The Changelog: Software Development, Open Source

Maintaining the massive success of Envoy (Interview)

Oct 30, 2020

Matt Klein, creator and maintainer of Envoy at Lyft, shares insights on the unexpected success of this edge proxy designed for cloud-native applications. He discusses the shift in Lyft's approach to open source and why he chose not to launch Envoy as a commercial venture. The conversation highlights the importance of community engagement, the challenges of maintaining open source projects, and the balance between an open-source ethos and commercial pressures in the tech landscape.

59:31

Creator website

Episode guests

Matt Klein

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Episode notes

Intro

3min

The Evolution of Envoy: From Lyft’s Challenge to Industry Standard

5min

The Journey of Envoy: From Proxy to Open Source Success

20min

Navigating Success and Challenges in Open Source Development

2min

Building Community in Open Source

20min

Reflections on Tech: Envoy and Community

8min

Exploring the Life of Open Source Maintainers

2min

Today we welcome Matt Klein into our Maintainer Spotlight. Matt is the creator of Envoy, born inside of Lyft. It’s an edge and service proxy designed for cloud-native applications. Envoy was unexpectedly popular, and completely changed the way Lyft considers what and how to open source. While Matt has had several opportunities to turn Envoy into a commercial open source company, he didn’t. In today’s conversation with Matt we learn why he choose a completely different path for the project.

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Featuring:

Matt Klein – Website, GitHub, X
Adam Stacoviak – Website, GitHub, LinkedIn, Mastodon, X
Jerod Santo – GitHub, LinkedIn, Mastodon, X

Show Notes:

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