Is a PhD Worth It? Brendan's Perspective

This is a conversation with Brendan Burns, co-creator of Kubernetes and current technical fellow at Microsoft working on Azure. We discussed what it was like building it at Google, how he got buy-in, and what he learned along the way.

🔸 My keyboard project: https://read.compose.llc/p/our-keyboard-design-reveal

𝗣𝗼𝗱𝗰𝗮𝘀𝘁 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗸𝘀:

• YouTube: https://youtu.be/FKijpCEH9D8

• Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-peterman-pod/id1777363835

• Transcript: https://www.developing.dev/p/the-creator-of-kubernetes-on-building

𝗧𝗶𝗺𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗺𝗽𝘀:

00:00:00 - Intro

00:00:37 - How he convinced Google leaders

00:09:26 - Building the MVP

00:11:43 - How he made time for Kubernetes

00:25:28 - Technical details on building Kubernetes

00:38:46 - Rallying the open source community

00:50:01 - Scaling Kubernetes up for AI training workloads

00:55:31 - Reflections on getting a PhD

01:00:22 - The inevitable trajectory of software is death

01:04:16 - Top book recommendations

01:05:22 - Advice for his younger self

01:06:21 - Outro

𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗕𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗻:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-burns-487aa590/

• Twitter/X: https://x.com/brendandburns

• Github: https://github.com/brendandburns

𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗥𝘆𝗮𝗻:

• Newsletter: https://www.developing.dev/

• X/Twitter: https://x.com/ryanlpeterman

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanlpeterman/

• Threads: https://www.threads.com/@ryanlpeterman

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ryanlpeterman

• TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@ryanlpeterman