Podcast
The MonkCast
Hosted by RedMonk · EN
Join the developer-focused industry analysts at RedMonk as they discuss news and trends in the software space with leaders and practicioners in cloud, AI, IaC, security, DevOps, developer relations, observability, data, and more.
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Meet RedMonk's Analysts
James Governor, Principal Analyst & Co-founder
Stephen O'Grady, Principal Analyst & Co-founder
Rachel Stephens, Research Director
Kate Holterhoff, Senior Industry Analyst
27episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Tech for Chickens with JT Perry
4d ago00:26:07Tap to summarizeIn this MonkCast Conversation, RedMonk Research Director Rachel Stephens talks with JT Perry, co-founder of Barn Analytics, about building ChickenSense — a hardware and software product that uses RFID tags and in-coop sensors to monitor backyard chicken health. JT shares how his own farming experiences led him to build a solution for detecting illness in egg-laying chickens before it's too late. They discuss the challenges of designing custom circuit boards for the first time, managing Bluetooth communication in environments without Wi-Fi, navigating tariffs and supply chain uncertainty, and the chicken-and-egg problem (pun very much intended) of building a data analytics platform before you have the data. Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/tech-for-chickens-with-jt-perry/Chapters:00:00 Introduction and Background01:32 From Tech Burnout to Farming (With Computers)02:46 The Hypothesis: Weight Loss as a Health Indicator05:34 Bluetooth, Battery Life, and Coop Connectivity09:18 Protecting Hardware from Chicken Grossness11:22 Manufacturing and Supply Chain Challenges12:26 The Platform16:24 Biggest Engineering Challenges17:54 Target Market and the Cattle-Pets Spectrum20:08 Roadmap and Product #2: USDA Temperature Monitoring22:37 The Team Behind Barn Analytics23:16 Lightning Round: Chicken Names, Horrors, and Eggs
Transcribe →Going Down the Stack: AI Inference, Kernel Fusion, and Model Tuning with Paul Brookes
2w ago00:25:07Tap to summarizeIn this MonkCast conversation, RedMonk's James Governor talks with Paul Brookes, a senior AI engineer at TurinTech, about making AI inference faster and cheaper. TurinTech predates the generative AI boom, having spent years optimizing complex code with genetic algorithms, and now points those tools at the models themselves. Brookes walks through techniques like kernel fusion and model compilation that squeeze more tokens per second out of specific hardware, drawing on the company's work with Intel on OpenVINO and vLLM. The two get into running capable open models such as Qwen on local machines, the spiraling cost of AI , and why judging engineers by tokens burned misses the point. Brookes also describes Artemis and its discovery harness, which lets agents learn from past results, and traces his own route from quantum physics into low-level performance engineering.This RedMonk conversation is sponsored by TurinTech.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/paul-brookes/Chapters00:00 Introduction to AI and TurinTech01:42 Optimization Challenges in AI04:30 Working with Semiconductor Companies08:46 The Cost of AI and Local Model Deployment11:29 Local Model Performance and Infrastructure14:44 Partnerships and Breakthroughs with Intel16:54 Key Techniques for Optimizing Inference19:39 The Role of AI Engineers21:50 Bridging the Gap with Customers23:21 Harnessing AI for Continuous Improvement
Transcribe →When Agents Become Users: Rethinking Developer Portals with Balaji Sivasubramanian
2w ago00:44:03Tap to summarizeAre internal developer portals dead? In this RedMonk conversation, Kate Holterhoff talks with Balaji Sivasubramanian, Senior Director, Product Management, Agentic AI Developer Platform at Red Hat, who isn't convinced. While some thought leaders claim that developers will soon live inside their own coding agents, making portals obsolete, Balaji argues that enterprises still need the golden paths and guardrails IDPs provide. Balaji's case is that a portal's UI matters less now, while the curated, verified context behind it matters more. Along the way they get into MCP's limits, context freshness, the rising cost of tokens, and why human judgment still beats an agent at some tasks.This RedMonk conversation is sponsored by Red Hat.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/balaji-sivasubramanian/Chapters00:00 Introduction to the Conversation00:54 Balaji's Role at Red Hat01:58 The Importance of Developer Portals in AI02:30 Debunking the 'Death' of Developer Portals04:12 The Evolution of User Interfaces and AI Agents06:50 The Impact of AI on Developer Workflows10:32 Understanding AI Hallucinations in Development13:25 Navigating Permissions and Audit Logs with AI15:37 Challenges of Agent-Driven Actions23:49 Transforming Ticketing Systems with AI26:25 Navigating Enterprise Complexity31:33 Building Effective Agents36:36 The Challenge of Freshness in Data43:16 Ensuring Safe Agent Deployment49:01 The Future of Portals in an Agentic Era
Transcribe →AI Code Optimization by Experimentation, Without Free Bread, with Mina Ilieva
3w ago00:28:55Tap to summarizeRedMonk's James Governor sits down with Mina Ilieva, AI engineer at TurinTech AI, to talk about a problem everyone in 2026 recognizes: we're shipping a lot of code slop. Ilieva explains how TurinTech's platform, Artemis, fights back. It began life running a genetic algorithm that scores candidate code against a fitness function, and it now has a newer tool, Discovery, built on an empirical loop where agents form hypotheses, turn them into experiments, and verify every change before a human approves it. The two get into what clients actually optimize for — throughput, latency, memory, runtime — and why none of it is free. Ilieva walks through real wins with Intel's vLLM work, QuantLib, BLAKE3, and a quantized Nemotron model. They also take apart "token maxxing," the habit of burning tokens to look busy, and make the case that verification skill, not raw output, is what keeps engineers employable.This RedMonk conversation is sponsored by TurinTech AI.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/mina-ilieva/Chapters00:00 Introduction to AI and TurinTech02:52 Code Optimization and Its Importance05:35 Use Cases and Client Engagements08:55 Token Efficiency and Cost Management11:46 The Role of AI in Software Development14:47 Trade-offs in Optimization17:37 Future of AI and Model Deployment
Transcribe →Chris DeMars on Patching and Security in the AI Era
4w ago00:42:51Tap to summarizeRedMonk's Kate Holterhoff sits down with Chris DeMars, Senior Developer Advocate at TuxCare, for a conversation about patching in the AI era. Chris started writing code in Q Basic in the mid-90s and now spends his time at conferences explaining the JavaScript supply chain to people who'd rather not think about it: typosquatting, the Shai-Hulud worm, and getting locked out of his own VS Code editor at Vueconf. They get into why a Dockerfile that Claude wrote him pulled in an insecure version of Node, why most enterprise customers are nowhere near migrating off end-of-life software regardless of the modernization story being sold to them, and what rebootless live patching actually looks like once a CVE drops.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/chris-demars/Chapters00:00 Introduction and Background of Chris DeMars02:59 The Role of Developer Advocacy in Security05:52 JavaScript Ecosystem and Security Challenges08:54 AI's Impact on Security Practices11:42 Developers' Awareness of Security Issues14:50 The Importance of Patching and CVEs17:37 The Future of Security in Development21:09 The Process of Fixing Vulnerabilities24:01 Modernization vs. Legacy Systems24:50 Engagement with the Open Source Community26:45 Challenges for Open Source Maintainers27:36 Enterprise vs. Smaller Companies29:39 The Role of AI in Upgrading Systems33:37 Compliance and Regulation Concerns38:24 Understanding Live Patching41:32 Closing Thoughts and Future Directions
Transcribe →An Interview with Kyle Daigle at Microsoft BUILD 2026: Models, Tokens, Agents & Developer Calm
Jun 2500:35:27Tap to summarizeAt Microsoft Build 2026, RedMonk's James Governor sits down with Kyle Daigle, COO at GitHub and CMO of Developer at Microsoft, to unpack the event. The conversation looks at Microsoft's first homegrown frontier models, the growing importance of "token economics", new NVIDIA Spark-powered hardware, the push toward containerization and isolation for agents both on-device and in the cloud, and Windows improvements aimed at a calmer developer experience. Daigle also previews the agent-first GitHub Copilot app with its shareable canvases, and addresses developer anxiety amid industry layoffs, insisting Microsoft's principle remains keeping developers in the loop.This RedMonk conversation is sponsored by Microsoft.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/kyle-daigle/Chapters00:00 Introduction to Developer Marketing at Microsoft02:08 Microsoft's Frontier Models and AI Innovations05:06 Local Model Execution and Security Concerns07:58 The Role of AI in Developer Productivity11:08 GitHub Copilot and the Future of Software Development14:20 Windows for Developers: Enhancements and Configurations17:05 Hardware Partnerships and Performance Expectations20:10 Supporting Developers in a Changing Landscape23:12 Addressing Reliability and Scalability Challenges
Transcribe →Jack Herrington on TanStack's npm Mini Shai-Hulud Compromise
Jun 2300:54:01Tap to summarizeKate Holterhoff sits down with Jack Herrington, Principal Software Engineer at Netlify and maintainer of TanStack AI, to walk the May 2026 TanStack npm supply-chain compromise. They discuss the incident in depth, including the risk of chained attacks, the role of GitHub Actions, what we know about the hackers and mini shai-hulud. Jack also weighs in on why developers are becoming more security aware and why the supply chain and CI/CD is more important than ever in the AI era.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/jack-herrington/Chapters:00:00 Introduction and Background09:08 The TanStack Hack Incident19:26 Security Insights and Lessons Learned26:45 Evolving Cybersecurity Threats34:22 Understanding Vulnerabilities in Open Source40:47 AI in Development and Security Concerns49:50 Advice for Open Source Maintainers
