The revolt of the reader
https://bcantrill.dtrace.org/2026/09/05/the-revolt-of-the-reader/
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Bryan Cantrill
@bcantrill@mastodon.social
mastodon 4.8.0-nightly.2026-10-06Co-founder and CTO of Oxide Computer Company. Nom de guerre: General Protection Fault.
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Joined April 03, 2017
Our $S200M Series C
https://oxide.computer/blog/our-200m-series-c
LLMs are changing every aspect of higher education, but perhaps none more so than computer science, where LLMs inflame the age-old tension between the thrill of building and the importance of first-principles understanding. Today, @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by Brown University CS professors Shriram Krishnamurthi and Kathi Fisler to talk about their experience teaching an agentic AI course -- and what it might bode for the future of CS education.
Join us, 5p Pacific today! https://discord.gg/QrcKGTTPrF?event=1500866494588780544
LLMs are -- to put it euphemistically -- seeing increased use among software engineers. This has sparked much consternation about what this means for our engineering rigor, but we have found that prudent use of LLMs can, in fact, allow us to be much more rigorous in our engineering. Today, @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by Oxide engineers who have been at the forefront of using LLMs as tools to increase the rigor in their own work. Join us, 5p Pacific today!
Recently, the software world was rocked by the discovery of a backdoor in XZ Utils. The backdoor represents many stories, but behind all of them is the story of a single Postgres developer, vexed by a relatable problem: "why is it taking so long to login?!"
On the next Oxide and Friends, @ahl@mastodon.social and I are thrilled to be joined by that developer, @AndresFreundTec@mastodon.social, the discoverer of the XZ backdoor. Join us on April 8th at 5p Pacific to hear this extraordinary story!
People say that @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io is a podcasting company that built a computer for content generation, but we also use funding milestones for content generation: join @ahl@mastodon.social, @sdtuck@hachyderm.io and me today at 5p Pacific as we talk about our $200M Series C!
No Oxide and Friends today, BUT...
Next week @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by software engineering pioneer Grady Booch to talk about the past, present, and (especially!) future of software engineering. Join us, 5p Pacific next Monday, for what promises to be a lively and wide-ranging discussion!
I am currently at a Dagstuhl seminar (my first!), "Trustworthy System Architectures for the Age of Custom Silicon." Slides for my talk yesterday (not recorded, unfortunately):
Oxide and Friends is back, at a special time! @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by Oxide engineers Andrew Stone and Finch Foner to talk about how we build a quorum of trust in the distributed system that is the Oxide rack. Join us today at 2p Pacific/5p Eastern!
We hit a new (and disturbing!) failure mode recently when a production rack that had been up for several months saw every (!) compute sled's service processor become simultaneously unresponsive. On today's episode, @ahl@mastodon.social and I willl be joined by the members of the Oxide team that debugged the vexing issue -- and @cliffle@hachyderm.io will reveal how he reached its surprising root cause. Join us at 5p Pacific for a wild tale of death by uptime!
The video for my #monktoberfest 2025 talk on trust as infrastructure is now up:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WF7J7qtZ8TA
Slides are here:
Okay, listen up Oxide fam: on Monday, @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by Evan Ratliff and Maty Bohacek from the extraordinary Shell Game podcast -- which gives you the rest of the weekend to binge listen to it:
(Both seasons are terrific, but if you only have one to listen to between now, and then, check out Season 2.)
Join us for what promises to be a fun discussion: Monday, 5p Pacific!
We hear of "nine nines" of uptime as a goal for a system, but today @ahl@mastodon.social and I are going to be joined by the @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io team to talk about a subsystem that had that uptime -- and how it wasn't nearly enough. Join us at 5p Pacific for a wild, multi-year debugging tale!
https://discord.gg/QrcKGTTPrF?event=1478128159021989950
On Monday, @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by members of the Oxide team to talk about a doozy: an 18-year-old ZFS data corruption bug that we recently nailed. We'll be at a special Europe-friendly time: 9a Pacific/noon Eastern/5p GMT -- join us for the wild tale!
@igb@mastodon.hccp.org became an instant folk hero when he called out the world's wealthiest man, taking him to task for his grievous misperceptions on how software systems actually work:
https://twitter.com/iamraisini/status/1605538033612177408
While brief, this exchange hit on some deep issues in software engineering; @ahl@mastodon.social and I are thrilled to announce that @igb@mastodon.hccp.org will be joining us for our @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io and Friends on Monday. Join us as we break it down with Ian Brown:
https://discord.com/invite/3jSyYpGP?event=1055335241411215383
Recorded, as always:
Throughout my career, I have believed that it is essential to dig into mysterious pathological systems behavior even if it seems somewhat tangential, for it can often reveal problems deep in the system that can have much more damaging presentation.
