Hey, hey everyone. Tessa here with the 99 Dev Problems show with my dear friend Carl Alexander.
Carl, why don't you introduce yourself?
Hi, I'm Carl. I have a wonderful Carl board behind me. That's like a whole...
He's there to creep out people and zoom calls with clients.
I don't even know how to describe my side of this board, but basically, since this is a dev thing, I'm a programmer.
I started programming when I was 41. I started programming when I was like 6.
So I've been doing different things.
I did logo. I don't know if you know logo. It was like logo writer. It was like an Apple thing. It was a little turtle.
Oh no.
You could draw and stuff like that. I think it was 8 or 10. I was in the news because I did a robotics thing that was controlled by the computer.
There was an animation and it would basically run the animation and then control motors.
So one year I had a Ferris wheel. Another year I had... The more complicated one was I had...
What do you call those things? Sorry, my first language was not English at FlyEye.
You know those... They float above the water. There's the hydro...
Like a hoverboard?
Yeah, but it's the actual ship.
Like the water kind.
Yeah, they have fans underneath and then they lift. So you have two fans controlling the thing.
So I had two fans controlled by motor in a pool.
Yeah, it was cool. It was cool.
But yeah, that was all logo. Then I did basic.
So you're just like a true nerd.
I'm a true nerd. I'm a true true to the bone nerd basically.
But I always loved programming. I've done teaching. I've done writing books. I would compare it to Legos.
Yes!
Programming to me is Legos basically. It's like Legos with code. You're like, oh, what do you feel like building today?
Okay, cool. And then you can make it a reality. I'm like, what's not to love about that?
I mean, that comes back to what we were talking when we just went live basically. You want to go back to that?
Yeah.
Yeah, well, let's dive into that. One quick thing I like to ask first hand.
Let's address the Lego comment first off. I don't know if you noticed, but it's in my logo.
And so my Friday guest, which was Noah Harris, also talked about how building as a developer is like Lego.
So you two should hang out because you obviously love programming and Legos just the same.
Oh my God. I have so many programming things that I would love to hang out with program.
I just want to hang out with programmers all the time, right?
Yes!
That's why you're in DevRel, right? You're just like, I mean, we can talk about that too.
Like that's why I built a product for developers because they're my people.
And I just want to build a product for my people.
So again, we're going to talk for a while.
We will be here.
Yeah. So yeah, I noticed that your thing was Legos. I love it.
Yes, because that's what it is, right?
And so the essence of my brand, and then I'm going to ask you about your developer education is what we're going to get into.
The essence of my brand is that, right? Is that at the end of the day, I've been in DevRel and I've built four developers.
I don't necessarily build code for developers now, right? I build programs. I build communities.
I build experiences, right? I build this stuff that developers want.
And so I very much wanted that same essence. So I really appreciate that you see that because that's so important.
So, okay, if you were programming as a young child and doing some very cool, cool, cool things,
did you actually go to school for anything related to technology? Do you have a college degree?
Yes. So I have, I mean, you've seen my jacket, right? Should I go get it?
I don't know if I've seen it. I want to go get it.
Carl's great, y'all. Also, I think he tripped on the way out because he made a little noise.
The energy that developers have when it comes to hanging out with developers is like really legit.
Okay. So yes, I have seen that.
So this is my Queens, Queens University in Canada. It's my applied science jacket.
It's the most priceless that I ever owned that I own. So yeah, so that's, so I love that you think that way.
So I did do college. I did computer engineering in the early 2000s. So I graduated in 06.
Cool. And back then, there wasn't like computer like software engineering, like the way that there is now.
So basically the way it worked was that you went into computer engineering and then you could choose an option.
You could choose software option or electrical option.
And basically computer engineering was kind of sitting in this weird area between electrical engineering and computer science.
And basically they would steer you. You want to do a bit more computer science or you want to do a bit more electrical.
So I have friends that did that and they work more with telecoms now.
Yes.
Like I have a friend in New Brunswick and he works with antennas basically.
Like telecom antennas and another friend that ended up at Nortel like doing like switches and stuff like that.
So yeah, but you didn't have like, so I just did the software option.
But before that, I just did like my high school had a computer, a couple of computer courses, but it was just like basic HTML.
So they didn't have like 3D. I don't know what the software was called, but they had like 3D modeling.
So I got into that too.
Like 3D stuff like I did an N64 logo again, bona fide nerd here.
So like where it's at though.
N64 logo rotating.
So yes.
But ended I ended up graduating and then I didn't even do computer science stuff when I graduated.
I might have told you that story. I worked for a law firm. I graduated and I just started basically working as like level two tech support in a law firm.
That's because I had been doing a lot of system in work.
Right.
I didn't do a long time. I've been assistant men since I'm about 16. Like I had like,
those servers switches in my house like I before when router is like, you know, the thing that comes with your modem now for free used to cost like 400 bucks and I was just like, Oh, I can use a computer from work.
That they're throwing out and just like do all the networking myself. So I just did all of that so.
Heck yes.
But I went back to work for them.
And, cause I didn't know what to do.
Like, nobody, it's like the catch 22 of like,
you graduate, how'd you get experience, all that stuff.
And they offered me a job.
Like I was in Greece, I was backpacking
and they were like, you wanna work?
And I was just like, sure.
And I started working there.
And I was doing cis and men stuff for them.
So I was higher up.
But then I started building tools for them.
Oh.
So I was like, so I, cause they wanted to do stuff.
And I was just like, oh, well, I love programming.
Let me just like, start do some.net.
Like, and I started working with the SDKs,
the Microsoft SDKs to like, just build tools for them.
Like, like little UI applications.
Yep, totally.
Like, like,
efficiency to their day.
Yeah, but I mean, that's like where I got into like,
I just like building tools for depth for people.
Like basically, you know, like,
that's what my little side business is.
And it's, and I just, you know,
I kind of liked it.
And then I got bored there.
That's the story of my life.
Like I get bored.
I can relate to that.
The ADHD side, basically.
And I got bored and I was like, that's 2008.
So like that, I literally quit when the crash happened.
And then I was like, okay, how am I gonna get a job?
So I tried applying for jobs.
Even if I coded all this life,
I've never successfully passed a coding exam.
Those are really weird and tricky though.
So I've literally never, like I would ace.
I mean, you can see I'm pretty outgoing.
And like, I'm like one of the few,
like I'm a rare nerd that somehow manage social skills.
So like, so I would kill the in-person interviews.
And they're like, we love you.
We just need to make you pass a quick programming exam
to just like see everything.
