Podcasts are a great way to pass the time when you’re doing chores, doing your daily commute, or even walking the doggo’s. This will be a short post on my part, but I thought it would be worth posting which podcasts I listen to regularly and why. Since this is a technical blog, I’ll stick to the technical podcasts. But each of these are podcasts where I’m always looking forward to the next episode!
Windows Weekly
Windows Weekly | Microsoft Tech Podcast | Windows, Office, Xbox | TWiT
While there are really awesome things about both Mac OS and Linux, I’m primarily a Windows user. I’m a huge fan of the Microsoft Surface line of computers, and while I hope that they’ll someday be better at running Linux natively, they’re obviously primarily Windows machines. That said, I do also like Windows a lot, despite some questionable decisions made by Microsoft over the past few years (sorry, Microsoft, I do NOT need or want ads or Candy Crush on my computer). I also use Windows at my office being a .NET developer (thanks to .NET Core, the requirement for Windows is diminishing, but since I have to support legacy apps written with the classic .NET Framework, Windows it is for now). That said, it’s great to keep up to date on what’s going on with it.
Windows Weekly is hosted by Mary Jo Foley, Paul Thurott, and Leo Laporte on the awesome Twit.tv network. The show is a fantastic combination of informative and funny and covers a wide range of topics. Despite being called Windows Weekly, they really are covering Microsoft overall, including Office, Teams, Visual Studio, Servers, Azure, and so forth.
The three hosts have a natural chemistry that adds to the information that they’re sharing, and often ends up with some hilarious moments. I also appreciate that, while they’re fans of both Microsoft and Windows, they’re not apologists for either in any way. They’re honest. They’re blunt. And their arguments are well thought out. They’ll praise Microsoft when they deserve it, and they’ll rip them apart when they deserve it.
Check out the show if you never have and have any interest in the what and why of Microsoft.
.NET Rocks
.NET Rocks! vNext (dotnetrocks.com)
Hosted by Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell, .NET Rocks has been around since the beginning of .NET itself, and is one of the oldest podcasts in existence, technical or otherwise, with show #1 being recorded in August 2002, and their most recent episode being episode #1756! They routinely have guests on the show that are well known in the industry as pioneers and/or advocates, and cover a wide range of topics related to .NET development, and will sometimes cover other development topics as well.
One of my personal favorite topics covered is that, from time to time, Richard will research a subject and present the details in “geek out” episodes that typically don’t have anything to do with development, but are just fun “side adventures” into other topics. He’s done geek outs on BBQ, cold fusion, and aerospace technology, just to name a few.
The .NET Core Podcast
The .NET Core Podcast (dotnetcore.show)
This .NET Core focused podcast is hosted by Jamie Taylor, who works out of the United Kingdom. The content of this podcast, as you might guess, focuses primarily on .NET Core, the awesome cross-platform version of .NET. It clearly hasn’t been around as long as .NET Rocks has, but in its time, Jamie has produced a set of very high quality shows with fantastic guests and great content!
What The Tech
What The Tech – Technology Podcast – GFQ Network
What the Tech is hosted on the GFQ Network, and stars Andrew Zarian and the aforementioned Paul Thurrott. In What the Tech, Andrew and Paul cover a much wider range of technologies than the other podcasts that I’ve mentioned above. While they do talk about Windows and Microsoft, they also cover Google, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, etc., whatever the tech news of the day me be. Just as with Pauls work on Windows Weekly, he and Andrew do this in a fairly even-handed way, calling out bad practices where they see them, and affording praise where it is deserved. The show is about delivering details and ideas about what is going on, not about generating preferences one way or another.
Suggestions?
What about you? What technical podcasts do you listen to, and why?
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