Dr. Amit Deshwar, a scientist specializing in machine learning, discusses using machine learning to speed up drug discovery and fight diseases like cancer. They explore Amit's career path, his research on pan cancer analysis and RNA therapeutics, and the process of drug development using machine learning. They also touch on the advantages of being located in San Francisco for machine learning and share unique experiences and interests in the city.

Programmer legend Jeff Atwood, co-founder of Stack Overflow and Discourse, talks about software development, community building, large language models, VR, and self-driving cars. They also discuss the importance of toxicity management in online communities, the significance of the freeCodeCamp community, the early days of programming and personal computers, ergonomics for programmers, public learning, discourse servers, AI without consent, and addressing toxic individuals in a community. They touch on the transition from remote work to office work and effective communication methods.

Today I'm talking with Sean Smith, one of freeCodeCamp's earliest graduates. Sean's also a prolific open source contributor, having helped develop freeCodeCamp's original React curriculum. Sean grew up in Tenessee and was an avid outdoorsman and rock climber. He went to college hoping to become a doctor. He even interned at the National Institutes of Health and published in the Journal of Virology. But one day he decided to leave the field – with no clear plans for the future – Leaving his friends and family puzzled. For two years, Sean worked at climbing gyms across Tenessee as a route setter, climbing the walls and installing climbing holds. And one day he decided he needed to learn to code. I caught up with Sean in downtown San Francisco, in a café that both he and I had coincidentally worked out of early in our developer careers. I learned a lot about Sean's journey into tech that took him from working in San Francisco to Singapore to Taipei. And spoiler alert: during the podcast we talk about Sean's job search. I'm happy to report that since I interviewed him last month, he's landed a developer job at a company focused on AI and e-commerce. If you dig this podcast, be sure to leave us a review. I'm excited to read any feedback you have for me. And tell your friends. It really helps us inspire more people. Sean Smith on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanmatthewsmith/

Today I'm talking with Sasha Sheng. She's a software engineer who worked at Yahoo and at Facebook. During her 9 years working at big tech companies in San Francisco, she worked on mobile apps and AI systems. Sasha grew up in rural China, and was the first person in her family to attend university. She studied hard and was able to get into one of China's most competitive schools. She was able to move to the US and finish out her Mechanical Engineering degree at University of Michigan. When Sasha got laid off 8 months ago, she hit the ground running. She immersed herself in learning the new wave of AI tools. And she applied those new skills at hackathons, winning several competitive events. I caught up with Sasha to hear her thoughts on AI engineering, AI safety, and how we can get more women into tech. If you dig this podcast, be sure to leave us a review. I'm excited to read any feedback you have for me.  Check out Sasha on Instagram: www.instagram.com/hackgoofer Follow Sasha on Twitter: and www.twitter.com/hackgoofer One of Sasha's Hackathon projects: Chat Out Loud: https://github.com/ytsheng/chat_out_loud_gpt

Today I'm joined by Shawn Wang, AKA Swyx. I first interviewed Shawn in 2019. Back then, Shawn had quit his $350k a year finance job and taught himself to code using freeCodeCamp. He was working as a full stack engineer. It's a wild interview that you should go back and listen to... after of course you finish listening this. Now a lot of people thought Shawn was crazy leaving finance. But this dude knew what he was doing. He has now risen through the ranks as a developer at tech startups. And now he's starting an AI startup of his own. He's already off to a strong start, having raised a $3 million pre-seed round from investors. This is the first time I've ever invited a guest return to the freeCodeCamp podcast for a second interview. And there was so much to talk about, I feel like I could have interviewed Shawn for days. The man has been eating, sleeping, and breathing AI engineering for the past year. I learned so much from talking with him. I'm confident that you will, too. Watch Swyx's AI Engineering conference live stream: https://ai.engineer The Latent Space Podcast: https://www.latent.space/podcast Follow Swyx on Twitter: https://twitter.com/swyx

Today I'm interviewing a long-time friend and role model of mine, Megan Kaczanowski. We met up in Brooklyn to talk about her journey into information security. She studied economics at University of Michigan before working in finance in New York City. But her ambitions lead her into cyber security – first as a threat analyst at a credit rating agency, and later as a Security Architect at a bank and a startups. Over the years, she's volunteered at charities around New York, and she's authored dozens of security tutorials as a contributor to freeCodeCamp. We talk about her journey into tech and her advice for folks getting into security – especially women. As with every time I talk with Megan, I learned a lot. And I hope you'll a lot, too. If you dig this podcast, be sure to leave us a review. I'm excited to read any feedback you have for me.  And tell your friends. Megan's many information security tutorials on freeCodeCamp: https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/author/megansdoingfine/ Follow Megan on Twitter: https://twitter.com/megansdoingfine Read the book she mentioned about the first ever worm: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cuckoo%27s_Egg_(book) Watch Mr. Robot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U94litUpZuc  