And I was like, oh, I'll see you never basically.
And...
Why do you think that is?
Like, do you think it was because like,
the way that they tested you or just...
Cause it's not relevant.
It's just not relevant.
I'm super against like, when I did hiring later on,
like I just never passed anybody a programming exam.
I just don't think it's relevant.
I mean, we see it back and forth.
Look, hiring is hard.
Like... It is, it really is.
Like, it's really hard.
I fully grasped how hard, you know,
like I listened to a couple of podcasts,
like it was Adam Wattan that he was like,
he got thousands of applications
and then they just ended up hiring somebody they knew.
And I was like, yeah, that makes a ton of sense.
That's why like, I think networking is really the best way
to get hired because honestly,
but it was just not in my brain.
Like I was just like, I don't need to memorize like...
What's an interface or like how to explain that?
Like I was straight out of school.
Like I was doing this like, like I knew how to program,
but I just didn't know conceptually everything.
And I didn't remember at all.
And I was just like, this is dumb and I just wouldn't do it.
But I really wanted to build tools.
Like I applied because I'm from Montreal.
So for all the video game lovers,
like there's a lot of video game studios.
Like it's like the Mecca.
So like I had applied to Ubisoft to be a tools dev basically
to build tools for the developers.
Cause I was just like, I love building tools.
Like that's what I wanted to do.
Like I just wanted to build stuff for devs even back then.
And but yeah, I just couldn't pass a programming exam.
And then the first place that didn't pass me a programming
exam, I got the job basically.
And that's like when I got into WordPress,
like I literally built their entire PHP division
and everything and you know, they were super happy.
But yeah, they didn't, they didn't pass me a programming test.
And they were like, I was applying for a.NET job.
And then they were like, oh, well actually we're trying
to do this thing with WordPress.
Do you know anything about it?
And I'm like, no, but I can figure it out.
And the rest is history.
But yeah, it was hard.
Like it was just, it's a weird journey.
Like it was just a weird journey to like get programming jobs.
Like I was just, yeah, it was just not what I was aiming for.
I mean, that's like kind of the career,
my career trajectory is like, it's always goes back
to programming.
Cause I remember like, we, that's to,
we're looping back to what we wanted to talk about.
But it's kind of funny, but basically I did the
sysadmin stuff.
I built tools.
I'm like, oh wait, I love programming.
Why am I not doing that?
Then I got hired to do the WordPress,
the PHP stuff.
And then like I was talking about like,
before the show started.
Which is where we met.
Yeah, which is where we met.
But back then, like we were talking about,
there was no career track for engineering.
Yep.
I had applied to like my Pat at the time,
I was joked there's an alternative universe
where I succeeded, but like I had applied to Harvard
to do, to do MBA.
You knew me both.
Like I had applied to Harvard to do MBA, Harvard, MIT.
Like I had a really good GMAT.
I was just like, okay, well, I'll just get into
like management consulting or like go to McKinsey
or Bain or whatever.
Like that's, what else am I going to do?
Like, you know, like, but I wrote all these essays.
And then I just realized like,
when I like managing people and I wanted to build
my own company, but also like, I just,
I just prefer coding.
Like I think managing people is the hardest thing
I've ever did, but I just like coding.
Yeah.
I just like coding and I wanted to code.
And I just decided I was going to try to build a business
where I'm still trying, you know, 12 years later,
but basically I just wanted to code.
And I think that's what it just comes back to with me
is I just always want to code.
Yeah.
And I want to be involved with code.
Like, which is great now because like, I've, you know,
I'm so out of it, like for the,
even for the engineering management track,
like I know all these titles now.
I had to look it up because like,
I was dealing with a potential acquisition
and I was just like, what title would I give myself?
You know, like, I don't even know where I sit with that.
And I fell in like principal engineer
or something like that.
Like, you know, something, I think you're supposed to be
like basically expert in multiple fields.
And then you do a lot of mentoring.
Like I like teaching devs.
I like devs.
So it's like.
Distinguished.
That's the one I want.
Cause that's the absolute top level.
Yeah.
Distinguished.
I mean, yeah.
Yeah.
But just like in terms of what the tasks was
and that we talked about it when we were in Portland
actually, because I started doing a bit of consulting
around that like fractional engineering leadership.
I was like, where can't be us in Portland?
Where can't, yeah.
Where can't be us in Portland?
And I didn't know there was a need for that.
And there's kind of a bit of a need.
Like it's like, you know,
engineering and leadership is, is interesting
because like a lot of times like we talked,
like a lot of these smaller shops,
it's their leader guide that gets promoted.
It's exactly my problem, right?
It's those people that become the CTO and stuff.
And then they don't have time
to do the actual engineering leadership,
but they don't have enough.
It's not big enough for them to do it,
have somebody full time do it.
So, yeah, there's a bit of a space for that,
but I do enjoy that.
But yeah, it's like, it's weird for like the career path.
Like I just, I'm always trying to figure it out on my own
because it was just never that simple when I started off.
Like it was just like, nobody had to ask these questions.
Google was still relatively new, like, you know,
and they're kind of like the forefront
of like having that kind of engineering track internally.
So it was a really weird time.
Like, and yeah, it was just, but it always goes back
to coding for me.
Like I like developers.
It's the same thing as you.
I love developers.
I want us, I built a product for developers.
I love developer.
I want to make your life easier.
I want to make my life easier.
And it's easier to empathize, right?
When you're all the time.
Sorry.
No, go ahead.
Not to cut you off.
I was going to say, I think like, it's been so interesting.
And I think like doing this show was like a big trigger
into spending time with developers,
but in a way that obviously can help me market my business.
Right.
And so people can get to understand
sort of these different types of developers
and, and you know, what they care about and what they want
because my clients are building tools for developers.
Right.
So the sort of the things that you enjoy.
But so when I was at where I'm getting to, right,
is like, I was at work, Camp US, you know,
you were there obviously, we got to connect there quite a bit.
And then there was an event in early December
called commit your code in Dallas.
Danny Thompson brought together.
So a very developer curated event.
He's a developer.
He built the event.
He brought together developers.
And I was saying that at the event,
it was like interesting how all these people were like,
yeah, I'm normally introverted, but like, you know,
I love these types of events.
I want to talk to other devs.
And I was like, see, like we are not anti-social.
And so I actually tweeted it out.
Oh my God.
We are so not anti-social.
Do you want to go on a complete trend?
Do you want to go completely crazy tangent right now?
Because I have, this is like something,
I'm working with my therapist, but I want to pitch maybe,
I'm trying to write the pitch for WordCamp Bureau.
