingHash + expectation of collision based on how fullBloom FilterLogLogUse first N bits as bucketUse max sequential 0s in each bucketAverageHyperLogLogHandle empty bucketsUse correction factor like linear counting for low counts (number of empty buckets) and high countsDistributingTransfer bucket counts

  ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★


169: HyperLogLog

Intro topic: What are expectations on developers that have nothing to do with programming

 News/Links:

Pushing for a lower dev estimate is like negotiating weather with a Meteorologisthttps://smartguess.is/blog/your-estimate-is-less-than-that/Announcing python in excelhttps://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/excel-blog/announcing-python-in-excel-combining-the-power-of-python-and-the/ba-p/38934397 Habits of Highly Effective Software Engineershttps://makingsmallercircles.com/articles/7-habits-of-highly-effective-software-engineers/Raspberry pi 5 begins shippinghttps://www.phoronix.com/news/Raspberry-Pi-5-Shipping

Book of the ShowPatrick:Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone Illustrated Editionhttps://amzn.to/3St3L35Jason: The Pete and Sebastian Showhttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-pete-and-sebastian-show/id570256898Patreon Plug https://www.patreon.com/programmingthrowdown?ty=h 
 Tool of the ShowPatrick: Obsidianobsidian.mdJason:Ink by Inklehttps://github.com/inkle/ink


 Topic: Godot

What is a game engine?Graphics, animation, particle effectsTilemapsEntity component systemsPhysicsSoundI/OInput handling (touchscreen, joystick)GDScriptWhy use a game engine?PortabilityAllow for testing individual components of the gameLibraries for ads, in-app-purchasesGodotOpen sourceFocused on 2-D but now many 3-D featuresGreat development environmentAI HeroStarted in phaser (development rut)Moved to Godot, rapid prototyping


  ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★


A Journey to Programming Mastery

Download our free app to listen on your phone