Engineering teams around the world are building AI-focused applications or integrating AI features into existing products. The AI development ecosystem is maturing, which is accelerating how quickly these applications can be prototyped. However, taking AI applications to production remains a notoriously complex process. Modern AI stacks demand LLMs, embeddings, vector search, observability, new caching layers, and constant adaptation as the landscape shifts week to week. Increasingly, the data layer has become both the foundation and the bottleneck to AI app productionization.

MongoDB has been expanding beyond its core document database into a full AI-ready database platform with integrated capabilities for operational data, search, real-time analytics, and AI-powered data retrieval. The company also recently acquired Voyage AI to provide accurate and cost-effective embedding models and rerankers to its users.

Fred Roma is a veteran engineer and is currently the SVP of Product and Engineering at MongoDB. He joins the show with Kevin Ball to talk about the state of AI application development, the role of vector search and reranking, schema evolution in the LLM era, the Voyage AI acquisition, how data platforms must evolve to keep up with AI’s breakneck pace, and more.

Full Disclosure: This episode is sponsored by MongoDB.

Kevin Ball or KBall, is the vice president of engineering at Mento and an independent coach for engineers and engineering leaders. He co-founded and served as CTO for two companies, founded the San Diego JavaScript meetup, and organizes the AI inaction discussion group through Latent Space.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

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Package management sits at the foundation of modern software development, quietly powering nearly every software project in the world. Tools like npm and Yarn have long been the core of the JavaScript ecosystem, enabling developers to install, update, and share code with ease. But as projects grow larger and the ecosystem more complex, this older infrastructure is beginning to show its limits with performance bottlenecks, dependency conflicts, and growing concerns around supply chain security.

Darcy Clarke and Ruy Adorno are veterans of this ecosystem. Both spent years maintaining the npm CLI and helping guide the Node.js project, where they saw firsthand the technical debt and design tradeoffs that define modern JavaScript tooling. Now they’re building vlt, a new package manager and registry that rethinks performance, security, and developer experience from the ground up.

In this episode, Darcy and Ruy join Josh Goldberg to discuss how vlt works, why they believe package management needs a server-side reboot, what lessons they’ve drawn from npm’s evolution, and how features like declarative querying, self-hosted registries, and real-time security scanning could reshape how developers build and share JavaScript in the years ahead.

Josh Goldberg is an independent full time open source developer in the TypeScript ecosystem. He works on projects that help developers write better TypeScript more easily, most notably on typescript-eslint: the tooling that enables ESLint and Prettier to run on TypeScript code. Josh regularly contributes to open source projects in the ecosystem such as ESLint and TypeScript. Josh is a Microsoft MVP for developer technologies and the author of the acclaimed Learning TypeScript (O’Reilly), a cherished resource for any developer seeking to learn TypeScript without any prior experience outside of JavaScript. Josh regularly presents talks and workshops at bootcamps, conferences, and meetups to share knowledge on TypeScript, static analysis, open source, and general frontend and web development.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Next-Gen JavaScript Package Management with Ruy Adorno and Darcy Clarke appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

WebAssembly, or WASM, has grown from a low-level compilation target for C and C++ into one of the most influential technologies in modern computing. It now powers browser applications, edge compute platforms, embedded systems, and a growing ecosystem of languages targeting a portable and secure execution model.

Andreas Rossberg is a programming languages researcher and former member of the V8 team at Google. Andreas helped architect WebAssembly from its earliest concepts through its most recent milestone releases, including the groundbreaking 3.0 spec that introduces garbage collection, richer reference types, and major steps toward multi-language interoperability.

In this episode, Andreas joins Kevin Ball to explore the history of WebAssembly, the constraints that shaped its earliest design, the major turning points in versions 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, and what’s coming next for WebAssembly.

Kevin Ball or KBall, is the vice president of engineering at Mento and an independent coach for engineers and engineering leaders. He co-founded and served as CTO for two companies, founded the San Diego JavaScript meetup, and organizes the AI inaction discussion group through Latent Space.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post WebAssembly 3.0 with Andreas Rossberg appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Surveillance technology is advancing faster than the laws meant to govern it. Across the United States, police departments are deploying automated license plate readers, facial recognition tools, and predictive systems that quietly log the daily movements of millions of people. These tools promise efficiency and safety, but critics argue that they represent a form of warrantless mass surveillance, and raise deep constitutional questions about privacy, accountability, and the limits of government power in the digital age.