Ooh, well, let me finish this,
and then let's talk about this.
Because I think you have tons of it.
So what I did is I just tweeted it really quick.
And so I know you're going to have tons of feedback.
As I tweeted it really quick,
and I was like, developers are not anti-social.
We are anti-social to anyone who is not us.
If we find out that you're a fellow developer
or a fellow programmer or whatever,
it's like an instant relationship.
Like I don't remember the exact time
that you and I first met.
I think it was WordCamp San Diego.
But it happens, it never fails that I meet someone else
and they're like, you're a developer.
And I'm like, you're a developer.
And then all of a sudden like, we're best friends.
It's like step brothers, you know, it just is like instant.
So let's talk about this and what you're thinking in
on your soapbox.
So my soapbox, I mean, I'm writing my year in review
still right now, because they, I mean,
last year was 10,000 words.
So it was just like, it's like a 3000 or something right now.
So last year, I've talked a lot about
basically autism, basically.
Like I'm a high functioning autistic person basically.
And I'm just slowly coming to grips with that.
But one of the things that I,
my first character got sick this year
and I found a new one who specializes
with adult autistic people, especially people
in their 40s, like me, you were just not diagnosed basically.
Like most people you learn through basically,
you learned that you're autistic.
I don't have any kids.
So basically, but for most people they learned
they're autistic because their children get,
their children get a diagnosis.
And they're like, wait, I'm like that.
So does that mean?
And then like the answer, yeah.
And so, but I learned so much.
And I realized that so many of us,
like developers are like that.
And lots of neurodiverges.
Yeah, lots of neurodiverges.
But what got me really excited about what you said
is that my therapist talked this year
about this theory called the double empathy problem.
Which comes from this research
that it comes from the in the 2010.
So it's really recent.
But basically the stereotype about like,
especially autistic people is that
they're not good socially, right?
So the premise of the research was like,
okay, we're gonna take neurotypical people,
neurodivergent people.
If we put them together, they're gonna struggle, right?
So like that's like assumed.
But what happens if we separate them?
Well, we'd assume the neurotypical people are gonna be fine
because like they know how to socialize and stuff like that.
But we expect that the neurodivergent people
will not be able to socialize really well
because they struggle socially.
But that's not what happened.
When you separated both of them, they did fine.
And that's because they communicate differently.
And that comes back to what you were saying about it.
It's just developers.
They want themselves.
They're kind of like,
a lot of it is neurodivergence, right?
So like that's why they always like,
even like if you wanna talk about it,
like that's why a lot of the job postings,
the way like they scream people,
like they're looking a bit for like that kind
of neurodivergence and candidates.
That doesn't mean that if you're not neurodivergent,
you can't be a programmer.
It's just like, you think about the stereotypes
of programmers and all that stuff.
It's a lot of that.
But it's really interesting because that's why like,
when you put programmers together,
like they understand like,
oh, like I can't deal with people right now completely.
Totally get it.
Like go away, go find your safe space.
You know, like.
Exactly.
But then you also can sit next to each other
and be like, I can't deal with people right now.
And just completely be in your own little zone,
sitting next to each other and not care.
And you're not gonna offend it.
They get you.
You're not gonna offend anyone.
Yeah, and you're not offended.
Yes.
Right?
Exactly.
And so it's really interesting.
So I really wanna talk a lot about that basically.
Cause there's a lot more stuff,
but like it's just the way you talked about it
and made me think about that all the time
because the double empathy problem is basically just,
you don't communicate.
So you have to empathize with the other side.
So if you wanna, you have to double empathize.
So you have to think about what you're thinking,
translate it to what they're thinking
and then translate what they're saying back to you.
So it's a lot of work.
That's why a lot of times people feel tired, right?
Like, you know, you get tired of, you know,
it's very common for developers.
Like they, you know, you deal with a non-developer person
and you're like, I'm tired of this.
Like I can't deal with that anymore.
And it's just because it's just demanding to do all this.
And I've been lucky because I'm a high functioning.
Like I can do a lot of it,
but you saw me at Portland,
I just come out of like a burnout,
like an autistic burnout.
And I was like much less social.
Like I was like, oh, I need to take time off.
You know, like it go my room,
I would sleep and stuff like that
because I was there to network.
Like, you know, we just talked about hiring, right?
Like I do consulting, how do I get clients and work
is networking.
So I have to be on, on, on.
Like, so like when I need my recharge, I go back and then,
but it's exactly what you're talking about.
That's why I would love to do,
like I always wanted if I had more time
to bring back a loop conf, you know,
the, the work press.
Oh, loop conf was so good.
Ryan, let's bring back loop conf in SLC.
It has to be an SLC.
Like it needs to be.
I think, I think I'm trying to get Raquel,
like we have a friend named Raquel that.
Wonderland curious.
That's trying to organize events now.
So in the WordPress space.
So she's doing a business one by told her, like,
if that's successful, you should look into doing that one X
because I think there's a lot of need for that.
And yeah, developers want to hang out with each other.
And they want to, they want to talk about nerdy stuff.
And stuff.
Yep.
And talk shop and stuff like that.
Like I had, speaking of like all this neurodiped
virgin stuff, like I learned really early on that I just,
just not talk about programming.
So I just not never talk about it.
Like the only time I talk about that's so heartbreaking,
but it's true though.
Like my parents, like my mom was a dentist.
Like a lot, everybody was like kind of the medical side.
I fainted the bloods.
I always joke that I went to the under applied science.
Like my sister is a veterinarian, but like I just like,
I fainted the blood.
So it's like, it's over.
Like I can't, I can't.
Also I have my shaking too.
So it's just can't, can't be a doctor.
Can't do that.
But they would always be really interested in what they were
talking about.
But I would like start talking about programming stuff
and they would glade their, their eyes would glaze over,
you know, and it was the same thing with a lot of,
a lot of my family.
Like it was just, even when I went on my own,
they didn't quite understand what I did for a living.
But once I started doing public speaking, they're like,
Oh, you cross a public speaker.
I was like, Oh, okay.
Okay.
Yeah.
And I'm like, you speak that conference.
And then they're like, okay.
They can understand that.
But it, but it taught me really early on that if I want to,
navigate the social world, I just don't talk about programming.
So it's, it sometimes it's hard to meet,
to get me to talk about it, unless we're in these kind of safe
space, because it is a kind of a safe space to be in a,
in a conference like that.
And be able to talk shop.
And I have a larger, there's a slightly different problem too
in the WordPress space, which is the skill range is so large.
Oh yeah.
