Legacy Code Rocks

Software security has become one of the most important topics affecting the lives of millions of people.

Today we talk with Rob Dickinson, a co-founder, and CTO of Resurface Labs, a data-driven API security solution. He tells us how can security be woven into the culture of a software team, how to build more secure software, and how to adapt traditional security tools to the challenges of cloud computing.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Rob on Twitter and check out resurface.io.

Mentioned in this episode:

Rob on Twitter at https://twitter.com/robfromboulder

Resurface Labs at https://resurface.io

We design software within a particular context. When that context changes, so should the software. But change is often difficult.

Today we talk with João Rosa, an independent consultant focused on helping organizations to make strategic decisions when building software. João is one of the authors of Software Architecture Metrics, the curator of the book Visual Collaboration Tools, and the host of the Software Crafts Podcast.

João tells us how to ensure that our software is evolving with the problems it is designed to solve and how can we evolve along with it.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with him on Twitter, visit his website and grab his book.

Mentioned in this episode:

João on Twitter at https://twitter.com/joaoasrosa

João's website at https://www.joaorosa.io

Software Crafts Podcast at https://www.softwarecraftspodcast.com

Software Architecture Matrics at https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/software-architecture-metrics/9781098112226/

Visual Collaboration tools at https://leanpub.com/visualcollaborationtools/

Jurgen Appelo, Management 3.0 at https://www.amazon.com/Management-3-0-Developers-Developing-Addison-Wesley/dp/0321712471

Jurgen Appelo, How to Change the World at https://www.amazon.com/How-Change-World-Management-3-0/dp/9081905112/ref=sr_1_1?crid=20PZS97XNXCVG&keywords=Jurgen+appelo+how+to+change+the+world&qid=1665953837&s=books&sprefix=jurgen+appelo+how+to+change+the+worl%2Cstripbooks%2C318&sr=1-1

If you try to fix broken things in JavaScript, you will probably break the Internet because the entire Internet expects those "mistakes" to be there. Today we talk with David Neal, a family man, geek, musician, illustrator, international speaker, software developer, and Microsoft MVP. David shares the quirkiest things he loves to hate in JavaScript and tells us about the most challenging aspects of working with legacy JS applications.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with David on Twitter and visit his website at https://reverentgeek.com.

Mentioned in this episode:

David on Twitter at https://twitter.com/reverentgeek

David's website at https://reverentgeek.com

Legacy becomes legacy only when the memory of how the system works is gone. This is where observability kicks in.

Today we talk with Hunter Madison. Hunter is the cloud architect for Instana, an observability platform for IBM. He has a decade of software development experience covering everything from e-commerce to database development. He tells us about the significance of observability for maintenance work, when using observability is most helpful, and how to adapt observability tools to match the needs of the system.

When you finish listening to the episode, you can reach out to Hunter at [email protected].

Mentioned in this episode:

Hunterr's email at [email protected]

Instana at https://www.ibm.com/cloud/instana

The world as we know it wouldn't exist without open-source software. We have learned to rely and depend on these free products that magically get maintained and updated by communities of volunteers. In our over commercialized world, the very plausibility of projects like Linux, Android, and Apache might seem incomprehensible to some. And yet, they make the world go round.

Today we talk with Naomi Ceder. She helps us understand the longevity and impact of successful open-source projects. Naomi served as the Chair of the Python Software Foundation Board of Directors, and is the recipient of its Distinguished Service Award. Naomi is also a co-founder of the Trans*Code Hack Day - a coding event focused on the trans and non-binary community and its allies.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Naomi on Twitter and visit her website at https://www.naomiceder.tech.

Agile has become the mainstream in software engineering, and agile principles should feel natural to legacy code menders.

Today we talk with Michael Toppa, the Senior Engineering manager at FastRuby.io. Michael has been a developer, product owner, and engineering director for over 25 years. He had worked for many organizations, including E-TRADE, Ask.com, the University of Pennsylvania, ActBlue, and many others. He is a passionate advocate of agile and lean practices, and today he tells us how to apply them when working with legacy code.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Michael on Twitter or contact him via FastRuby.io.

Imagine if you could refactor legacy code with a single CLI command? Well, you can, at least if you are working with PHP.