For a vivid example of pathological behavior, a deep underlying problem, and (especially) the methodology to connect one to the other, read this extraordinary analysis from @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io engineer Dave Pacheco:
The first Monday of the new year means... predictions! Thrilled to announce that @simon@fedi.simonwillison.net will again be joining @ahl@mastodon.social and me for 1- 3- and 6-year predictions. Bring your own predictions and join us today at a special time: 4p Pacific!
https://discord.gg/QrcKGTTPrF?event=1456066106002509947
The Book of Genesis, as written by GenZ 🤣🤣🤣
It's our last episode of the year -- so @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be engaging in our @changelog@changelog.social-inspired annual tradition of reviewing the year of episodes. Join us at 5p Pacific -- and bring your own favorite moments!
https://discord.gg/QrcKGTTPrF?event=1445156662125006970
The CrowdStrike BSOD fiasco is extraordinary in its scale and scope; on Monday's Oxide and Friends, @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by security researcher and @LutaSecurity@infosec.exchange CEO @k8em0@infosec.exchange to help us sort through the many layers of this mess. Join us, 5p Pacific!
The video for my talk at #monktoberfest is now up, and I would like to make an unusual request: please watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzdVSMRu16g
As @monkchips@mastodon.social pointed out after the talk, it's not just a talk about how we think about youth, but me reflecting on my own transition into adulthood (and parenthood!) -- and the responsibilities we have to younger technologists.
I am grateful to @sogrady@mastodon.social -- as I have been so many times before -- for the venue uniquely suited to this talk; thank you!
Those with even passing familiarity with @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io have run across our Request for Discussion system, which constitutes the backbone of our writing-intensive culture. Tomorrow, @ahl@mastodon.social and I will be joined by our colleagues to discuss this system, its history, and its evolution. Join us at a Europe-friendly time slot: 9a Pacific/5p BST/6p CET.
https://discord.gg/QrcKGTTPrF?event=1275240687620587601
Great @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io and Friends discussion today on Mastodon and the Fediverse with @ahl@mastodon.social and @nova@hachyderm.io, including appearances from @antranigv@bsd.network and @penguin@hachyderm.io among others!
The recording will be up on YouTube soon, but can be found on the birdsite in the meantime:
https://twitter.com/bcantrill/status/1592200528016314369
And -- an Oxide and Friends first! -- you can also find it on @nova@hachyderm.io's Twitch stream:
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1652616971
Thanks again to @nova@hachyderm.io for joining us -- the future is bright!
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@AndresFreundTec@mastodon.social @ahl@mastodon.social I was going to say the same, but about transaction ID wraparound autovacuum!
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@sogrady@mastodon.social @timbray@mastodon.cloud All true: I am another Mastodon believer, and @ahl@mastodon.social and I have indeed left Twitter Spaces. After some toying around last week, Discord is going to be our new home for the @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io and Friends podcast.
Our first Discord is going to be tomorrow -- and we would absolutely love to host a discussion on @timbray@mastodon.cloud's piece (which, unsurprisingly, nails it). Let us know if you're up for it!
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@timbray@mastodon.cloud 🤣 The good news is that Discord is teenage gamer proof -- the bad news is that you don't get there by assuming positive intent! 😉
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@timbray@mastodon.cloud @sogrady@mastodon.social @ahl@mastodon.social @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io We have done them at 5p Pacific (and occasionally at 9a Pacific to give Europe a shot to participate). We record them and turn it into a podcast:
https://oxide-and-friends.transistor.fm/
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@timbray@mastodon.cloud @sogrady@mastodon.social @ahl@mastodon.social @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io https://discord.gg/4PEMYUZt7H We'll get the event scheduled!
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@ezivkovic@hachyderm.io Ha, yeah, I found that one -- but I wanted the original (i.e., not translated) and couldn't seem to find it. But maybe that image is original?
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@sogrady@mastodon.social @timbray@mastodon.cloud @ahl@mastodon.social @oxidecomputer@hachyderm.io Send or DM your questions for Tim? Failing that, I will do my best to proxy the concerns you've already expressed...