Oxide and Friends

Latest Episodes:

Solutions Software Engineering with Matthew Sanabria May 07, 2025

Show notes

Matthew Sanabria joins Bryan and Adam to talk about his role at Oxide--Solutions Software Engineer--and how it fits in with engineering, sales, support and marketing. It takes everyone in Busytown! Sound good? Apply!

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by Oxide colleague, Matthew Sanabria.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them:

If we got something wrong or missed something, please file a PR! Our next show will likely be on Monday at 5p Pacific Time on our Discord server; stay tuned to our Mastodon feeds for details, or subscribe to this calendar. We'd love to have you join us, as we always love to hear from new speakers!

Shootout at the CNCF Corral May 01, 2025

Show notes

Last week the kerfuffle between Synadia and CNCF, tussling over the ownership and futures of NATS, bled into the public. The outcome may cast a long shadow for open source and for the CNCF. Bryan and Adam were joined by Rachel Stephens and Adam Jacob to discuss how we got here and possible outcomes.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by Rachel Stephens Adam Jacob, and Eliza Weisman.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them:

Postscript:

The CNCF updated its blog with proof that the ACH transfer of $10,000 was completed [still very funny! -ahl].

Derek Collison--as reported by Runtime News--has agreed to transfer the NATS trademark to the CNCF "because we just feel that the damage to the ecosystem and the ugliness is not worth it for anyone."

Bringing up Cosmo Apr 24, 2025

Show notes

Oxide is bringing up its next generation server. To discuss the (amazingly smooth) bringup process, Bryan and Adam were joined by members of the oxide team. Tales of adversity, re-work, un-re-work, and triumph!

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by Oxide colleagues Nathanael Huffman, Ian Sobering, Matt Keeter, and Aaron Hartwig.

We mentioned quite a few terms! Here's a helpful guide:

Cosmo - Oxide’s next-generation sled (currently in development) with an AMD Turin CPU
Gimlet - Oxide’s current-generation sled with an AMD Milan CPU
Turin - AMD Epyc 9005 Series
Milan - AMD Epyc 7003 Series
Genoa - AMD Epyc 9004 Series (Oxide chose to skip this generation)
Sequencing - the precise control of when power rails are energized throughout a PCB
Sled - One of the (max 32) computers in an Oxide rack; a custom form-factor optimized for power and cooling efficiency
IBC - Intermediate Bus Converter (Our 54VDC -> 12VDC converter)
RoT - Root of Trust
SP - Service Processor, the small computer (running Hubris) that allows for low-level control
Ignition - An even lower-level control network for power management (including power of the SP)
Ruby - The AMD reference platform (Oxide has used this to prepare Cosmo software in advance of bringup)
DC-SCM - https://www.opencompute.org/documents/ocp-dc-scm-spec-rev-1-0-pdf and OpenCompute standard form factor.
Grapefruit - OCP DC-SCM form-factor board with our SP, RoT, and FPGA on it, used to replace the OCP DC-SCM baseboard management controller in the Ruby platform.
Cadence - Software Oxide previously used for PCB design
Altium - Software Oxide now uses for PCB design
Hubris - Oxide’s embedded operating system, run on the SP and RoT
Humility - The Hubris debugger
PLM - Product Lifecycle Management – a class of software used for managing hardware BOMs
BOM - Bill of Materials – the components required to build a hardware product
RFK - Our colleague, Robert Keith (to distinguish him from our other colleague, Robert, and our former colleague, Keith)
FPGA - Field Programmable Gate Array – Also referred to as “soft logic” – effectively programmable hardware
ILA - Integrated Logic Analyzer
JTAG - A debugging interface for various processors
UART - A serial port or connection

For previous tales from the bringup lab:

Character Limit with Kate Conger and Ryan Mac Apr 17, 2025

Show notes

Bryan and Adam have been gushing for months over Character Limit, the fantastic book by Kate Conger and Ryan Mac about Elon Musk's haphazard and disastrous takeover of Twitter. They're joined by the authors themselves to discuss the book, Musk, DOGE, and some of the Character Limit unreleased B-sides.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, our guests were Ryan Mac and Kate Conger.

Hell is other networks Apr 04, 2025

Show notes

An Oxide customer encountered a peculiar issue at the intersection of their Oxide network and their broader network. Bryan and Adam were joined by several members of the Oxide team who collaborated to investigate and--ultimately--solve the problem using a combination of tooling, intuition, and dark knowledge.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by Oxide colleagues, Levon Tarver, Alan Hanson, Will Chandler, and Trey Aspelund.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them:

PRs needed!

Raiding the Minibar Apr 01, 2025

Show notes

Much of the work at Oxide goes into hardware and software used to build and test the eventual product. Bryan and Adam were joined by Ian, Doug, and Nathanael to talk about "Minibar", a rig for connecting up an Oxide server (code name: Gimlet) for manufacturing and internal use. Triumphs and catastrophes including stabbing a connector with a guide pin and bringup mishaps!

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, speakers included Ian Sobering, Doug Wibben, and Nathanael Huffman,

Some other, related Oxide and Friends

Images from the show:

Lip-Bu Tan's Intel Mar 21, 2025

Show notes

Intel has a new CEO! And it's Lip-Bu Tan. We had assumed it would not be Lip-Bu--he was such a clear front-runner that the more time passed the less likely it seemed it would be him... and yet! Bryan and Adam were joined by Reuter's Max Cherney to discuss.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, our esteemed guest was Max Cherney; we were also joined by Bryan Russett, and Alex Kesling.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them:

A Happy Day For Rust Mar 15, 2025

Show notes

Recently, a change to a utility in the Rust toolchain changed behavior in a way that impacted users. Rather than being a story of frustration and aspersions, it was a story of a community working... and working well together! Bryan and Adam were joined by Dirkjan Ochtman (of the rustup team) and Steve Klabnik to discuss.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by special guest, Dirkjan Ochtman, and treasured colleague, Steve Klabnik.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them:

Steve: A Happy Day For Rust
PRs needed!

A Crate is Born Mar 06, 2025

Show notes

Bryan and Adam were joined by Oxide colleagues Andrew, Rain, and John to talk about creating a general purpose crate for diffing structures. More generally, how do you know when something new is needed? How do you know when the investment of time to validate an idea is warranted? Software engineering is hard! (And also: general enthusiasm for Rust macros.)

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by Oxide colleagues, Andrew Stone, Rain Paharia, and John Gallagher.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them:

Checking in on Bryan's 1 Year Intel CEO prediction
Hiring letter to Intel's co-CEO
From The Register "Re-hire Gelsinger!"
Oxide RFD 457: Control plane sled lifecycle
Oxide RFD 459: Control plane component lifecycle
daft crate
diffus crate

Transparency in Hardware/Software Interfaces Feb 28, 2025

Show notes

The value of transparency in engineering can have huge benefits--nothing can compare to the momentum of an enthusiastic community! Bryan and Adam discuss the value of transparency at the hardware/software interface with Oxide colleague, Ryan Goodfellow. Transparency can be scary--especially in the hardware domain where secrecy is the norm--but once we knock down some of those fears, the business benefits start to emerge.

In addition to Bryan Cantrill and Adam Leventhal, we were joined by Oxide colleague, Ryan Goodfellow.

Some of the topics we hit on, in the order that we hit them: