Episode Details

Why does the history of computing matter? Joël and Developer at thoughtbot Sara Jackson, ponder this and share some cool stories (and trivia!!) behind the tools we use in the industry.

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• Sara on Twitter
• UNIX philosophy
• Hillel Wayne on why we ask linked list questions
• History of Unix, Linux, and Open Source / Free Software
• Collected Histories of Unix
• Selected pages from the nine research editions of the UNIX® Programmer’s Manual illustrate the development of the system. Accompanying commentary recounts some of the needs, events, and individual contributions that shaped this evolution
• These are dates that every hacker knew were important at the time, or shortly afterwards.
• Unix at 50: How the OS that powered smartphones started from failure
• First hand account of history of Unix and Multics by Tom Van Vleck

Transcript:

JOËL: Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Joël Quenneville. And today, I'm joined by fellow thoughtboter, Team Lead, and Developer Sara Jackson.

SARA: Hello, happy to be here.

JOËL: Together, we're here to share a little bit of what we've learned along the way. So, Sara, what's new in your world?

SARA: Well, Joël, you might know that recently our team had a small get-together in Toronto.

JOËL: And our team, for those who are not aware, is fully remote distributed across multiple countries. So this was a chance to get together in person.

SARA: Yes, correct. This was a chance for those on the Boost team to get together and work together as if we had a physical office.

JOËL: Was this your first time meeting some members of the team?

SARA: It was my second, for the most part. So I joined thoughtbot, but after thoughtbot had already gotten remote. Fortunately, I was able to meet many other thoughtboters in May at our summit.

JOËL: Had you worked at a remote company before coming to thoughtbot?

SARA: Yes, I actually started working remotely in 2019, but even then, that wasn't my first time working remotely. I actually had a full year of internship in college that was remote.

JOËL: So you were a pro at this long before the pandemic made us all try it out.

SARA: I don't know about that, but I've certainly dealt with the idiosyncrasies that come with remote work for longer.

JOËL: What do you think are some of the challenges of remote work as opposed to working in person in an office?

SARA: I think definitely growing and maintaining a culture. When you're in an office, it's easy to create ad hoc conversations and have events that are small that build on the culture. But when you're remote, it has to be a lot more intentional.

JOËL: That definit