That's, that's, yeah.
And, and, and I'm at like basically like the point zero,
zero, one percent percent.
I'm like, at the top.
So I know all the smart people that I can talk to, but,
you know, like half the time I just, there's not that much
conversation to be had in the first place.
But, you know, that's the reality of it.
And, but that's why those, those events are important.
That's why, that's why I was brought up loop conf and I said,
like, I would love to bring that back because there's just,
there's just something about having a space for developers
where they're just like, okay, like I'm just talking to
under developers, we can nerd out, get really offended
because you use like spaces versus tabs or like something
like that.
Like, you know, like, you know, like, okay, you're using tabs,
like go over there.
Although like, we're anti, we're anti spaces over here.
Yeah.
I've changed, I still use spaces, but if I, I understand now
why tabs are better basically, but it's only for the accessibility
aspect that I let them win basically is I remember reading
somebody that said like for screen readers, because there's
a Alex Stein, I think it's easy to WordPress space.
Like he's, he's a blind programmer.
And I think it was true him that I heard about it, but,
but basically if you have spaces on the Braille reader,
it's like four characters, right?
So it just takes a lot of space.
It's not like accessible for, you know, a tab is one character.
So tabs win is what you're saying.
Tabs win basically.
Woo!
But I still use spaces.
No validating.
I still use spaces.
Eventually I'll just do a whole thing where I'll switch to tabs.
I haven't pulled a trigger on that yet, but I admit that for
that reason, I think you should use spaces, not spaces,
the tabs just for, from, from an accessibility,
an accessibility standpoint, because I'm really bored that.
And I think that that was like, before that I just didn't,
I didn't care.
Like I was just use whatever you want.
I really like spaces, but when I heard that argument, I was like,
okay, there's an actual real.
There's a right answer.
There's a right answer because it does affect them.
Yeah.
Namely, you know, because even if you're like, oh, well,
it's four spaces, but it's there, there's only so many characters they can have on
this screen, right?
Like it's not like us where you can like, like just make your screen,
like zoom out or something like that.
And then, and all that stuff, like they don't have that option.
So for me, I'm sure it was, it probably was their time too,
because it has to read through each space.
So it's probably like space, space, space, space.
And you're like, that's annoying.
Yeah.
Imagine when you're like, if you're like, especially the work
press space where they like love indenting for like eight levels of indentation.
No good reason.
And then, and, and you're like, oh, well, okay, like this line is just all spaces.
I don't actually know what, like you're, you're in the Braille reader and it's like
just all spaces.
You never know what's on the other side because it just goes off.
But yeah, no.
So when I heard that, I was like, I think, I was like, no, this is legit.
Yep.
So a bit harder to change like decades of your own kind of preference, but
Especially for years.
Yeah.
You've been doing it for years.
Yeah.
But I, when I heard that, I was like, because before that it felt so like, okay.
It was just a funny argument.
Yeah.
It was a funny argument.
Oh, well, you know, with tabs, you can adjust it to whatever you like and all that stuff.
And I was like, I get that, but it's like really annoying for like formatting,
you know, like when you're doing output and things like that.
But I just felt like, no, okay.
Like if you're somebody that needs like special, have special needs around like your screen reader,
like, and it does negative you, like I feel like that trumps basically
Any opinion?
Yeah.
Any opinion you have basically on that.
And so that's why I say, so that's why I say like real,
I'm, I'm not, I don't say reluctantly, but like it's hard.
Like I said, it's hard to change your own habits because like I've always used space spaces,
but I would tell somebody now, like you're better off using tabs if you can for that reason.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.
Even if there's not a ton of people, like, you know, I think about that all the time
because I'm just like programming sweet.
Like if, if you can do it, which is like amazing to me, like I can't even imagine having to do that.
But there's, there's a non negligible amount of people that are, you know,
blind or have like high site issues and that is useful for them.
So it's like, that's really important.
So that's where I found that.
Yeah, totally.
So we'll come back around to like the neurodivergent side of it.
Right.
So speaking more to that and like,
Yeah.
I think whether you're neurodivergent or not, I think the thing that you spoke to
with that that relates to sort of like anyone who might be blind as a developer or whatever
is like, it's a passion for us.
Like it is not a job.
And I think that a lot of people really struggle to relate to that and also really
struggle to understand our work in that way.
Yeah.
My husband doesn't get it.
He's just like, it's your job.
And I was like, it's my life.
Like it's, it's like my everything.
And so I think like if you are of the mindset, right, that programming is a beautiful thing
for you because you love to build things with like O's very similarly.
Yeah.
And it's, you don't let those sort of neurodivergence or other disabilities kind of
slow you down, right?
You just work around them and still very admirable.
But I think that what I'm getting to is like, when programming is in your blood,
it's in your blood and there's no stopping it essentially.
Yeah, exactly.
And it's really hard.
Like it's that's why, like it, it, it, I mean, you've said it perfectly, you know,
like that's why I keep going back to programming.
Like I get pushed into like different directions.
And then when I listen to my heart, I'm just like, what I really want to do, like it's,
that's the same reason a lot of developers dream about having their little side business
because they just want to tinker on the, like one of the best
it was a blog post.
I'll try to find it for you if you want.
I don't know if you do show notes, but basically,
I do.
Yeah.
It was called like something about gardening, but basically like, I just want to putter in
my garden basically.
Oh, yes.
Yes.
Like I'll find it's on it's bare blog.
It's your hobby.
You want to go play with your hobby.
Yeah.
But it's like if you do gardening, right?
Like you want to just go putter in your plants.
Like, you know, like I, I basically at some point, like I work on a product called E-Mir
and basically I wanted to modernize the code for like, fix all this stuff to like make it
like at the, the recent PHP versions.
And then I just like, yeah, period and fixed it and I could, you know, I could just,
if you want to spend time like writing a test or doing the stuff, you can just like putter
around and, and do that stuff. And that's a lot of, you know, when you talk to programmers
that wish that had their own little business, it's like, they're not necessarily looking
to have like, like I'm not looking for a six figure a year necessarily like business.
Like I'm just looking for something where I can like, like wake up in the morning and
like work, work on like, on my code and make again, it's a developer product.
Just make people's life easier. Like I don't have a ton of clients, but like the clients
that use my product love it. So that makes me super happy. I wish I could reach more people
and that's different. That's a bit like the struggle with your clients, but it's, but that's
you are one of my clients technically. That's the case.
Yeah, technically.
You are my client profile.
