Linux Dev Time
Episodes
Linux Dev Time – Episode 149
03 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
It’s yet another hot questions episode. Colour schemes, syntax highlighting, code patterns, fonts, and keyboards. ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 148
19 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
We get into dependency management. The pros and cons of tools like Dependabot, the varying approaches with different languages and standard library si...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 147
05 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
It’s another hot questions episode. Whether we think better on our own or with other people, our non-standard debugging habits, favourite interv...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 146
22 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In the wake of Discord’s recent announcement about age verification, Matrix recently came in for a lot of criticism by a lot of people who said ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 145
08 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The importance of having and sticking to correct development processes, what can go wrong when you don’t, and how to fix the problems you might ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 144
22 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
People often like to talk down Electron, but it is really that bad? There may be better ways to use Web technologies to make desktop apps, but isnR...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 143
08 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The career progression options you have as a software engineer, moving from junior to senior dev, other paths you can go down like architecture or tec...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 142
25 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Software complexity is a complex topic, so we dig into it. Support us on Patreon and get an ad-free RSS feed...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 141
11 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Dealing with a crisis as a developer, how to keep everyone in the loop while you fix systems and code, why pointing the blame isn’t useful, som...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 140
28 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What we are likely to be doing when you hear this, and why it’s unlikely to involve much in the way of development. This is a short episode beca...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 139
14 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How far you can go with eliminating global variables, forcing everything you ever need to be passed in as arguments. Tails...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 138
30 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When the right time to make a big change to your software is, how you get users to test pre-release versions, how long you keep old features around, w...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 137
16 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What object-oriented programming is, why it went out of fashion, and how more modern approaches to development incorporate some of its aspects. ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 136
02 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Some of the languages that we love and why we love them. It’s not just Rust, honest! Support us on Patreon and get an ad-free RSS feed w...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 135
19 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
With constant news stories about security issues with developer-published software in package managers like npm, we weigh up the pros and cons of this...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 134
05 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What makes a good commit, the tools we use to help us produce good commits, and why we care about this. Support us on Patreon and get a...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 133
21 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Some of the alternatives to GitHub that we use, why we use them, and how they differ in terms of features and workflows. Support us on ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 132
07 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A lot of key open source software is paid for by large companies. That has some advantages, but it can also cause some issues. Maybe it would be bette...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 131
24 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We explore the differences between terms like coder, software developer, engineer, and architect. They are often used interchangeably, but there can b...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 130
10 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Not invented here syndrome is very common in open source. We get into why that is, when it makes sense to start your own project from scratch, and how...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 129
27 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
With the recent news of Bcachefs (probably) being removed from the Linux kernel, we are joined by Allan Jude from 2.5 Admins and Klara to discuss some...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 128
13 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What it takes to sustain a medium-to-large-sized open source project. Support us on Patreon and get an ad-free RSS feed with early epis...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 127
29 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When and how to use benchmarking in your project, why it’s hard, and why optimising your code can be even harder. Blog post about the speed of ri...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 126
15 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
How we deal with complex projects involving non-technical people as well as developers. How to manage expectations about timing, how to deal with issu...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 125
01 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What are the fundamental ideas and components of development and programming? Support us on Patreon and get an ad-free RSS feed with early...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 124
18 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It’s another hot questions episode. Tabs vs spaces, whether we have imposter syndrome, why software keeps getting heavier, the correct length of fun...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 123
04 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Andy is convinced that functional programming isn’t boring. Listen to find out if he’s right! Functional Programming & Haskell Beautiful Racket...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 122
20 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We’ve done hot takes episodes in the past but this is different, it’s hot questions. Would we rather have bad managers who can code or good manage...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 121
06 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Joe accidentally tried vibe coding and it was as much of a disaster as you’d imagine. Amolith has also tried it, and does his best to defend the use...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 120
23 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Our advice on how to move into a career in software development including making and contributing to projects, advocating for your work, collaborating...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 119
09 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Andy is only publishing his games on F-Droid and not the Google Play Store from now on, and he tells us why. Rabbit Escape Box Stacker Smolpxl Game...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 118
23 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We dig into the technical details of the Linux Kernel Rust drama. Support us on Patreon and get an ad-free RSS feed with early episodes somet...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 117
09 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Mark from Linux Matters who’s a web developer joins us to talk about working in PHP – a language that’s mature and well established, and how tha...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 116
26 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Where is the balance between efficiency and openness when it comes to saved file formats? If everything was based on plain text it would make the file...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 115
12 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We dig into SQLite – an interesting and unusual project that is widely used but has an uncommon licence, a proprietary test suite, and doesn’t tak...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 114
