Sophie DeBenedetto and Meryl Dakin on Training and Building Elixir Projects Under Constraints

Today on the show we are joined by Sophie DeBenedetto from GitHub and Meryl Dakin from Frame.io to talk about the processes involved in training others and building Elixir projects. They share about studying and working together at the Flatiron School and what they do now in their respective new roles at Github and Frame.io. During their time at Flatiron, they worked on various projects, often collaborating with engineering teams from other companies and having to train these team members in Elixir. They talk about how they managed to develop new features while simultaneously onboarding new people and getting everyone on the same page. For them, the pair programming model had been most beneficial, and they discuss the habits and practices they implemented to encourage team members, optimize each learning experience, and share knowledge during training events. Sophie and Meryl also share the Elixir-specific challenges they encountered while developing applications for 2U, how Elixir’s failure-first programming capability guided them, how they prepare for training workshops, and the productivity hacks that keep them focused and energized.

Key Points From This Episode:

• How Sophie and Meryl know each other from working and studying at the Flatiron School.
• Frame.io as a tool that facilitates the communication between video editors and clients.
• Meryl’s new role as a full-stack developer working with Elixir and React.
• The projects they worked on at Flatiron and partnering with various companies like 2U.
• Their secret to developing new features while also introducing new team members to Elixir.

• The benefits of pair programming and teaching a programming language to others.
• Reserving time to celebrate wins and knowledge share during training events.
• Key lessons they learned from their collaboration with the 2U team.
• Elixir-specific challenges during the development of the applications project with 2U.
• How Elixir’s failure-first programming capability ultimately helps developers.
• Sophie and Meryl’s experience using LiveView at Flatiron and the problems encountered.
• The work that went into preparing for training workshops.
• Advice for teaching someone who is not technical to become a working developer.
• Productivity hacks to stay focused and regain energy.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Sophie DeBenedetto on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/sophiedebenedetto/
Sophie DeBenedetto on Twitter — https://twitter.com/sm_debenedetto
Meryl Dakin in LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/meryldakin/
Meryl Dakin on Twitter — https://twitter.com/meryldakin
Eric Oestrich — https://oestrich.org
Frame.io — https://frame.io
GitHub — https://github.com
Flatiron School — https://flatironschool.com
Elixir — https://elixir-lang.org
React — https://reactjs.org
2U — https://2u.com
Kubernetes — https://kubernetes.io
Ruby — https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/
Elixir School — https://elixirschool.com/en/
Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain — https://www.amazon.com/Drawing-Right-Side-Brain-Definitive/dp/1585429201
Etsy — https://www.etsy.com
EMPEX NYC Conference — https://empex.co/nyc.html
SmartLogic — https://smartlogic.io/

Special Guests: Meryl Dakin and Sophie DeBenedetto.