September 18, 2025

DevRel, Linux, and the Shrinking Path for Junior Developers w/ Ali Diamond

1 hour

This week, Robbie and Chuck talk with Ali Diamond about her journey through tech, cybersecurity, and community building. They sip tequila, swap hot takes on programming languages and developer culture, and dig into the realities of junior engineering paths, DevRel’s evolution, and how passion—not tools—shapes meaningful work.

In this episode:

(00:00) - Intro

(02:39) - Tequila rating & review: Espolon Tequila Blanco

(13:46) - From tequila to other favorite drinks

(16:11) - Hot Take: Why junior engineers should focus on - fundamentals

(18:57) - Hot Take: MacOS or Linux?

(22:25) - Ali’s take on Linux flavors (and her own twist)

(25:22) - Hot Take: Is DevRel really dead?

(27:28) - Software developer vs. software engineer: does it matter?

(31:45) - Hot Take: Rails vs Laravel

(35:14) - The shrinking path for junior developers

(47:34) - Life outside coding: Ali’s passions and projects

(54:34) - Ali’s journey into tech and family background

(57:40) - Plugs & where to find Ali online

Links

Espolon Tequila Blanco: https://www.espolontequila.com/

Minecraft: https://www.minecraft.net/

Java: https://www.java.com/

Lua: https://www.lua.org/

Spindrift: https://drinkspindrift.com/

Costco: https://www.costco.com

All Things Open: https://allthingsopen.org/

The Net Gala: https://x.com/_thenetgala

1942 Tequila: https://www.donjulio.com/our-tequilas/don-julio-1942-tequila

Clase Azul: https://claseazul.com/

Fresca Mixed: https://www.frescamixed.com/

LaCroix: https://www.lacroixwater.com/

Diet Coke: https://www.coca-cola.com/us/en/brands/diet-coke

Monster: https://www.monsterenergy.com/

Celsius: https://www.celsius.com/

Django: https://www.djangoproject.com/

Rails: https://rubyonrails.org/

MacOS: https://www.apple.com/macos/

Linux: https://www.linux.org/

Andriod: https://www.android.com/

iPhone: https://www.apple.com/iphone/

Vim: https://www.vim.org/

VS Code: https://code.visualstudio.com/

Omarchy: https://omarchy.org/

DHH: https://x.com/dhh/

Arch Linux: https://archlinux.org/

Debian: https://www.debian.org/

Ubuntu: https://ubuntu.com/

Kali: https://www.kali.org/

Twitch: https://twitch.tv

CactusCon: https://www.cactuscon.com/

Ep 114: Privacy, Cyber Crime Stories, and Tech with Jack Rhysider: https://whiskey.fm/privacy-cyber-crime-stories-and-tech-with-jack-rhysider

Laravel: https://laravel.com/

PHP: https://www.php.net/

Scala: https://www.scala-lang.org/

Guillermo Rauch: https://x.com/rauchg

Vercel: https://vercel.com/

Taylor Otwell: https://x.com/taylorotwell

Walmart: https://www.walmart.com/

WordPress: https://wordpress.org

React: https://react.dev/

LeetCode: https://leetcode.com/

NPM: https://www.npmjs.com/

Mark Zuckerberg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Zuckerberg

Mad Money: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_Money

Bill Gates: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gates

Microsoft: https://www.microsoft.com/

Kubernetes: https://kubernetes.io/

YAML: https://yaml.org/

Smiski: https://smiski.com/

Brandon Sanderson: https://www.brandonsanderson.com/

Game of Thrones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_of_Thrones

Lore Olympus: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lore_Olympus

Webtoon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webtoon

Invincible: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invincible_(TV_series)

The Boys: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_(TV_series)

Burning Man: https://burningman.org/

Coachella: https://www.coachella.com/

Nine Inch Nails: https://www.nin.com/

Go: https://go.dev/

MIT: https://www.mit.edu

Pokemon Go: https://pokemongolive.com/

Stanford University: https://www.stanford.edu/

UC Berkeley: https://www.berkeley.edu/

Harvard University: https://www.harvard.edu/

Connect with Ali

Website: https://ali.dev/

X / Twitter: https://x.com/endingwithali

Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/endingwithali

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@hak5

Connect with the hosts

Robbie Wagner: https://x.com/RobbieTheWagner

Chuck Carpenter: https://x.com/CharlesWthe3rd

Adam Argyle: https://x.com/argyleink

Subscribe and stay in touch

Website: https://whiskey.fm

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/whiskey-web-and-whatnot/id1552776603

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Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1552776603

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@WhiskeyWebAndWhatnot

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