Transcribe →Inside the Acquisition: VoidZero Joins Cloudflare with Evan You
Jun 1601:00:20Tap to summarizeIn this MonkCast Conversation, RedMonk analyst Kate Holterhoff talks with Evan You, the creator of Vue.js and Vite and founder of VoidZero, just days after VoidZero announced joining Cloudflare. Evan clarifies what the deal does and does not include, as well as the history of how it came about. He's also candid about the motives that inspired VoidZero to look for partnership with a cloud provider. They also discuss the state of open source and frontend tooling in 2026. Can independent open source infrastructure survive today without getting bought by a bigger platform? Why Evan is still unconvinced that Vue needs a foundation. What is AI doing to the economics, and the craft, of building in the open?Cloudflare is a RedMonk client, but this RedMonk conversation is unsponsored.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/evan-you/Chapters:00:00 Introduction to Evan You and VoidZero02:37 The Acquisition and Its Implications05:26 Vue and Vite: Independence and Future Directions08:15 Monetization Challenges and Business Models11:23 Collaboration with Cloudflare and Development Experience14:34 Community Concerns and Competition in the Market17:08 Funding and Support for Open Source Contributors29:34 Building a Community and Team Dynamics31:02 Lessons Learned from Open Source Monetization38:26 Navigating AI's Impact on Open Source44:24 The Foundation Debate for Open Source Projects49:31 The Bundler Wars: Performance and Artifact Size
Transcribe →Steren Giannini on Google Cloud Run: Past, Present & Future
Jun 1101:17:17Tap to summarizeGoogle Cloud Run is a few years old now, and in this RedMonk Conversation, James Governor sits down with one of its founders, Steren Giannini, to talk through where it came from and where it's going. Back in 2017, most people assumed serverless meant functions. Steren's team disagreed. They figured the real value of serverless was simplicity, scale, and paying only for what you actually use, and that the thing you deploy should be a container, not a function. That call ended up shaping the whole product. James and Steren get into the decisions that gave Cloud Run its longevity: staying opinionated about simplicity without boxing developers in, a Kubernetes-compatible API designed so you can walk away whenever you want, and an open debt to Heroku's git-push experience. Steren is also honest about the messier parts, from fighting feature creep, to building the enterprise networking and security that big customers needed, to handling the traffic that AI agents are now generating. Looking ahead, Steren argues that the next generation of developers might be anyone who can describe an app in a prompt and hit publish.Google is a RedMonk client, but this is an independent piece of content.Show Notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/steren-giannini-google-cloud-run/Chapters:00:00 Introduction to Google Cloud Run01:08 The Origins of Cloud Run02:12 Design Principles and Longevity05:35 Openness and Portability in Cloud Run07:23 Open Source Strategy and Knative10:42 Simplicity and User Experience12:22 Progressive Complexity in Design14:23 Embracing Developer Standards16:21 Learning from Heroku18:02 Focus on Quality and User Feedback19:44 Cloud Run's Satisfaction and Popularity22:01 The Rise of AI Agents24:56 Adapting to Evolving Workloads27:44 Collaboration with Other Google Cloud Products30:23 Innovations for AI and Long-Running Workloads31:19 Notable AI Companies Using Cloud Run34:28 Cloud Run's Growth and Success37:19 Infrastructure Preparedness for Scale40:02 Scaling and Resource Management in Cloud Services44:09 Enterprise Features and Customer Needs46:53 Refocusing on Developer Experience51:16 Simplifying Complex Systems56:50 Security Challenges and Solutions01:05:03 Real-World Applications and Use Cases01:10:30 The Future of Cloud Run and AI Integration
Transcribe →Juan Cruz Viotti on JSON Schema, the Invisible Infrastructure Powering APIs and LLMs
Jun 200:18:47Tap to summarizeJSON Schema might be the most important technology you've never thought about. In this MonkCast, Rachel Stephens sits down with Juan Cruz Viotti, founder of SourceMeta and member of the JSON Schema Technical Steering Committee. They discuss how JSON Schema is the backbone of OpenAPI specs and just might be the language of AI.Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/juan-cruz-viotti-json-schema/Chapters00:40 - What is JSON Schema?03:00 - JSON Schema in OpenAPI and AI05:30 - Challenges in API Ecosystem Management07:00 - Siloed API Specs and Governance Issues08:00 - Benefits of Schema Layer Governance09:30 - JSON Schema as a Data Dictionary11:00 - JSON Schema in AI and Code Generation13:30 - SourceMeta's Ecosystem and Tools16:00 - Small Teams and Infrastructure Innovation16:50 - AI, Documentation, and Data Semantics17:30 - Vision of the Future
Transcribe →