I am your, I'm your, I am your client profile in a way. Just like, I just make a thousand
bucks a month. So it's like, I'm not in your technical and the revenue, but, but it's that,
but you know, but here's the thing though, you're just to speak to you only because
there's an opportunity here and I rarely talk about my business, but I think here's the thing
though is like, you could be a $5,000, a $10,000 business. If your clients love your product
as much as they do, there are more of your clients out in the world.
Of course. Yeah.
Who love your product. So it's, it's just fine.
It's hard to market. It's not easy.
It's not easy. It's hard. No, that's it. It's not easy. And it's like a WordPress product,
although I'm like looking to branch out. I don't want to get into the stupid drama,
but basically, but, but, but yeah, like the clients that I use it stick with it because
they love it, you know, because I'm always like, and I wish I could do more. Like all,
I have like this laundry list of ideas of things that I would love to build, but I'm just like,
I have to do consulting. I have to live, you know, and I don't, and, you know, but that's a
lot of what the program is. You talk about programmers that like want to build their little
business. I would argue that most of the time when I talk to them, they're not looking for a huge
payout necessarily, you know, like, you know, like, if they want to scratch that itch, they want to
do something. They want to scratch that itch. Like, yeah, like when I was looking to, to,
when I was having acquisition talks, like I was just looking to, okay, like how much do I need?
Like I would go backwards and I was like, okay, how much do I need so that I can just like program
for the rest of my life basically. Yeah. And like build stuff, you know, whatever it is. Build stuff
with me. Yeah, exactly. I mean, you have my email. I do. So, but, but it was like, just building stuff
is fun, you know, like, and I know some programmers that do it a lot more than me. Like I have friends
that I have a friend in particular, like who just like is always like trying to break shit,
basically he has the hacker gene. He has the hacker gene. I have to, I always say, like, I have the
reverse engineering gene. Like it's like, they're different, they're different things. I always tell
people, like the hacker is like, did they think about this edge case? They're always like trying to
break it in some way. And then the reverse engineering, you don't necessarily have either of them, but I
just know I'm a really good reverse engineer because I'm really curious about how they got it.
Like how did they get there? You know, and then you like try to reverse, okay, what could they have
used? What could they have done? And then you kind of built from that, which is very different from
like, breaking stuff. Because like, he's, he's crazy. Okay, so we're, we're dealing with a lot of nerds.
So there's probably a couple of World of Warcraft people in there. Oh, guaranteed. Lots of gamers.
Basically, in the, it was the third expansion, the second expansion of World of Warcraft was like,
kind of like, it's called Radlich King. And they had an event that was called like zombies, but they
had zombies. And this game is two sided, you have one side, you have like, Horde Alliance,
basically. But during that event, if you were a zombie, you were on the third side zombies.
And basically, you couldn't build a guild that was like, could only be on one side. But what he
did is he got zombies to sign his guild charter. And then he basically, so he had characters on
both sides. And then he got scared to even log in because they were like, if you find, they find out
like, that I have like a guild, now they have it as a feature, like it doesn't matter anymore. But
like, 10 years ago, he just broke it. Like, he was incredible. But like, yeah, but you just need
people that have that brain, right? Like it's like, like, and he's a self taught developer, like he
has high school education, but he's like, kind of like, savant, level. Yeah, savant level. I mean,
he's so funny. Like he works with maps and stuff like that. And he's the most geographically
challenged person I've ever met. Like he can't go to blocks without using a GPS basically, but he
works with maps all the time. But when you know how to solve problems, you know how to solve problems.
Exactly. Exactly. So it's, it's great. But that's like the, that's what I love about programming.
Exactly. It's like, you have that. Just it's, it's all about building stuff and like,
fixing problems, breaking things. Like, I don't know. There's nothing like it. So that again,
that's why like, you, you go back to it. Like it's like, you told your husband, it's in your blood,
right? Like, I just, I like that a lot. And I like programmers and they're, they're my people. That's
why like, it was really hard to, to think about management. Yeah. Absolutely. A decade ago, because
of that. Yeah. Yeah. Fully agree. Okay. So let's actually talk shop a little bit more. You've already
been on here for a long time. So we're like, you could have me for two hours, you know me, right?
So I did not have like meetings. Yeah. Okay. So what are your favorite tools in terms of like
developer tools, right? You like building tools for developers, but what do you like using?
What's your kind of tools? Yeah. So I'm still very involved in the PHP space. Yeah. I'm a, I'm a big
PHP. Is it Stan when you're a fan of like, basically like, I don't know, but basically I'm a love,
I'm a PHP fan. Yeah. And actually, I was just at a Christmas party dinner just before the holidays
with a bunch of programmer friends, they're all in the video game industry. And we were,
I was me and another friend, we were talking about PHP and we were just saying PHP is great.
Like I just love PHP. So inside PHP, there's Laravel. You asked about Laravel. I did. I really
like Laravel. I mean, the programmer in me, the kind of like OCD programmer in me doesn't like
Laravel all that much because there's a lot of magic, but it gets stuff done. Like it's just like,
you get like, you know, like at the end of the day, like you asked about Rails too. Like if I had to
learn another framework next, I would probably learn Rails because it's the same kind of energy.
Like if, if you're a developer that wants to get stuff done, like I pay attention to a lot of what
Taylor says for that reason, because like Taylor has a good sense of what developers want. You
know, like he is a developer. He's a developer. He builds for himself. And so I really like PHP,
Laravel. I was trying to think of stuff that frustrates me recently, but I mean, a lot of
stuff that frustrates me recently is all database related. Like I just like, like back, I had to
rewrite like, like I had to like, one, like MySQL and MariaDB not, not working together anymore. It's
pain the ass. Like I find there's a lot of pain around databases. And again, I'm assistant men.