Michael Soyfer is an attorney at the Institute for Justice, a nonprofit public interest law firm focused on defending individual rights. His work centers on the Fourth Amendment and the growing use of surveillance technologies by local governments. Michael joins the show with Kevin Ball to discuss the rise of Flock Safety cameras, the Institute for Justice’s lawsuit against the City of Norfolk, how decades-old legal precedents struggle to keep up with modern technology, and what citizens, technologists, and policymakers can do to protect privacy in an era of pervasive data collection.

Kevin Ball or KBall, is the vice president of engineering at Mento and an independent coach for engineers and engineering leaders. He co-founded and served as CTO for two companies, founded the San Diego JavaScript meetup, and organizes the AI inaction discussion group through Latent Space.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post America Under Surveillance with Michael Soyfer appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Modern software development is evolving rapidly. New tools, processes, and AI-powered systems are reshaping how teams collaborate and how engineers find satisfaction in their craft. At the same time, developer experience has become a critical function for helping organizations balance agility, security, and scale while maintaining the creativity and flow that make top tier engineering possible.

Capital One is continuously transforming its developer culture, with a focus on faster development cycles, reducing operational overhead, and boosting productivity across the organization.

Catherine McGarvey is the SVP of Developer Experience at Capital One. She joins the podcast with Sean Falconer to talk about what developer enablement means at enterprise scale, measuring developer productivity, being agile in a regulated environment, AI in enterprise development, the future for developers, and much more.

Full Disclosure: This episode is sponsored by Capital One.

Sean’s been an academic, startup founder, and Googler. He has published works covering a wide range of topics from AI to quantum computing. Currently, Sean is an AI Entrepreneur in Residence at Confluent where he works on AI strategy and thought leadership. You can connect with Sean on LinkedIn.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Developer Experience at Capital One with Catherine McGarvey appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Modern software development is more complex than ever. Teams work across different operating systems, chip architectures, and cloud environments, each with its own dependency quirks and version mismatches. Ensuring that code runs reproducibly across these environments has become a major challenge that’s made even harder by growing concerns around software supply chain security.

Nix is a powerful open-source package manager that builds software in controlled, declarative environments where dependencies are explicitly defined and reproducible. Its functional approach has made it a gold standard for reproducible builds, but it can also be difficult to learn and adopt.

Flox is a company that builds on top of Nix, with increased supply chain security and abstractions that streamline the developer experience.

Michael Stahnke is the VP of Engineering at Flox and formerly worked at companies including Caterpillar, Puppet, and CircleCI. He joins the podcast with Kevin Ball to talk about Flox, building on top of Nix, how reproducibility underpins software security, the concept of “secure by construction, how deterministic environments are reshaping both human and AI-driven development, and much more.

Full Disclosure: This episode is sponsored by Flox.

Kevin Ball or KBall, is the vice president of engineering at Mento and an independent coach for engineers and engineering leaders. He co-founded and served as CTO for two companies, founded the San Diego JavaScript meetup, and organizes the AI inaction discussion group through Latent Space.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Flox, Nix, and Reproducible Software Systems with Michael Stahnke appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Visual Studio Code has become one of the most influential tools in modern software development. The open-source code editor has evolved into a platform used by millions of developers around the world, and it has reshaped expectations for what a modern development environment can be through its intuitive UX, rich extension marketplace, and deep integration with today’s tooling landscape. Now, in an era defined by rapid advances in AI-assisted programming, VS Code is at the center of a profound shift in how software is written.

Kai Maetzel is the Engineering Manager leading the VS Code team at Microsoft. He joins the show with Kevin Ball to talk about the origins of VS Code, how AI has reshaped the editor’s design philosophy, the rise of agentic programming models, and what the future of development might look like.

