The Bike Shed

Latest Episodes:

479: Hardly Strictly Remotely In-Person Oct 21, 2025

Show notes

Aji and Sally set out to crack the problems surrounding remote working as they share their thoughts on the various aspect of working from home.

Together they discuss their time at the recent thoughtbot summit in Amsterdam, how they felt about working in-person again, what they took away from the experience, the best remote solutions they’ve found to recreate that in-person feeling, and what friction points about remote working still linger for them both.

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Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

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478: ADHD at work Oct 14, 2025

Show notes

Aji and Sally sit down to discuss their struggles with ADHD and the systems they have in place to stay focused at work.

They each share the note taking systems and tools they use to navigate a normal working day, how they came to fully understand and manage their ADHD, and Sally reminds us all why it’s very important to use a slash in your Slack reminders.

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This episode of the Bike Shed has been sponsored by Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way, check the link for your free gift!

Try out the reminder app Aji mentioned in this episode to help keep yourself on track.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

477: Change Management Oct 07, 2025

Show notes

Time to plan an upgrade as Joël and Aji talk about the hurdles involved with various change management in their projects.

The pair lay out some different approaches to protecting your data when planning a migration, the risks of code and data changes, the elements that will and won’t be affect in the process, and Joël gives his experience on a tough migration project and what he learnt from it.

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If you’ve not used Merge before you can learn more about it here.

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Aji Slater

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

476: Green Flags for Code Sep 30, 2025

Show notes

Joël and Sally sit down to discuss their green and red flags when it comes to PR review.

Joël breaks down the different ways humans review code vs AI, how they both break down large projects into smaller digestible PRs and clarifying your reasoning for certain decisions, as well as discussing the most common red flags they’ve encountered when looking over code.

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Take a break from coding to brush up on your Roman History.

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

475: Invisible Mentorship Sep 23, 2025

Show notes

Sally and Aji discuss their experiences with invisible mentorship when it comes to code review.

Together they question when is the right time to have conversations with your team in a bid to chase improvement, the importance of understanding your co-workers perspectives, as well as the best ways to initiate a mentoring moment.

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Check out some of the things mentioned in this episode - The Coding Train - Sarah Mel’s Livable Code

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

474: Board games and programming Sep 16, 2025

Show notes

It’s board game night at the Bike Shed as Joël and Aji crack out the game pieces to assess how their work as programmers influences strategy when playing some of their favourite games.

As they make their way round the board they discuss the cycle of setbacks and iteration, finding the optimal solution to a puzzle, as well as the key skills that best links their programming work to board games.

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Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Check out the upcoming conferences mentioned in this episode - XO Ruby and Rocky Mountain

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

473: Mental models for browsers Sep 09, 2025

Show notes

Joël prepares to write his new book by asking Sally some fundamental questions about Web browsers.

Together they look to answer the deceptively simple question of what is a browser, examining what they are at their core, what they’re capable of beyond basic functions, the nuances of programming for the web across different systems and devices on the front and back end, as well as unpacking the surprising benefits of different forms of browsers like the terminal text based platform Lynx.

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Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

472: What is the skill in software development? Sep 02, 2025

Show notes

Sally and Joël kick off a new season of the Bike Shed by asking the question, what exactly is it that we as developers even do around here?

Together they discuss their roles as developers, how their workflows and skills have changed over time, the value of context and experience when evaluating different solutions to a problem, why so much of their work revolves around googling error codes, and giving some advice to aspiring junior developers.

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Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

471: New Hosts Join the Show Aug 26, 2025

Show notes

Joël is joined by some familiar faces in today’s episode of the Bike Shed to help reveal some exciting changes to the show as he asks his new co-hosts, what’s new in your world?

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Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Joining Joël Quenneville as your new co-hosts are Aji Slater and Sally Hall.

Get to know your hosts a little better by checking out Sally’s recent episode on timezones or Aji’s RailsConf Keynote and handy list of previous keynotes.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed

470: All about queues with Adam McCrea Aug 19, 2025

Show notes

Joël talks with Adam McCrea, founder of Judoscale, about the best ways to manage your queues and autoscaling.

Adam discusses some tough lessons he learnt recently during a technical outage at Judoscale, what exactly autoscaling is and how it works, the best signals to assess when working with an autoscaler, and provides some simple tips to better organise your own queues.

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You can connect with Adam via LinkedIn or check out the work he does with Judoscale, who have also sponsored this episode of The Bike Shed. Be sure to claim your free gift if you haven’t already!

Thanks to the second sponsor of this episode Scout Monitoring.

Your host for this episode has been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: hosts@bikeshed.fm

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

Support The Bike Shed