Like I don't have a perfect solution to how we make that less painful. Like I know, like there was
like, like I played around with some of the auto scaling stuff too, but it, but it wasn't even around
that. It was just like backups and restore, like just back up in the restore, like the number of
times like a backup breaks for me when I'm dealing with client stuff, like I'm just like, okay, I
have to manually edit it because it's like, it was taken in one version of this and it's not
compatible for that. Like it's just really obnoxious. A lot of the stuff that you like,
I, that and like, I mean, this one's like really for the assistant men in your audience, mail servers,
mail servers are the worst. I still have to manage some mail. Mail servers are the worst. I, I still
have to manage one for a client and I hate my, I hate every time that I have to deal with it. I'm
so thankful for chat GPT now to like save me from having to scour through old use net posts to try
to find out what's going on with this archaic stuff. But I have huge respect for anybody that
works with mail servers on a daily basis and keeps them running and deals with spam and all that
stuff because it's in mailboxes and all that stuff. It's just really painful. Like, but yeah,
like on the dev side, it's like, it's really like the day, honestly, the database stuff now feels
like the worst. It's like, you know, are you, is it like in a, in like a WordPress sort of like
tech stacks? I feel like database there's a nightmare there, but like in sort of like other
technology databases are a lot more efficient. Yeah. I mean, it's just the day to day usage
of the database. I mean, it's not like, Oh, I mean, if I had a choice, I'd use Postgres. But
yeah, I mean, it's like most of the, even Larabelle, they're kind of like my sequel heavy. Like it's
just the PHP just loves my sequel. Yeah. So they really like my sequel and PHP Lance. So you just
end up using a lot of it. But I don't know if I'd have as many problems with Postgres and stuff
like that again, because like it's just on the my sequel, the my sequel, Maria DB fork stuff. Like
also like, I'm a bit worried for the next like decade, like there's just a lot of forks happening,
like engine X got forked, like, like, I think Rita's got forked, like it's just because, you know,
and it's just really hard to like, like the compatibility around all those things is like
the heart like it's just, it's annoying around that stuff. So but yeah,
I hate to say that this is even a thing because like, obviously these are my clients. So they're
fruitful and necessary and like we love them. But I think the developer tools ecosystem has
kind of sort of like gotten a little too crazy. And I'm not saying it's too crazy and that there
are too many tools per se. But I think that we're seeing a lot more of developer tools being
creative. And I think that yeah, when we do that, it's developers trying to make a tool, right? And
we kind of talked back to, you know, how that can be problematic and not understanding sort of the
growth side of it and actually the market fit side of it. But I think that there's that is sort
of the negative right of all the developer tools is like, you want to make an opinion about a
developer tool that you want to start using, but it's like, does it perfectly fit with everything
else? Right? Can I right? Exactly. Well, I think a lot about that it's kind of weird, right? Because
so with EMEAR, a lot of people are like, okay, what do I use locally? Because for EMEAR, just for
a background is like basically infrastructure management. Like it's like basically the Larval
Vapor but for WordPress right now. And so it manages your AWS infrastructure and all that stuff.
But a lot of people are like, okay, but what do I use locally? And I'm like, whatever you want,
I did not make this. Yeah, I don't want to pit. So it's weird because some developers, they just
want to be handheld. They do. Yeah, in WordPress, but I find like it's just newer developers,
maybe some that come from where it's not like we talk about like when it's in your blood, because
like, I think, I think we'll see more of that, you know, because the job market's a bit difficult,
I think we might see more of the people that stay are the people that really are that's in their
blood kind of thing. Yeah, like a lot of the boot camps was like, oh, there's a ton of money here.
Let me just do a boot camp and then do programming. And they want to be handheld, right? Like,
they're not asking questions. They like, they'll go to chat GPT and just be like, can you do the
whole thing for me? And then when they don't, they're just upset. I feel like those are the
developers that will make it through sort of this AI boom, right? Because there's all this
conversation of like cursor and bolt and v zero and all these tools that can help you write code.
I try it's going to be the ones that's in their blood. Yeah, you try them. I tried them. I mean,
I want to do a talk on that. Like I like you on the built for dev hub.
Do it on the built for dev hub. My little ticker across the bottom people don't even know I have
a giant developer community of like developers. But yeah, I've been pitching this talk for a year
and a half now. But basically, I think a VI more as a pair programming tool. Exactly. Exactly.
Smart of your buddy, your little assistant. Yeah, you're a little assistant, right? And
I think it works better for again, the people that it's in their blood, right? Because like
you're like, I use it, you know what it's been the most useful for like, it's kind of funny,
because I was talking with, you know, we have a friend in common called Toby and I was talking
with who was asking me a question. He's like, why did you name it this way? And I was like,
Oh, I just had a conversation with Chad GPT about naming stuff because like, you know,
the saying in programming, there's two hard things in programming, cash in validation and
naming things. And Chad GPT is amazing for naming things. Like I'll have discussions about it.
I'm like, no, I don't like this. Like, can you think about her thing? And eventually, like we
nail down a name that like sits what's going on in my head. I love that. But it's having, it's,
it's kind of having that discussion. But yeah, so it's hard for tools. Like for me,
in the WordPress space, exactly, like a lot of it want to be handheld, some of them don't. And
then I built a tool where you're not supposed to be handheld that much. So it's been a lot of struggle
for my growth, basically, because of that, because you have, if, if you're thinking about your clients,
we want to talk shop a bit, probably you have to think about what developers you're aiming for.
Are you exactly for the people like me, who just need a really good documentation site? Like,
I get comments on my documentation site because I care a lot about documentation. So I wrote a lot
of it. Developer experience matters. And that's great for those developers, but some of them just
want to be handheld. And then that scenario, the document site, they don't really care about it
because they're not going to read it. And so it's really hard on that respect. That's why I was saying
like, like, they come to me and then they're like, okay, what do I use locally? And I'm like, whatever
you want, I'm not here to, like, I try to make the tool for developers. In my mind, the developers
are, they're opinionated. They want to have, they want to work the way they're comfortable with.
So I don't want to, I try as little as possible to get in their way of doing that. And so, but
that's a really interesting discussion to have like when you're talking with your clients, because
depending on which type, like archetype of developer they're aiming for, the doc site's useless
for them because like, nobody's going to go visit it because they just want to be completely handheld.
Well, that comes into like knowing your exact, like just to kind of speak to what you're saying.
And this is, this is how I try to be different. And maybe you and I should get on like a strategy
session since you're my friend. I like spending my time, but like, because there's a, there is a,
there is a target audience for your tool, right? And so when you can figure out that target audience,
that's when you can build that experience around them. Because if it is say your target audience
ends up being just depending on your solution, right? I'm just hypothetically throwing out examples
here. Let's say that your target audience ends up being developers who do need to be handheld.
That changes everything, right? If your target audience is less technical, but is still building
WordPress sites, still has to deal with infrastructure, but they don't necessarily know. And I'm not
saying this is your audience. I'm just throwing out things. You're going to have to have more docs.
You're going to have to have an onboarding experience. You're likely going to have to have
tools that connect things together that connect to their preexisting solutions. You may even have
to have an opinion around what to use locally. You don't have to build it, but you can say,
I think you should use this and here's exactly how you connect it. Because like you said,
there is a, there's a scope with a target audience, right? And it's what does that person look like
and when you can actually sit down and narrow into that exact audience, then you can build a
product that perfectly does exactly what they need. And you know where they're hanging out. So
you know how to go find them. You know what they like. It's a very interesting, but yeah, at the
same time, right? You're like in this technical founder in this state of like, what do I do?
