Bryan Cantrill Interviewed at ACM Bytecast | Hacker News Reader

Bryan Cantrill Interviewed at ACM Bytecast

learning.acm.org

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Nice and worthwhile interview of the inventor of dtrace.

Transcript https://learning.acm.org/binaries/content/assets/leaning-cen...

Overview

0:27 Introduces guest Bryan Cantrill

1:00 - Bryan’s background

9:24 - Following your own path

12:21 - The initial idea of DTrace and how it came to life

17:15 - You are your own customer

21:30 - Discussing the idea of observability

25:08 - How advanced softwares reflects the need for observability

27:42 - Crucial questions for new systems

31:28 - Application of machine learning

33:15 - Discussing open source

41:40 - Remote-friendly workplaces

42:58 - Mentorship and influence

46:27 - What is Bryan most excited about in the field of computing in the next 5 years?

Bryan and the Oxide folks have a podcast of their own called "On The Metal" where they interview awesome tech people, generally people who work closely with hardware. I enjoy it a lot:

https://oxide.computer/podcasts

I'm really bad at keeping up with podcasts and On The Metal is the only one that managed to have me listen to all of the episodes.

The thing he said about ML being complex pattern recognition felt good to hear, I've been thinking this for awhile, but have 0 experience other than blog posts and such.

I've always enjoyed listening to Bryan discuss his computing passions. It struck me listening to this that he seems like a man who has never suffered hardships or trauma and had supportive parents. It made me sad to think about what a difference that would have made in my life.

I haven't seen an ACM interview yet that went into childhood trauma. They are pretty topical. What makes you infer more childhood happiness from Bryan's childhood than anybody else from the technology sector? Because he is outspoken about tech? I am not sure that means he was never traumatized.

I hope you get can persevere with your problems, of course.

He's an Eagle Scout who became a Boy Scout troop leader for his boys. His mother influenced him to go into computer programming. He's relentlessly positive. If he's had hardship and trauma, he's doing a great job of hiding it.

Edit: He could afford to go to Brown University, something I could only dream about. Just to be clear. I don't begrudge Bryan for any of this. Someday if society evolves, we will all have the nurturing Bryan had.

It’s not really viable to take a few facts like this and extrapolate a lack of hardship or trauma.

I think you’ve stepped pretty far outside of reasonable discourse about the post, and into the realm of intense speculation about somebody else’s personal life.

Maybe don’t do that.

Kind of like not extrapolating that someone hates females if they use a gendered noun?

I’m not sure how you got from my comment to this, but in the interest of being clear:

Extrapolating that somebody has a positive vibe and was an Eagle Scout, so they can’t have had past hardships is radically different from “extrapolating” that somebody who uses gendered language has gender biases. The former is a textbook logical fallacy (“affirming the consequent”). The latter is not.

Cantrill's "vibe" has been controversial in the past. I wonder, while trying to be as neutral as possible, if the original commenter was actually sensing something like overconfidence or even arrogance.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19161006

Indeed. Everything points to someone who had never understood the damage he has done to others through his actions.

If you're here, using a computer to type on the HN Web site, you already have a lot of advantages over billions of other living people.

Find your opportunities, put yourself out there and at risk for things you want, and see what you can make happen.

And as you do this, and encounter problems you can't solve for your own personal situation, try to improve them for others, now and in the future.

Maybe that means raising kids and trying to give them more than you had, maybe that means helping a few random individual people whose problems you recognize, maybe that means fixing a systemic problem more directly.

My sad wistful feeling comes from being over 60, so it's a bit too late. I did give my kids a better life and that's some consolence. I also have empathy for and offer help to people who are struggling. I doubt I would if I hadn't endured suffering.

Sounds like you're doing well. I think it's OK to occasionally be struck by the idea of mighthavebeens. Sometimes we need to be reminded not to dwell on it, count our blessings, see what blessings we might want to pursue/embrace next.

FWIW, I don't know about the subject of this post, but I've spent a lot of time around some of the places where people with the most charmed upbringings congregate disproportionately. People who never had anything bad happen to them are in the minority even there, though they do exist. But it's pretty important in many "success" (very privileged) circles to project that you're also a "success" person, and people will spin their origin stories and circumstances for that. Doing so can be intentional, subconscious code-switching, or simply mood/context.

Also FWIW, I think Brown has need-blind admissions now, and (like I imagine a lot of schools lately, now that there's more awareness), an applicant's story about how they got to that point matters. In Brown's case, I bet they still genuinely want diversity of experiences, social justice, etc. (Though a diverse-experiences student applying to a prestigious school will still have to stand out among all the "success" people, many of whom are professionally coached on how to hit the right qualitative notes for admission criteria and perceptions.)

I understand why you might infer that. I had lunch with Brian once many years ago. Despite one of my objectives at DigitalOcean being stopping Joyent, he was very open, very honest, and very polite, easy going, super friendly. I'd caution against using the abstract as a leading indicator for an upbringing, I know more than one person whom come across similar to Brian in their background and outwardly nature, but have had extreme childhood trauma.

Thanks for pointing this out. Overcoming trauma and suffering strengthen the character of some people, probably a smaller percentage than those that they keep down. I have achieved the happiness and positivity that Bryan has by overcoming them. My sadness is about the decades it took, but even so, I am grateful that I did.

In the response to bullying, most become angry and defensive or submissive and fearful, some clever assholes, and a rare few become very nice yet assertive people and even a rarer few become the next superstars. The response to trauma is varied.

So, in most cases, bullying causes damage to the victim?

I think about this a lot when people talk about a "growth mindset" - the entire concept comes from a place of privilege, the idea that if you swing big and miss, you'll still land on your feet, when in reality a lot of people are in a mindset where if they risk their job and lose, they're in deep financial trouble and have no safety net to support them.

For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: “It might have been!”

— John Greenleaf Whittier, 1856

I’m often tempted to think that I would have accomplished more if my parents had like, taught me to read or whatever.

But the most remarkable person I’ve ever worked with was born female in the PRC at a time when, well that was even more of a handicap than contemporary US-style sexism and misogyny, to put it mildly.

This person had to be at the top of every list by sheer character and determination from birth on to even get to where my fucked up childhood started me. And has far exceeded my accomplishment so far.

It kind of keeps it in perspective for me that as hard as I’ve worked, it’s possible to work harder and smarter and achieve more.

Don't let that hold you back, mate. Don't think about what you could have been because you'll end up thinking about it forever.

I know this advice is fairly cliché, but focus on yourself now. Keep your chin up. :)

Damn, just reading the podcast guest list is enough to trigger imposter syndrome. But in all seriousness excellent suggestion!

Kudos to the oxide folks for humorously spelling out their job requirements and clearly disclosing pay. You don't see that much in our industry.

Wow, that's pretty personal speculation. The answer for me -- as it probably is for many -- is more nuanced than it might appear: I have had great privilege, but I also suffered some pretty intense childhood trauma that has very much shaped important aspects of my character. I'm unlikely to ever talk about this publicly in detail, so I'll leave it at this: one should never assume that someone else has not suffered hardships or trauma.

All of that said, I'm sorry to hear about your own challenges, and I'll leave you with the note that my own mother wrote me at a particularly difficult moment: the strongest sailor knows the roughest seas. I'm sorry if that comes off as trite, but that sentiment (plus a child psychologist!) really helped me, and hopefully can provide some solace for you as well.

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