RedMonk August 2024 Update
A small, sharp research firm focusing on developer-led technology adoption and developer culture. We help folks understand the industry by understanding you.
It’s time for another monthly update, this time from your favorite* RedMonk analyst, Rachel.
I adore when global events bring the world together – the rare moments when we all stop to witness something extraordinary. In the last month we’ve had a series of moments unite us in awe and spectacle.
Athletes flipping and twisting through the air! Impossibly close races! Amazing feats of strength! Blue screens of death causing outages around the world! There has been so much to watch with wonder!
Here are some of the lessons I have taken to heart from my summer as a spectator:
Whatever you’re doing, lean in with your whole chest. (Sprinter Noah Lyles wins the 100m)
Celebrate the successes of others. Your real competition is with yourself. (Gymnasts Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles hail the victory of Rebeca Andrade)
Leave it all on the mat. Even your shoes, if you’re awesome enough. (Greco-Roman wrestler Mijaín López retires after winning) five consecutive Olympic golds)
By all means embrace resources that enable you to do your best, but remember that success can also appear humble and low-tech. (Contrasting the styles of unflappable pistol shooters Kim Yeji and Yusuf Dikeç)
You don’t have to be an expert at everything; it’s okay to specialize. (Gymnast Stephen Nedoroscik excels at pommel horse)
Go read Blue Ocean Strategy if you want metaphors about riding waves. My takeaway was: compete in events that happen in Tahiti. (Surfer Gabriel Medina rides an iconic wave.)
Last but not least, practice progressive delivery and gradual deployment when pushing global updates. (CrowdStrike takes out millions of Windows machines worldwide with an improperly validated content update)
Enjoy the rest of your summer! Don’t miss the Paralympics at the end of the month, and as always, be careful about how you use wildcards in your software testing!
* Margin of error: +/- 4 analysts
Links Roundup
Upcoming book alert: Nicole Forsgren and Abi Noda have a book about Developer Experience in the works.
The official post-mortem from CrowdStrike and a great discussion of the incident from Oxide and Friends.
Why AI training data is drying up and the methods that creators are employing to halt the practice of free-for-all web scraping
Techniques in prompt engineering for docs from Tom Johnson
A useful writeup from the always excellent Heidi Waterhouse on navigating various speaker stage/tech setups
Check out The Developer Science Review, a curation of scientific research pertinent to developers (bonus: learn what an overlay journal is)
Featured Article
“In the longer term, Valkey represents – whatever the project’s ultimate fate might be – the first real, major pushback from a market standpoint against the prevailing relicensing trend.”
Stephen O’Grady on the state of open source in The Post-Valkey World RM clients mentioned: Amazon, Google, Heroku (Salesforce), MongoDB, Neo4J, Oracle, Percona and Redis
Recent RedMonk Research
Kate Holterhoff on what the great AI rebrand means for search: AI and the Future of Search RM clients mentioned: Dynatrace, Elastic, Fauna, Google, Honeycomb, and Redis
Kelly Fitzpatrick dissects her experiences during this spring/summer’s Season of AI Conferences, starting with (Part 1): Content Curation at SW2Con RM clients mentioned: Cloudflare, GitHub, Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Stacklok
Recent Videos and Media Appearances
RedMonk’s Kelly Fitzpatrick joins VMware by Broadcom’s Cora Iberkleid (Developer Advocate) and Michelle Sebek (Product Marketing Engineer) for a quick look at the Spring ecosystem and a deep dive into Spring Application Advisor, which is designed to keep Spring applications up to date at scale.
Rachel Stephens guests on The Cloud Gambit podcast episode Tech Debt, Communities, and the Rise of the New Kingmakers to discuss tech debt, layoffs, software development trends, and more.
James Governor and Moti Rafalin, CEO and Founder of vFunction, dive into findings and strategies for combating software complexity in this webinar on Conquering Complexity in the Age of Monoliths and Microservices
Kate Holterhoff guests on Scaling Devtools and shares why Frontend Developers: the Newest New Kingmakers are increasingly dictating the adoption of new developer tools.
In What is a Cloud Native Buildpack? How to Build a Portable App with Paketo James Governor and Ram Iyengar, chief evangelist of the Cloud Foundry Foundation, discuss the evolution and significance of buildpacks in modern software development.
New on the MonkCast
Local First, Cryptographic Proofs, and Data Anywhere: RedMonk analyst Kate Holterhoff and J Chris Anderson, cofounder of Couchbase and CEO of Fireproof, discuss trends in the data space including the history and importance of Apache CouchDB, the evolution of client-side technologies, and the local-first movement.
A Quickish Take on VMs: RedMonk principal analyst and co-founder Stephen O’Grady talks virtual machines (VMs) in this quickish take, outlining what they are, high-points in VM history, major players in the space, how containerization and Kubernetes shook up the infrastructure landscape, and why VMs continue to matter in 2024.
How Coding Bootcamps Leverage AI, Corporate Partnerships, and Community Building: Tina-Marie Gulley, Interim CEO at Ada Developers Academy, discusses her background and the intersection of technology, DEI, and education with Kate Holterhoff, senior analyst at RedMonk.
A RedMonk Conversation: Generative AI is Changing How Developers Work: Adam Seligman, VP of developer experience at AWS, chats with Kate Holterhoff, senior analyst at RedMonk, about the continuing importance of developer relations, the impact of developer certification programs, and the changing landscape of software engineering with the advent of generative AI.
RedMonk Recommends
This part of our newsletter introduces those of you looking to hire talented individuals to people we know who are looking for new opportunities.
This month RedMonk recommends Jessica West. Those who attended Monki Gras 2024 have already experienced Jessica’s strategic planning and organizational magic, but her skill set extends far beyond helping RedMonk host awesome events.
Jessica’s career encompasses engineering, management, marketing, and sales roles. She is known for her ability to make technical concepts meaningful and accessible. Her specialty is using her technical acumen and communication skills to help bridge gaps between teams. You may have witnessed her public-facing work in building communities and delivering fantastic conference talks, but she also excels at getting into the weeds with customers and engineers on a technical level.
Jessica is looking for consulting work with companies that are building tools for developers. Her broad skill set makes her a particularly good fit for high-growth companies that need someone to tackle a variety of problems, from the strategic to the minutia. Check out Jessica’s Linkedin profile for more details about her expertise.
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See available sponsorship opportunities here and contact Morgan Harris with any questions you might have about sponsorships, including pricing.
Can’t decide which sponsorship is right for you? Help RedMonk improve underrepresented communities’ access to tech events by sponsoring the Monktoberfest’s Diversity Program, or help bring our one-of-a-kind talks (and a brief intro piece from your org) to an even larger audience as our Video Series Sponsor.
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Meet the Monks
Events we'll be attending:
VMware Explore: 8/26 - 8/29/2024, Las Vegas, NV
Dreamforce 2024: 9/16 - 9/19/2024, San Francisco, CA
Current 2022: 9/17 - 9/18/2024, Austin, TX
Write the Docs Atlantic 2024: 9/22 - 9/24/2024, Virtual
Events we'll be hosting:
The Monktoberfest 2024: 10/3 - 10/4/2024, Portland, ME. Tickets available now!
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