Yeah. And I'm also in the WordPress space, which is the one. Exactly. The WordPress space is
like all because the WordPress space is like so large on skill level that it's like impossible
basically because like I have to you niche down. Yeah. But I'm like, I'm like, I always joke, right?
I'm a niche within a niche within a niche in WordPress. Like I did an object oriented programming
book for WordPress. Like you have a quote on it, you know, so on the landing page. So it's,
it's really hard because like I'll get clients. They're like, I can't install a plugin. I'm like,
of course you can't install a plugin. Like this is like an enterprise thing. And I have enterprise
clients. They're like, Oh no, this is fine. Like, you know, like, but I know who my target are. It's
just like in the WordPress space is hard because it's like all the enterprise agencies and they have
like the IP and all that stuff, like without getting into all the details for like the non-word
press people. But they're like, I've been in this space for five years trying to market this. Like
I have a good idea. Like I, what I do a lot is plant seeds. Like I call it planting seeds. Like
I just like build relationships with agencies and stuff like that. And people that I know have
the technical know how to use the product. Exactly. And when they're ready, and then when
they're ready, they have the client, the project where they're ready to use it. Then we start
having the discussion. So it's like a much longer term thing because it's so niche. It's so niche,
right? But, but just talking on for like the larger products that are thinking about developers.
Yeah. I've thought about that. Like, okay, how do I make it easier? But it is just in WordPress.
I'll never solve it all because they'll be like, okay, okay, you connected to my GitHub repo,
it deploys automatically, you put the get up action, you made it all automatic and beautiful.
I actually don't know how to get push deploy or like, you know, like, it's just, you know,
like there's some people, there's a lot of people that are just used to like, why kind of an sftp
into this and totally totally. So it's just really hard on that respect. It's nothing to do with
but it shows to like, okay, who are your developers and but I'm stubborn, basically, I'm a Torah
and I'm stubborn and I just want to keep building it for people like me. And hopefully there's a
lot, there's more like it slowly people find me and then I eventually I do have a couple of customers,
but it's just, it's hard. Like it's just, it's, it's the reality also of like building developer
tools is that yeah, when especially if you're a more advanced devs, like you, it's, it's hard,
like when you're trying to deal with the different skill ranges, it's, it's hard to build a developer
tool where you're like, okay, I love this tool. I, and I think people on my skill level are going
to love this tool, but actually I need to make it so that Lord skill people or like people with
different like educational backgrounds or whatnot, like we were talking about like boot camp, if you
come from a boot camp and it's less in your blood, like it's more of a, like it's a job more than like
a passion, right? Like, you know, to talk like a millennial, right? Like it's just like, you know,
for a lot of people programming is for people like me, programming is a passion, right? Like
if I want to make money, I wouldn't, I'd be like doing something completely else. Like,
not, not programming wise, but I wouldn't be sitting in my basement building a product and
just doing a little bit of consulting. Like I just, I just, so you have to think about that too. So
when you're thinking about the devs and all that stuff, because it's just some of them, they're
just no, like I'm, like I'm using whatever is cool right now because that's where the money is.
And then just do it all for me. Please chat GPT slash cursor slash bull, like write the website
for me, write the project for me. I don't, and then it's great for me because I come in after
and I clean up their work basically because like, because that's like one of the things that people
don't, the less business, the people don't necessarily understand the more business people,
sorry, the less developer people understand, don't understand is that it's easier to write
new code than to maintain old one. And so like for, for me on my consulting side, like I just end up
doing that a lot of the time, like it's like, Oh, I have to maintain people's old stuff and
developers want to work on the new and shiny and they don't want to work on the new stuff. But
also from a skill level, you just need, you need to be more skillful to work on old code. Like you
don't want to break that. You have to be able to keep more stuff in your head at once. So,
so it's yeah, sorry, we went on a tangent, but that's okay. No, that's where the show's supposed
to go. We do need to wrap up though, because I do have a meeting got to love that. Okay, so last
question, we can kind of tell the last five minutes here before it's 11am personally for me.
Yeah. What, what do you do when you get stuck? Because obviously you work as a consultant, you're
also going to product, you don't work side by side with a lot of developers, except for in your
projects and your actual client. Yeah, correct. How do you sort of get unstuck or, you know, work
through those challenges when they when they do arise? Well, now, like, what we talked about earlier,
like now I, I do chat GPT. I figured. So, and I can give you a super cool example from, yeah,
just literally from the holidays. So I was having an issue with E-Mir. I was having people, I was
having bots sign up, which was really weird, because like, it just sends a verification email, but
I was starting to get like some spam complaints and like weird auto replies, because they were
using the right, they were using the right email, they were using correct email, but they were just
entering gibberish, basically. It was like, and I was like, I was trying to talk with chat GPT,
like how can you like, can we do it like a gibberish, like, validator thing? And they were
like trying to figure out entropy. Anyways, it was completely off, basically. Like I tried a
couple of things, because it wasn't working. But then I asked it, could you think, like,
think something, like, give me solutions that are so outside the box, you know? And, and it gave me
a couple of things. Like it was like, use like language models to like evaluate the names. I was
like, okay, that's a bit too crazy. But it suggested something called name API. So there's an,
there's an API that exists. That's, it's like an old site, like it looks like straight out of the
like early 2000s, basically. But it's, but it's called name API.org, I think. And it's, it's a,
it's a name parsing API. So it will, in multiple languages, like it supports, like, you know,
like, Cyrillic and, you know, Kanji's and all that stuff. But it will, you send it a name, and it
will return back, like you say, okay, I'm giving you a full name, and it'll parse it, try to figure
out what the first name is, and it'll give you a confidence and enroll and a likeliness. And of
that, it's a name. And then I just basically started. So I was like, Oh, this is good. And then I was
like, started playing with it, like I had my API tools, like, postman, and I was like testing to
see and I was like, okay, like this could work. And I didn't ask more from chat GPT. I was just
like, okay, like, this is good. And I like, I built like a, like, it's a larval app. So I built a
validation tool that just sends the name over via the API gets it back. If the confidence interval
is below a certain threshold, basically, you reject it. And all this spam went away, basically.
But that was like, but that was like a way of life, because I was just like, I don't want to put a
capture, like I hate CAP. Yep. So I didn't want to put a CAP shot on the, on the site. And I just
didn't, you know, I, I don't send a lot of emails, but I was a bit worried, like I'd get like on
spam lists or something like that. So I was just like, Oh, like, get me something.
