ctrl-alt-expletive

By: Mark McCracken & Michael McCarthy
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  • Summary

  • Join us for a laid back catch up on what's going on in the world of software, enterprise business, news for software and tech, and miscellaneous bureaucracy.
    © 2025 Cracksoft
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Economics Management Politics & Government
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Episodes
  • Episode 10: Career Changes and Coding Bootcamps, with Chris Hunter

    Episode 10: Career Changes and Coding Bootcamps, with Chris Hunter
    Feb 8 2025
    Michael keeps up with his "listen to 100 albums in a year" resolution. Mark has a weights rack of shame. Chris fails dry Jan by a matter of days. There's a 1% chance we'll all be mush anyway. GIVE US FEEDBACK! Do this form, it will take 4 mins (https://forms.office.com/e/gQJFBRJJAY) Chris Hunter Working in government on a project with other consultancies also contributing. Are they in competition? Lovely personal github readme (https://github.com/chriswhunter89) Quickfire Questions Hurling, GAA, or other? Most used terminal command at the moment? Dev or Ops, pick one for the rest of you life. Dream Industry to work in? Least enjoyable technologies you've worked with? Michael's weirdest habbit? How scared are you AI will take your job? What's your "getting down to write code" music? Breaking Prod Clean sheet, but has seen a team unable to deploy to prod for over a month! Big Topics Changing Careers You’ve had a big career change. * What made you decide you wanted to change careers? * Were you frustrated with the day-to-day job, or environment? Lack of variation? Lack of opportunities? * Presumably you were on at least alright money, was it worrying taking a pay cut? * Did you have to build a financial buffer to finance the change? * Do you wish you had done it sooner? Or timed it right? * How did you go about skilling up? Coding Bootcamp, at Le Wagon (https://www.lewagon.com/london) All in person, or online? What sort of topics did you cover? Anything you loved or hated? You had a few months gap after the coding bootcamp, before your job. Was that nerve wracking? To think you’d spent a few months of time/money, and not yet got a job? Were you already warmed up to the idea that finding work might just take a while? Did you get guidance on how to go about getting a job? Has the content you learned then all been useful? Any cruft? How is the pay now, relative to your previous role? Was it a great investment? Any advice for anyone considering a career change into tech? News AI sensors used in homes of vulnerable people (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp827ekneg4o) Ontario responds to Trump tariff by pitching Starlink deal into the trash (https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/03/ontario_canada_responds_to_trump_tariff/) EU's AltStore Gets First Native iOS Pornography App (https://www.macrumors.com/2025/02/03/eu-altstore-porn-app/) Irish AI minister has never used ChatGPT (https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/04/irish_ai_minister) Australia bans DeepSeek on government devices (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8d95v0nr1yo) Abandoned S3 buckets and the potential to do harm on a SolarWinds+ scale (https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/04/abandoned_aws_s3/?td=rt-3a) Elon Musk lies about gaming ability (https://fortune.com/2025/01/20/elon-musk-video-games-scandal-path-of-exile-asmongold-quin/) Recommendations Music The Long Forever, Elephant Tree & Lowrider (https://music.apple.com/gb/album/the-long-forever/1775636079) Studio Ghibli, Anime Music (https://music.apple.com/gb/playlist/joe-hisaishi-studio-ghibli-works-essentials/pl.9d00cd92b13746c096dd552d24a46a3b) Podcast Search Engine: The New Zuckerberg (https://www.searchengine.show/listen/search-engine-1/the-new-zuckerberg) Movies Dune 2 (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15239678/) The Brutalist (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8999762/) GIVE US FEEDBACK! Do this form, it will take 4 mins (https://forms.office.com/e/gQJFBRJJAY) Special Guest: Chris Hunter.
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    1 hr and 27 mins
  • Episode 9: Contracting Insights from 3 decades of Experience with Marie Wigmore