Today we talk with Matthias Noback, a long-time web developer and the author of several programming books, including Rector - The Power of Automated Refactoring, which he co-wrote with Tomáš Votruba. Matthias tells us how to use Rector in your daily workflow, how it automates repetitive maintenance and refactoring tasks, and what is the potential of this approach for other programming languages.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Matthias on Twitter, visit his website at https://matthiasnoback.nl, and grab his book Rector - The Power of Automated Refactoring.

Mentioned in this episode:

Matthias on Twitter at https://twitter.com/matthiasnoback

Matthias' website at: https://matthiasnoback.nl

Rector - The Power of Automated Refactoring at https://leanpub.com/rector-the-power-of-automated-refactoring/

The Mikado Method at http://mikadomethod.info

Corgibytes at https://corgibytes.com

There is a lot of buzz around Kotlin, a new Java-based programming language that many think might eventually replace Java. But is all this talk justified, and are the predictions of replacement realistic?

Today we talk with Duncan McGregor and Nat Pryce, the authors of Java to Kotlin. They reveal to us all the advantages of Kotlin, why and when you would want to transition to it from Java, and how to facilitate the refactoring in a painless and efficient way.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Duncan and Nat on Twitter and check out their book Java to Kotlin.

Mentioned in this episode:

Duncan on Twitter at https://twitter.com/duncanmcg

Mat on Twitter at https://twitter.com/natpryce

Kotlin to Java, 1st edition at https://www.amazon.com/Java-Kotlin-Duncan-McGregor-ebook/dp/B09CT5KZLM

Kotlin Programming Language at https://kotlinlang.org

Joshua Bloch, Effective Java, 3rd Edition at https://www.amazon.com/Effective-Java-Joshua-Bloch-ebook/dp/B078H61SCH/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3CG84SQ8VU5ET&keywords=effective+java+josh&qid=1653917364&s=digital-text&sprefix=effective+java+josh%2Cdigital-text%2C260&sr=1-1

Corgibytes at https://corgibytes.com

We all want our code to be stable and resilient to future challenges. But we need to strike the right balance between testing our systems and the cost of failure. This is much harder to achieve than it sounds.

Today we talk with Melanie Frank, Managing Vice-President of Cyber Engineering at Capital One. Her teams innovate boldly to secure the enterprise while obsessing over excellence. Before Capital One, Melanie worked at Honeywell at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, where she tested software that conducted scheduling, command, and control for space network communication satellites.

Drawing from her experience in the aerospace and financial industry, she tells us about the significance of testing and how to do it right for your product.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Melanie on LinkedIn.

Mentioned in this episode:

Melanie on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-frank-06b3675/

Capital One at https://www.capitalone.com

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center https://www.nasa.gov/goddard

Corgibytes at https://corgibytes.com

Empathy in Tech at https://empathyintech.com

We all strive to write an ideal code - easily readable, functional, and clean. We use many tools to achieve this. However, we often forget why we need our code to be tidy.

Today we are talking with Samuel Taggart, President of GDevCon N.A. and the owner of SAS Workshops. Sam is a natural teacher, and he enjoys sharing what he learned with others. We talk with Sam about the tools and methods that make our code clean - refactoring, retrospectives, and style guides. While they are all meant to keep us and our code in check, we forget that these tools and methods also need to be under control. Sam reminds us of a crucial question that will help us do just that.

When you finish listening to the episode, connect with Sam on LinkedIn and Twitter and visit the SAS Workshops website at www.sasworkshops.com.

Mentioned in this episode:

Samuel Taggart on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/taggartsam/

Samuel Taggart on Twitter at https://twitter.com/sasworkshops

GDevCon N.A. at https://gdevconna.org

SAS Workshops at https://www.sasworkshops.com

Mikado Method at https://understandlegacycode.com/blog/a-process-to-do-safe-changes-in-a-complex-codebase/

Legacy Code Rocks - Living Documentation with Cyrille Martraire at https://www.legacycode.rocks/podcast-1/episode/2fd0fdeb/living-documentation-with-cyrille-martraire

Zettelkasten Method at https://zenkit.com/en/blog/a-beginners-guide-to-the-zettelkasten-method/

Corgibytes at https://corgibytes.com