The Test Set by Posit
Episodes
Your VP Is Doing a Rogue Analysis in Cursor Right Now — with Nell Thomas
23 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Nell Thomas has spent two decades in data — from equity research to the DNC to Facebook to leading a 400-person data org at Shopify. She walks Micha...
Sleeping Rats and Sociopathic Agents — with Phillip Cloud
09 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Phillip Cloud has been shaping the Python data ecosystem since the early pandas days — and he has *opinions*. Now a principal engineer at NVIDIA lea...
More productive but a lot less fun — with Charlie Marsh
23 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Charlie Marsh built Ruff, uv, and Ty — the tools that mass-fixed Python's worst pain points. Now he's grappling with what happens when age...
Alenka Frim: What yoga teaches us about discipline and collaboration in data science
09 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Alenka Frim went from teaching yoga full-time to becoming a committer and PMC Member on Apache Arrow. In this episode, Alenka joins The Test Set hosts...
Emily Riederer: Column selectors, data quality, and learning in public
26 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Emily Riederer writes Python with an R accent, and we’re all comfortable with it. In this episode, Emily reflects on her journey through R, Python, ...
Rebecca Barter: Persistent learning, tool building, and ‘Will code even exist?’
12 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Rebecca Barter, senior data scientist at Arine and adjunct assistant professor at the University of Utah, refuses to work on things she doesn’t care...
Marco Gorelli: Narwhals, ecosystem glue, and the value of boring work
15 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
You’ve probably used Narwhals without realizing it. It’s the compatibility layer helping apps and libraries like Plotly play nice with Pandas, Pol...
Kelly Bodwin — Quarto hacks, AI in the classroom, and why R should stay weird
01 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we’re joined by Kelly Bodwin — candy corn defender, board game enthusiast, and Assistant Professor of Statistics and Data Science...
James Blair: Part 2 — Solutions engineering, critical thinking, and staying human
17 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This episode is Part 2 of our conversation with James Blair. He explains how he found his “accidental perfect fit” as a solutions engineer and how...
James Blair: Part 1 — Portfolios, practice, and staying curious
04 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In Part 1 of our conversation with James Blair, we trace his delightfully non-linear path from childhood robotics dreams to journalism to R, with a fe...
Julia Silge: Part 2 — Glue work, licensing, and open source in the age of LLMs
20 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In part two of our conversation with Julia Silge, we discuss how work actually ships: the boundaries, the glue, and the tools that turn noise into sig...
Julia Silge: Part 1 — Positron, pineapple pizza, and the art of iteration
08 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In part one of our conversation with Julia Silge, astronomer-turned–data-science leader, we explore why data science needs a different kind of IDE. ...
Michael Chow: From psychology and Python to constrained creativity
25 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For this episode, we turn the mic around. Wes McKinney takes over the interviewer’s chair to chat with his co-host, Michael Chow. Michael’s a prin...
Roger Peng: Sustaining data science — in classrooms, code, and conversations
26 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Michael, Hadley, and Wes welcome Roger Peng, professor of statistics and data science at UT Austin and co-host of Not So Standard Deviations. Together...
Mine Çetinkaya-Rundel: Teaching in the AI era — and keeping students engaged
11 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In this conversation, Mine Çetinkaya-Rundel, data science educator at Duke University and Posit, joins Michael, Hadley, and Wes to talk about teachin...
Wes McKinney: Part 2 — The open source hustle and an insider view of Positron
29 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In part two of our conversation with Wes McKinney, we dig into the challenges and realities of sustaining open source development. Wes shares how fund...
Wes McKinney: Part 1 — Building Pandas, Arrow, and a speedrunning legacy
14 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Wes McKinney’s fingerprints are all over the modern data stack — from inventing Pandas to co-creating Arrow. But before all that, Wes was organizi...
Hadley Wickham: Spreadsheets, bikes, and the accidental empire of R packages
30 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Before Hadley Wickham became a pillar of modern data science, he was a spreadsheet-loving teenager making databases for his dad’s job. In this episo...