Kevin Ball or KBall, is the vice president of engineering at Mento and an independent coach for engineers and engineering leaders. He co-founded and served as CTO for two companies, founded the San Diego JavaScript meetup, and organizes the AI inaction discussion group through Latent Space.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post VS Code and Agentic Development with Kai Maetzel appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Blender Studio is the creative arm of the Blender Foundation and it’s dedicated to producing films, games, and other projects that showcase the full potential of Blender. The studio functions as both an art and technology lab and pushes the boundaries of 3D animation through open productions. All of their assets, production files, and workflows are shared publicly, which gives artists and developers valuable resources to learn from and build upon.

Most recently, Blender Studio released its second game, DOGWALK, where the playable character is a dog exploring snowy winter woods with a child. The project was built entirely with open-source tools including Blender, the Godot engine, Krita for concept art, Kitsu for project management, and Linux.

Simon Thommes is a Lead Technical Artist at Blender Studio and a developer on DOGWALK. He joins the podcast with Joe Nash to talk about Blender Studio, the process behind building DOGWALK, and developing a pipeline between Blender and Godot.

Joe Nash is a developer, educator, and award-winning community builder, who has worked at companies including GitHub, Twilio, Unity, and PayPal. Joe got his start in software development by creating mods and running servers for Garry’s Mod, and game development remains his favorite way to experience and explore new technologies and concepts.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Blender and Godot in Game Development with Simon Thommes appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

JavaScript has grown far beyond the browser. It now powers millions of backend systems, APIs, and cloud services through Node.js, which is one of the most widely deployed runtimes on the planet. Keeping such a critical piece of infrastructure fast, secure, and stable is a massive engineering challenge, and the work behind it is often invisible.

Rafael Gonzaga is a Principal Open Source Engineer at NodeSource and a member of the Node.js Technical Steering Committee. He’s spent years digging into the performance and security layers of Node’s core, helping shape the direction of the runtime itself. Rafael joins the show to talk about the state of Node.js performance, how benchmarking really works, the balance between speed and stability, and what it means to contribute to one of the world’s most important open-source projects.

Josh Goldberg is an independent full time open source developer in the TypeScript ecosystem. He works on projects that help developers write better TypeScript more easily, most notably on typescript-eslint: the tooling that enables ESLint and Prettier to run on TypeScript code. Josh regularly contributes to open source projects in the ecosystem such as ESLint and TypeScript. Josh is a Microsoft MVP for developer technologies and the author of the acclaimed Learning TypeScript (O’Reilly), a cherished resource for any developer seeking to learn TypeScript without any prior experience outside of JavaScript. Josh regularly presents talks and workshops at bootcamps, conferences, and meetups to share knowledge on TypeScript, static analysis, open source, and general frontend and web development.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Node.js in 2026 with Rafael Gonzaga appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Zachtronics is a legendary independent game studio known for creating intricate, engineering-focused puzzle games that merge logic, creativity, and code. The studio was founded by Zach Barth in 2011, and it has become a cult favorite among programmers and tinkerers alike with titles such as SpaceChem, Infinifactory, TIS-100, and Shenzhen I/O. Most recently, Zachtronics released Kaizen: A Factory Story, in which players take on the role of an American engineer hired by a Japanese manufacturing company in the 1980s to design assembly processes for various products.

Zach Barth joins the podcast with Joe Nash to talk about the games he makes.

Joe Nash is a developer, educator, and award-winning community builder, who has worked at companies including GitHub, Twilio, Unity, and PayPal. Joe got his start in software development by creating mods and running servers for Garry’s Mod, and game development remains his favorite way to experience and explore new technologies and concepts.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Designing Innovative Puzzle Games with Zach Barth appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Rivals of Aether and Rivals of Aether II are indie fighting games that combine fast-paced platform combat with elemental-themed characters. The game takes inspiration from Super Smash Bros. and emphasizes skillful movement, tight controls, and competitive balance, making it popular in the fighting game community.

Dan Fornace is a game director and designer at Aether Studios, the developer of Rivals of Aether. He joins the show with Joe Nash to talk about developing platform fighting games.

Joe Nash is a developer, educator, and award-winning community builder, who has worked at companies including GitHub, Twilio, Unity, and PayPal. Joe got his start in software development by creating mods and running servers for Garry’s Mod, and game development remains his favorite way to experience and explore new technologies and concepts.

Please click here to see the transcript of this episode.

Sponsorship inquiries: [email protected]

The post Rivals of Aether with Dan Fornace appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.