29 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We explore the line between developer and sysadmin and come to the conclusion that despite the clear difference between the roles, there is a lot of c...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 113
15 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by popey from Linux Matters to talk about how software packaging has changed over the years. The tooling has improved massively, contain...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 112
01 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
More of our development hot takes including excessive energy use, optimising your code, the importance of licences, Matrix and Jabber being on the sam...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 111
17 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Some of the work-adjacent things that we do including writing code that we shouldn’t like writing Rust in Rust, fun projects that turned into paid w...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 110
03 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Our development hot takes including “rewrite it in Rust”, lack of documentation, single vs multiple monitors, dependency numbers, light vs dark mo...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 109
20 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You need to be able to write good code to be a successful developer, but how important are other “soft” skills like communication, relating to and...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 108
06 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Campbell Barton joins us to talk about porting Blender, the hugely popular professional 3D software, to Wayland. Wayland support in blender task Wa...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 107
22 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What is it about Linux that draws us to it as a development platform? Plus why we choose the specific distros that we use. 1Password Ex...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 106
08 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Following on from our episode about dealing with a horrible codebase, Andy argues that completely rewriting a project is almost always a bad idea. Thi...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 105
25 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Kevin and Andy talk about their project extremes: the oldest and newest projects they’ve worked on, the biggest and smallest codebases, the ugliest ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 104
11 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How to deal with a horrible codebase that you’ve inherited. Getting started, breaking the problem into smaller pieces, understanding what’s actual...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 103
28 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Developing as part of an in-person team vs working remotely, synchronous vs asynchronous development, how to make a hybrid team work effectively, and ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 102
14 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What agile software development is exactly, why planning and being willing to adapt the plan are key, the pros and cons of all the process that’s in...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 101
30 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Andy is annoyed that so much free and open source software is hosted on a proprietary platform that’s owned by Microsoft. There are plenty of altern...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 100
16 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If you want to be a good developer, how many different programming languages should you learn? Maybe becoming an expert in one specific language is th...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 99
02 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Forks are a fundamental aspect of open source software so we get into the different types of forks, when and why you might want to fork a project, the...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 98
19 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Allan Jude to talk about what it’s like to run a company that develops and maintains open source software with a focus on upstream...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 97
05 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Andy is a huge proponent of test-driven development and explains why – including types of code testing including unit tests and integration tests, w...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 96
21 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Kevin and Andy answer Joe’s noob questions about development including the differences between compiled and interpreted languages, C vs C++, why the...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 95
07 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Drew DeVault to discuss his programming language called Hare, which aims for 100 years of forwards compatibility. We mentioned Drew’...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 94
24 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How we first learned to code, and how we learn new technologies now. Snake in Terraform Snake in lots of languages Web server in Sinclair BASIC ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 93
10 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What we’ve learned over the years about the interview process for software development jobs, both as the applicant and the interviewer. Kol...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 92
25 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The automation tools we use in our development and why we use them. Plus how to engage with your project’s community – both in real time, and asyn...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 91
11 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Andy Balaam joins us to talk about accepting contributions from devs with varying levels of experience. When to invest the time to mentor them, why do...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 90
28 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How we use AI coding assistants like GitHub Copilot, what they have done to the development industry, what might happen in the future, and the ethics ...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 89
14 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We follow up on last episode with some clarifications from Amolith about code collaboration. Plus we get into development workflows in general, code r...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 88
31 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When it comes to collaboration workflows, Amolith dislikes the pull request model that GitHub made popular and much prefers the email/patch-based appr...
Linux Dev Time – Episode 87
17 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Linux Downtime is now Linux Dev Time! In this first episode we talk about “sharpening our tools” – changing your dev tools, trying out new langu...
Linux Downtime – Episode 86
03 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Kevin joins us to talk about the hype that surrounds some programming languages like Rust and Python, how some languages like Java went out of fashion...
Linux Downtime – Episode 85
19 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a meme that software developers should be forced to use low end hardware to experience what it’s like to be a real user. So what hardware ...
Linux Downtime – Episode 84
05 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Roger Light to discuss what it’s like to work for a company that uses the open core model — maintaining an open source project an...
Linux Downtime – Episode 83
22 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Marcin Kulik – the creator and maintainer of asciinema. We talk about the project itself, developing on Linux, IDEs, targetting a t...
Linux Downtime – Episode 82
08 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Jim Salter joins us to talk about getting the most out of your open source project. From designing and planning, to attracting contributors, consideri...
Linux Downtime – Episode 81
24 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
How to get hired for your first development job, more on contributor license agreements, and our thoughts on different immutable OS approaches. Fid...
Linux Downtime – Episode 80
10 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Element developer Andy Balaam to talk about working on open source software after 20 years in the proprietary world. We get into work...
Linux Downtime – Episode 79
27 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are all on board with the right to be forgotten but it can cause some tricky problems for open source projects – particularly small ones. Plus wh...
