“Just in Case” vs. “Just in Time” with Aditya Bhargava

How you learn is important. Corey Quinn is joined by Aditya Bhargava, a Staff Software Engineer at Etsy and the author of Grokking Algorithms. They talk about the nuances of technical learning and the contrasting philosophies of "just in time" versus "just in case" learning. In this episode, Aditya emphasizes the importance of effective teaching methods and the value of incorporating fun things like drawings into technical explanations. This approach also bleeds into his illustrated Substack, DuckTypes. As Corey and Aditya discuss, a good, informative book doesn’t need to drag on, and this quick, insightful, 30-minute conversation is no different.

Show Highlights

(0:00) Intro

(1:24) The Duckbill Group sponsor read

(1:58) Corey's admiration for Aditya's writing

(5:40) How Aditya clearly explains AWS networking

(8:06) “Just in case” vs. “just in time”

(10:15) Why business books don't need to be hundreds of pages long

(14:19) Reading for pleasure vs. reading for work

(16:57) The Duckbill Group sponsor read

(17:24) Explaining Aditya's book on algorithms

(20:07) The great editor behind Aditya's book

(22:20) DuckTyped and how Aditya got into AWS networking

(25:16) Where networking folks fall in the era of the cloud

(28:12) The importance of staying up-to-date in your field

(31:46) Where you can find more from Aditya

About Aditya Bhargava

Aditya Bhargava is a Software Engineer with a dual background in Computer Science and Fine Arts. He blogs on programming at adit.io.

Links

• Aditya’s blog: https://www.adit.io/
• Grokking Algorithms, Second Edition: https://www.manning.com/books/grokking-algorithms-second-edition
• DuckTyped: https://www.ducktyped.org/
• Last Skeet in AWS: https://lastskeetinaws.com/

Sponsor

The Duckbill Group: duckbillgroup.com