    Episode 9: Contracting Insights from 3 decades of Experience with Marie Wigmore
    Jan 31 2025
    Michael has caved and got a new microphone, China are back in the news, and we've got a better joke than last time. Michael is on the super stouts Marie is doing dry "couple-of-days" What's a plosion? Michael has over-researched micophones Is Feng-Shui a load of nonsense? Or Real? Marie rubbishes Mark's new years resolution Who is Marie Wigmore (https://www.ctrl-alt-expletive.com/guests/marie-wigmore)? Independent contractor for over 3 decades, currently engaged at BT Jira-avoidance wizard Graduate of the Youth Training Scheme, proud achiever of 5 O-Levels Driving Licence holder There will be a quiz at the end! Quickfire questions Inside or Outside IR35? Microsoft Project Planner or Jira? AI - scared or not scared? If you were in charge, what's your RTO policy? Do you prefer to consult for public sector, or consult for private sector? Sports Car or SUV? Most Expensive Dress you've ever worn? One fashion tip for Mark? Cat person or dog person? Breaking Production Leaderboard (https://www.ctrl-alt-expletive.com/breaking-prod-leaderboard) Clean Sheet, or Big Bang? Marie has a podcast exclusive for us, on the post office scandal. Bloody toffee-crisp eaters! Big Topics Contracting How has it changed? Are the good times behind us? How have the big 4 influenced government policy? Have you ever had any contracts go bad, mid-way through? In the past, you’ve got a contract coming to an end, it’s not getting renewed, you’ve got bills to pay. What’s the game plan for landing you next gig? Starting a consultancy What’s the gameplan for launching a new company? What are you gonna sell? How will you get clients? News for the week Experts urge caution over use of Chinese AI Deepseek (The Guardian) (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/28/experts-urge-caution-over-use-of-chinese-ai-deepseek) James Howells suing Newport council again, after partner binned bitcoin wallet, and they won't let him dig up landfill (BBC) (https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgr0dyy152jo) Microsoft to acquire tiktok? (The Guardian) (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/28/donald-trump-microsoft-tiktok-purchase-claims) Google maps renaming, after Trump renaming (The Register) (https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/28/google_maps_trump_order/) Amazon prime air to launch in Darlington (Tech Crunch) (https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/28/amazons-prime-air-drone-service-is-headed-to-this-uk-town/) AWS & Microsoft CMA investigation (Computer Weekly) (https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618449/AWS-and-Microsoft-could-face-targeted-intervention-from-CMA-over-UK-cloud-competition-concerns) Old news, but relevant: * Chinese major hardware hack uncovered (The Guardian) (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/13/tech-giants-us-chinese-spy-chips-bloomberg-supermicro-amazon-apple) Recommendations Music Justice – Cross (https://music.apple.com/us/album/justice/259751732), electro/dance Underworld - Second toughest in the infants (https://music.apple.com/us/album/second-toughest-in-the-infants-remastered/1443227490), electro Sonny Federa (https://music.apple.com/gb/artist/sonny-fodera/324128050), DJ, House TV Mr McMahon (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt33301469/), wrestling documentary Traitors: Uncloaked finale (https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m00276n6/the-traitors-uncloaked-traitors-series-3-episode-12), with Claudia Winkleman Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action (https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/81685634), documentary Girl You Know It's True (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt21927594/), music movie about Milli Vanilli, who had one of the biggest scandals in music history The White Lotus (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13406094/), drama, comedy Gangs of London (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7661390/), Crime Drama Books Feng Shui Modern, by Cliff Tan (https://guardianbookshop.com/feng-shui-modern-9781526639998/) (Guardian Bookshop) Podcasts Designated Driver, the podcast for fans of Adam Driver (Podbean (https://designateddriveradam.podbean.com)) Jokes What do you call a Hippo on One Leg? Change your nickname on iOS (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb5eHXavk34) (YT video) Next Time: Chris Hunter joins us talking about coding bootcamps Follow us, like & subscribe Leave us a rating on Apple Podcasts/Spotify etc.. Find the trailers wherever you are: Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/ctrl_alt_expletive) YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@Ctrl-Alt-Expletive) LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/ctrl-alt-expletive/) Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/ctrl_alt_expletive/) BlueSky (https://bsky.app/profile/ctrl-alt-expletive.com) Our Website (https://www.ctrl-alt-expletive.com), where you'll find our breaking prod leaederboard and nationalities of guests and more. Special Guest: Marie Wigmore.
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    1 hr and 27 mins
  • Episode 8: Data Lakehouse, Data Mesh, Changing Jobs after more than a decade, and Mark's fancy shaft

    Episode 8: Data Lakehouse, Data Mesh, Changing Jobs after more than a decade, and Mark's fancy shaft
    Jan 24 2025
    What does James do? Is Sky a big company? What's your favourite file format to read from? Favourite format of book to digest? East London vs. West London What even is Burns Night? Deep fried battered scottish things James is dropping tables like it's hot... in the first week Big Topic Data. Big Data. HUGE Data. What's it like to leave after more than 10 years at one company? Why the change? Why not sooner? News Instagram hides search results for Democrats (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g32yxpdz0o) UK digital driving licences (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgkjjkjy4p8o) BT scraps EV charging scheme, having only installed... one. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c75zwyeq3v9o) Gotta be over 18 to watch porn in the UK from July (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwye3qw7gv7o) AI drugs are on the way (https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/22/google_deepmind_ai_drugs/) "Eventually you could imagine personalized medicine where it's optimized, maybe overnight, by an AI system for your personal metabolism" Is Melania Trump's autobiography written using ChatGPT? (https://www.reddit.com/r/ChatGPT/s/DeV5QrX7UL) Hulk Smash Muck and Zuck (https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/14/free_our_feeds_decentralized_social_media/) AI Brad Pitt dupes French woman out of €830,000 (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgnz8rw1xgo) Excel World Championships with 7.5 hour live stream (https://www.zdnet.com/article/the-excel-world-championship-is-real-and-it-just-crowned-the-king-of-spreadsheets/) Working from home is “not proper work”, according to Lord Rose, of M&S and Asda (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0qww8xdvnwo) Recommendations Movies Civil War (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt17279496/) Music The Middlenight Men - Issue 2 (https://music.apple.com/gb/album/issue-2/1745318732), rock Justice - Cross (https://music.apple.com/gb/album/justice/259751732), electronic dance TV Mr. McMahon (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt33301469/) wrestling, on Netflix The Day of the Jackal (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt24053860/?ref_=fn_all_ttl_1) on Sky/NowTV Severance season 2 (https://tv.apple.com/gb/show/severance/umc.cmc.1srk2goyh2q2zdxcx605w8vtx), Apple TV Traitors is finishing this weekend (https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/p0db9b2t/the-traitors), BBC iPlayer Podcasts The rest is Entertainment (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-rest-is-entertainment/id1718287198) Here comes the guilotine, by Frankie Boyle (https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/here-comes-the-guillotine/id1729090748) Special Guest: James Balloch.
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    1 hr and 36 mins

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