Achieve Repeatable Builds Of Your Software On Any Machine With Earthly

Episode • Feb 6, 2022 • 54m

Summary

It doesn’t matter how amazing your application is if you are unable to deliver it to your users. Frustrated with the rampant complexity involved in building and deploying software Vlad A. Ionescu created the Earthly tool to reduce the toil involved in creating repeatable software builds. In this episode he explains the complexities that are inherent to building software projects and how he designed the syntax and structure of Earthly to make it easy to adopt for developers across all language environments. By adopting Earthly you can use the same techniques for building on your laptop and in your CI/CD pipelines.

Announcements

Hello and welcome to Podcast.__init__, the podcast about Python’s role in data and science.
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Your host as usual is Tobias Macey and today I’m interviewing Vlad A. Ionescu about Earthly, a syntax and runtime for software builds to reduce friction between development and delivery

Interview

Introductions
How did you get introduced to Python?
Can you describe what Earthly is and the story behind it?
What are the core principles that engineers should consider when designing their build and delivery process?
What are some of the common problems that engineers run into when they are designing their build process?
- What are some of the challenges that are unique to the Python ecosystem?
What is the role of Earthly in the overall software lifecycle?
- What are the other tools/systems that a team is likely to use alongside Earthly?
- What are the components that Earthly might replace?
How is Earthly implemented?
- What were the core design requirements when you first began working on it?
- How have the design and goals of Earthly changed or evolved as you have explored the problem further?
What is the workflow for a Python developer to get started with Earthly?
- How can Earthly help with the challenge of managing Javascript and CSS assets for web application projects?
What are some of the challenges (technical, conceptual, or organizational) that an engineer or team might encounter when adopting Earthly?
What are some of the features or capabilities of Earthly that are overlooked or misunderstood that you think are worth exploring?
What are the most interesting, innovative, or unexpected ways that you have seen Earthly used?
What are the most interesting, unexpected, or challenging lessons that you have learned while working on Earthly?
When is Earthly the wrong choice?
What do you have planned for the future of Earthly?

Keep In Touch

Picks

Tobias
- Shape Up book
Vlad
- High Output Management by Andy Grove

Closing Announcements

Thank you for listening! Don’t forget to check out our other show, the Data Engineering Podcast for the latest on modern data management.
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