Like, I was a bit stuck, right? Like I was a bit stuck. And I was just like, okay,
get, get me, find me something creative solutions. Yeah. Like, like, throw me some stuff. Like,
and then I can just, you know, some stuff, it was hallucinating. You still got to do your editing
job. But basically it threw that out. And I was like, Oh my God, this is an actual thing. It exists.
They have a free tier, which is super generous. And I was just like, cool, I'm just, I built it.
And I was like, I took me, I think two hours, I built it, shipped it. And then it was, it was done.
It was done. And it was like, but a lot of it is chat. Like chat GPT is really good at getting on
you unstuck. Like it's really good at like blank page problem. If you do a lot of, I do a lot of
writing too, right? I agree with that. Give me a summer to start. Give me an outline at least.
Give me, give me, what will you write? What will you do? Like, because something I like,
I've written a lot. So I, I know when it's giving me stuff that I, I think is trash, but I'm, I'm,
I'm trying to get substance. I'm trying to get the ball rolling. And sometimes that's what you need.
Like, um, so for me, it's like my go to, like, I always tell people, like outside an IDE, I can't
think of a tool that changed my way of working right more than chat GPT did. Like, and again,
I'm not using it like cursor or whatnot. Yeah, totally. You're just getting
unstuck fundamentally, not necessarily programmatically. Cause I saw on Twitter on like,
you know, the, the Peter levels and stuff, they're like cursor, cursor, cursor. Uh,
this is like the bomb. And I've seen like some videos of people using it and look, I, I get it.
It's great. It's great. But I think it's a tool for the people that we were talking about, the boot
campers. Yep. Yep. Or it's a tool, I mean, like, or me, right? Like I haven't, I don't code a lot.
And we talked about that, how I've like gotten distant away from my technical jobs. And so
it's beautiful for me to just go in there and be like, Oh, walk me through this. Like I would go
in there and I'm like, create me a getting started guide. And I did it for one of my clients because
I couldn't find like there, this is a whole digression, but there was, um, documentation was
hard to find, right? And so I was like, give me a getting started guide and walk me through it.
And like it had errors, but I was able to push back and be like, that's not going to work. You
didn't even ask me for the API key. So I could like push back and I do agree. You have to like
technologically understand what you're doing. And then it's incredibly valuable.
Yeah. I think that the cursor versus chat GPT as a pair programmer, I think speaks a lot to like
the passions versus like, there was a, there was somebody on Twitter who was like, just the doers
versus like, I don't know the tinker or I don't, I forget what they were talking about, but
you know, the people that just want to do, they just want it done. They want the results. They
want the results. They don't care. But like the people that are more on the passion side, like,
I think chat GPT more as a pair programmer fits them better because like I wanted to get my hands
in it a bit more than just having a discussion with somebody and fixing stuff. And you know,
like I want my variables a specific way and it can learn all that stuff.
Yeah. Or if you're like in an enterprise role, so like cursor, we had a, there was one called
or an interview a few weeks ago where they essentially were using it as a productivity
tool. So they asked their teams to start using it, which I think is valuable, but I fully agree
with what you're saying, right? It's like, if you're already deep into it, you're likely not to use
cursor. You're likely to solve it. Yeah. I mean, I'm, I'm, yeah, I mean, I'm always like keen
on paying attention to like tools and things like that. Just because I find it interesting,
like I find it interesting, like, you know, I was an early user of chat GPT, and I think there was
a lot of benefits once it got really good. Okay. So I do have to go. Yeah. But two notes.
First note, you should probably come in my business more because you like love DevTools so
much. And like, I actually could use a bit more like technical nerdiness. Yeah, of course. So we
should talk about that. Yeah, absolutely. And then the second note, I will, the second note,
I wanted to just throw out Arcjet. So if you go look, so it's A R C J E T dot com. It's a developer
tool. One of my past clients, I guess I could say it's still current, which is still impending
things. But that's what they do actually was the solution that you built out is like, yes,
there are many different ways that someone can come in and actually start to like spam you or
annoy you or hit your endpoints or overuse things. And so it's a security as code tool. So it allows
you to basically put those security layers into your code. I think they like it and other people
listening would probably like it. And since I'm looking now, I'm going to shout it out. They're
so they're working on the Laravel one. So they don't their modern JS right now. And I think
they're they're working towards that future of like the Django and the Laravel world. So
yeah, I see a Django Ruby on Rails Laravel as the case coming soon. Exactly. Yeah. But detection
rate limiting email validation. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's it they're like a little they're
they're little things but you nothing like bots and hacking makes you think outside the box more
exactly. Exactly. Like even for my my consulting stuff, like I have to deal with a lot of
bots like I had the server level. Yeah, I can imagine. And doing that in clever ways
is is tricky, you know, like, because they they can't use cloudflare and stuff like that. So you
have to be a bit more creative. But yeah, absolutely. But that looks cool. I just looked at it. So
that's great. Yeah, super, super, super cool founder. Okay, so to wrap up, where can folks find
Carl, your product and your work? Okay, I lost actually tabbing. I now have a blank screen
for the for the restream thing. So but basically, it's emirapp.com. Okay, perfect. So that's that's
my little side product. CarlExander.ca is where I used to write a lot. Now I just basically
write my year in reviews. And I have my book there, where people can find I mean, I used to be on
Twitter, I'm kind of gone. I'm trying to basically get off social media, to be honest. But I'm,
I would say LinkedIn now, like, okay, I think where I'm like trying to be active more. I mean,
I'm not really posting. But if I started to post, I probably post on LinkedIn, because
it's just everybody's kind of more fragmented now, right? Like, and then
it's definitely to go to him for debt. Yeah, we're good. Yeah, GitHub, like it's Carl Alexander,
basically. But yeah, I think LinkedIn is usually the best. And at this point, and yeah, it's good.
I took talk for hours that we're going to get you on my podcast now. And then we'll talk for
another hour, it'll be great. So yes, absolutely. It has been super awesome hanging out with you,
just like we talked about developers love spending time with each other, which is why
I'm investing so heavily in the actual built for dev hub. So if folks are interested in rewatching
this after the fact, or to come hang out and some of the other awesome developer events and hang
out, you can visit that at hub dot built for dot dev. Carl, it has been so awesome talking to you.
This will be on all the channels that has been streamed and also a podcast. And I look forward
to coming on your podcast. Yeah, I'll send you an email about that. Okay. Perfect. All right. Bye friends.