Linux Downtime – Episode 78
13 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Why Amolith uses Arch, why Gary uses Debian, and why Joe uses Ubuntu. Factor Factor’s fresh, never frozen, meals are ready in just 2 minute...
Linux Downtime – Episode 77
30 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Contributor license agreements aren’t very popular, but not having a CLA can cause problems for projects in the future. Gary can’t do things like ...
Linux Downtime – Episode 76
16 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Chris Waldon to talk about how to get started with coding and software development. Chris mentioned his blog. Factor Factor’...
Linux Downtime – Episode 75
02 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Is there really a renaissance in open communication tools? Does the success of the Fediverse mean that people are finally moving away from the huge co...
Linux Downtime – Episode 74
18 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Jorge tries to address Félim‘s concerns about immutable desktop distros like Silverblue and Universal Blue. Factor Factor’s fresh, never fr...
Linux Downtime – Episode 73
04 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Amolith attempts to argue that avoiding ads using open source software is piracy, and that piracy in this case is good. See our contact page...
Linux Downtime – Episode 72
21 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Part 2 of our chat with Molly White from Web3 is Going Just Great. This time we talk about Mastodon and the Fediverse, central bank digital currencies...
Linux Downtime – Episode 71
07 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Molly White from Web3 is Going Just Great to talk about the issues with crypto, Bitcoin, the Lightning network, blockchain, NFTs, and...
Linux Downtime – Episode 70
23 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Liam from Gaming on Linux joins us to talk about the current state of Linux gaming, the Steam Deck, how things progressed to this point, Valve being t...
Linux Downtime – Episode 69
09 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Amolith from Linux Lads and Alan Pope to discuss Generation Z’s view of technology, and whether modern abstraction layers ultimatel...
Linux Downtime – Episode 68
26 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Alex from Self-Hosted to talk about home media setups. Is it a good idea to use a NAS running a desktop while connected to a TV, or d...
Linux Downtime – Episode 67
12 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What is the right level of customisation for the Linux desktop? See our contact page for ways to get in touch. Subscribe to the RSS feed.
Linux Downtime – Episode 66
26 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Should open source projects use open platforms for their communities, or should they meet people where they are – places like Discord? Join the Disc...
Linux Downtime – Episode 65
12 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Martin tells us about why he decided to work with Nix and NixOS professionally. He mentioned Determinate Systems and Zero to Nix See ou...
Linux Downtime – Episode 64
29 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In the modern world where we run more and more software from outside our distros’ repositories, how do we know what to trust? See our conta...
Linux Downtime – Episode 63
15 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Martin, Gary, and Hayden explain how their regular live streams benefit the open source projects that they work on. Martin’s Twitch and YouTube G...
Linux Downtime – Episode 62
18 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Modding a Game Cube with a Raspberry Pi Pico, writing a book about cross-platform and cross-architecture development, and the struggles of self-hosted...
Linux Downtime – Episode 61
04 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Alan Pope (popey) joins us to discuss building and fostering a positive and productive community. See our contact page for ways to get in tou...
Linux Downtime – Episode 60
20 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Martin has created a new desktop environment and a container tool, Gary has been clustering Raspberry Pis, and Hayden has been playing with the new Mi...
Linux Downtime – Episode 59
06 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Simon Butcher joins us to talk about how open source AI can be, in theory and in practice. See our contact page for ways to get in touch. ...
Linux Downtime – Episode 58
23 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What problems that we are currently facing will be solved with Linux and FOSS in the future, and why does it involve AI/ML? See our contact p...
Linux Downtime – Episode 57
09 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Does it matter where you host your FOSS code? GitHub benefits from the network effect, but other options have their own benefits. Plus Gary explains w...
Linux Downtime – Episode 56
25 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What’s the best way to implement telemetry and metrics in open source software, and should it be opt-in or opt-out? See our contact page...
Linux Downtime – Episode 55
11 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What F/OSS means to us and why it’s important. See our contact page for ways to get in touch. Subscribe to the RSS feed.
Linux Downtime – Episode 54
28 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It’s part 2 of our discussion about sustainability in FOSS. Make sure to listen to part 1 first. See our contact page for ways to get in...
Linux Downtime – Episode 53
14 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
There is a sustainability problem in FOSS. How do we fix it? See our contact page for ways to get in touch. Subscribe to the RSS feed.
Linux Downtime – Episode 52
31 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Hayden explains why he uses Windows Subsystem for Linux on a daily basis, and argues that Microsoft is a very different organisation from the one that...
Linux Downtime – Episode 51
17 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Martin and Hayden explain what it’s actually like to use GitHub Copilot, and why they think it’s going to have a positive impact open source softw...
Linux Downtime – Episode 50
03 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Stuart Langridge joins us to discuss the nuances of gatekeeping in the Linux community, and why he thinks we inadvertently engaged in it on the last e...