Freedom Dumlao: What 70 Java Services Taught Me About Focus

More from Maintainable

1. 

   E209 · 1 Jul 2025 · 57 min

   Joel Chippindale: Why High-Quality Software Isn’t About Developer Skill Alone

   Is high-quality code really just about developer skill? According to CTO coach Joel Chippindale, the key to maintainable software often lies in the conversations you have before writing a single line of code. In this episode, we explore how to reframe technical debt, build cross-team trust, and make legacy systems easier to change.

2. 

   E208 · 10 Jun 2025 · 50 min

   Melanie Sumner: Why Continuous Accessibility Is a Strategic Advantage

   What if accessibility wasn’t a checklist—but an integrated part of your development workflow? Melanie Sumner shares how her team at HashiCorp is building with purpose and why continuous accessibility gives them a lasting edge.

3. 

   E207 · 20 May 2025 · 56 min

   Joe Masilotti: Simplify Your Stack, Ship Mobile Sooner

   Consultant Joe Masilotti shares why most mobile apps don’t need to be fully native, how he helps Rails developers simplify their stack, and what it means to be a respectful guest in someone else’s codebase.

4. 

   E205 · 8 Apr 2025 · 49 min

   Mercedes Bernard: Friendly Code Welcomes Everyone In

   Mercedes Bernard believes that friendly code is the truest measure of maintainability. She shares how teams can reduce friction, make small architectural wins, and advocate for technical debt investment without sounding the alarm.

5. 

   E204 · 1 Apr 2025 · 1 hr 9 min

   Evan Phoenix: The Why of the One Line

   What if trying to “future-proof” your code is actually making it harder to maintain? Evan Phoenix shares how a well-intentioned monolith split went sideways—and why clarity and confidence matter more than cleverness.

6. 

   E203 · 25 Mar 2025 · 47 min

   Chris Salvato: Building Developer Paradise by Sitting in the Problem Space

   Senior Staff Engineer Chris Salvato believes that understanding real bottlenecks starts with focusing on the problem space. Instead of rushing in to fix legacy code, he listens—deeply—to the people behind it. By trimming bloat and clarifying the domain, Chris reveals how a few carefully chosen changes can transform a codebase.

7. 

   E229 · 6 Oct 2026 · 54 minNew

   Matija Šošić: Abstractions Aren’t Going Anywhere

   What happens to frameworks when generating code becomes cheap enough that nobody particularly cares about the boilerplate anymore? Matija Šošić joins Robby to talk about boring software, abstraction as a form of restraint, Wasp’s decision to abandon its custom DSL, and why AI may make good abstractions more valuable rather than less.

8. 

   E228 · 29 Sep 2026 · 54 min

   José Valim: Designing a Language You Can Maintain for Decades

   What changes when the software you’re maintaining is a programming language that thousands of other applications depend on? José Valim joins Robby to trace Elixir from a frustrating Rails concurrency bug to a language designed for long-term evolution, then looks at how AI is changing documentation, dependencies, coding tools, and open-source maintenance.

9. 

   E227 · 8 Sep 2026 · 1 hr 22 min

   John Athayde: Maintaining the User Side of Software

   The user interface of a long-lived application carries years of technical decisions, design choices, and organizational history. John Athayde joins Robby to explore how teams can untangle that front-end sprawl, and what changes when AI makes it much easier to analyze and rewrite what came before.

10. 

    E226 · 1 Sep 2026 · 54 min

    Kristin Isaac: The Customer Doesn’t Care About Your Technical Debt

    Customers don’t ask you to pay down technical debt. They notice when the product is slow, unreliable, or keeps breaking in the same damn way. Kristin Isaac joins Robby to explore how engineers can translate invisible maintenance work into customer and business impact… and why that skill may become even more important as AI makes software faster to create than to understand.

Every episode of Maintainable →