today I'm joined by Brian Douglas. He's a software engineer who's worked at tech companies like GitHub and Netlify. And now he's an entrepreur runs his own startup – OpenSauced.pizza. Brian grew up in a small town in Florida, and his family was the only black family in town. He worked hard in school and earned a full scholarship to Florida State University, where he studied business. He started off working in sales, but gradually taught himself how to code. It took a while to get into the software, but he was ultimately able to move his family out to the San Francisco Bay Area. If you dig this podcast, be sure to leave us a review. And tell your friends. Follow Brian Douglas on Twitter: https://twitter.com/bdougieYO And check out his open source tool: https://opensauced.pizza

Today I'm joined by Sarah Shook is a software engineer who started out as a recruiter, then started learning system administration on the job at a school. She didn't finish university. She learned to code on the job, from studying freeCodeCamp, and from attending a short bootcamp that she won free admission to. And she did all of this while raising 3 kids. She is a career-long remote worker, and insists she will never work somewhere where she needs to be away from her kids. Today she runs software development agency and works with clients.  Sarah and I talk about her coding journey, how she's worked to overcome depression and severe shyness, and her love of front end libraries like Tailwind CSS. If you dig this podcast, be sure to leave us a review. And tell your friends. It really helps. Without further ado, my interview with Sarah Shook. Sarah Shook on Twitter: https://twitter.com/shookcodes

Welcome back to the freeCodeCamp Podcast. I'm Quincy Larson, teacher and founder of freeCodeCamp.org. And I'm bringing you insight from developers, entrepreneurs, and ambitious people getting into tech. It's been 4 years since we published a podcast episode. It's good to be back. This is the first of three interviews I'm publishing this week – my interview with Danny Thompson. Danny's a bit a legend among career changers.  He had a kid early in life. For 10 years he worked at a gas station in Tennessee, frying chicken for people to eat. He sometimes worked 80 hour weeks just to provide for his family. And yet, Danny had ambition. He taught himself to code using freeCodeCamp. He built his network through local tech events. And eventually, he landed his first job as as software developer.  Danny's since worked at tech companies like Google and Front Door, and he's now a software engineer at AutoZone, a major US retail chain. Danny has helped so many people along the way. He's developed a free course on how to leverage LinkedIn as a developer. And he's helped start a ton of local developer meetups. I couldn't dream of a better interview to kick off this new season of the freeCodeCamp podcast. New season. That's right. I've got dozen interviews lined up, and I'm recording these all in-person, in public libraries across Dallas, San Francisco, and New York City. I'm publishing 3 episodes this week, and then a new episode every Friday. We're talking about DevOps, cybersecurity, AI – tons of topics that I know you're gonna find helpful as you continue to expand your skills. If you dig this podcast, be sure to leave us a review. And tell your friends. Danny on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DThompsonDev

In this special crossover episode, we celebrate 10 years of The Changelog. It's the home of the biggest podcast focused on open source, and a favorite of freeCodeCamp founder Quincy Larson. This 4-hour episode is actually 2 interviews: 1. For the first 2.5 hours, Quincy interviews Changelog co-hosts Adam Stacoviak and Jerod Santo about how they got into software development and podcasting, and the history of their legendary podcast. 2. Then we end with Adam and Jerod turning the tables and interviewing Quincy about the past and future of freeCodeCamp.org. If you haven't heard of The Changelog before, it is website that hosts a podcast about open source software. Each week they interview new developers from around the software galaxy and explore what makes those projects tick. Adam Stacoviak founded The Changelog exactly 10 years ago. And Jerod Santo joined as co-host 7 years ago. Together - across 370 episodes - they've interviewed everyone from programmer legends, to the maintainers of open source projects you may have never even heard of. Quincy has listened to hundreds of The Changelog episodes over the years, and credits The Changelog with giving him such a broad view of open source, and the philosophies of the developers who started these projects. These interviews were conducted in-person in Adam's Houston-based studio. If you haven't yet, you should subscribe to The Changelog podcast. They have a variety of shows. We recommend starting with their Master Feed, which lets you explore all of their shows: https://changelog.com/master And check out the special website they built to celebrate their 10 year anniversary: changelog.com/ten Follow Adam on Twitter: https://twitter.com/adamstac Follow Jerod on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jerodsanto And Quincy is: https://twitter.com/ossia