PurePerformance

PurePerformance

The brutal truth about digital performance engineering and operations. Andreas (aka Andi) Grabner and Brian Wilson are veterans of the digital performance world. Combined they have seen too many applications not scaling and performing up to expectations. With more rapid deployment models made possible through continuous delivery and a mentality shift sparked by DevOps they feel it’s time to share their stories. In each episode, they and their guests discuss different topics concerning performance, ranging from common performance problems for specific technology platforms to best practices in development, testing, deploying and monitoring software performance and user experience. Be prepared to learn a lot about metrics. Andi & Brian both work at Dynatrace, where they get to witness more real world customer performance issues than they can TPS report at.

  1. From Bowling Lanes to AI Lanes: Chris LaBrado on MDCD and the AI Interface Era

    4D AGO

    From Bowling Lanes to AI Lanes: Chris LaBrado on MDCD and the AI Interface Era

    In this episode of the PurePerformance Podcast, Andi and Brian sit down with Chris LaBrado—Solutions Architect for AI Enablement, FSO, SRE, and ITSM at HSN/QVC, where he has spent an incredible 27 years shaping operational excellence. Their conversation dives deep into how AI is transforming software creation, enterprise workflows, and even the very role of developers. Chris shares how the barrier to entry for building tools and automation has dropped overnight thanks to natural‑language-based development: “Everyone can now create automation or tools without having to worry about the syntax.” He explains why AI is rapidly becoming the primary interface into the enterprise—capable of navigating presentations, emails, and complex back‑office systems—and why the future of engineering may shift from human‑oriented coding to AI-driven development models such as MDCD (MarkDown Continuous Development). The discussion also takes unexpected but fascinating detours into Chris’s background as a former bowling‑industry podcaster, his recent work with generative agents like DynaClaude, his Vibe Coded Root Cause Agent, and a philosophical exploration of AI, creativity, and the concept of singularity. Amidst all the change, Chris remains optimistic: “AI opens up a lot of new opportunity for everyone willing to adapt. It will result in us creating more things that ultimately help us as humans.” This episode is a thoughtful, energizing look at where software engineering is headed—and why the future might be brighter than we think. Links we discussed Chris LaBrado on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrislabrado/ Mo Gawdat, former Google Executive on the Singularity "moment of truth": https://x.com/vitrupo/status/2008824930646057380?s=20 CEO of NVIDIA had an interesting excerpt from interview: https://x.com/MinusWells/status/2031974516155695414?s=20 Elon Musk on speed of AI: https://x.com/r0ck3t23/status/2031639621465931903?s=20 AI brain emulation of a fly (e.g. "a sign of the times"): https://x.com/alexwg/status/2030217301929132323?s=20 Elon on fiat currency transforming based on AI manufacturing loop: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2020202496547844312?s=20 Fiat currency moves to model based on thermodynamics: https://x.com/r0ck3t23/status/2033371028202602547?s=20

    54 min
  2. AI-Ready Codebases: Engineering Discipline for Agentic AI with Adam Tornhill

    MAR 30

    AI-Ready Codebases: Engineering Discipline for Agentic AI with Adam Tornhill

    In this episode, Andi and Brian welcome back Adam Tornhill—founder of CodeScene and author of Your Code as a Crime Scene—to explore how agentic AI is reshaping software engineering. Adam shares his personal journey from 40 years of hands-on coding to orchestrating AI-generated code, and what this shift really means for development teams. Together, they dive into new research on the hidden risks of AI-assisted coding, why low-quality or legacy code slows AI down, and how to measure the “AI-readiness” of a codebase. Adam breaks down practical strategies from his latest work on Agentic AI Coding, including guardrails, refactoring patterns, enforced processes, and why test coverage has become a surprising cornerstone for safe, fast AI iteration. Whether you're experimenting with AI coding tools or planning enterprise-scale adoption, this episode delivers actionable guidance rooted in data, engineering discipline, and real-world experience. Links https://codescene.com/blog/agentic-ai-coding-best-practice-patterns-for-speed-with-quality https://codescene.com/blog/strengthening-the-inner-developer-loop-turn-ai-into-a-reliable-engineering-partner

    53 min
  3. AI‑Native: Building Faster Than We Can Spec with Wolfgang Heider & Benedict Evert

    MAR 16

    AI‑Native: Building Faster Than We Can Spec with Wolfgang Heider & Benedict Evert

    AI is transforming software engineering—faster than many teams can adapt. In this episode, Andi talks with Wolfgang Heider and Benedict Evert about what it really means to build “AI‑native” software, where prototypes turn into production apps in minutes. We explore why good engineering fundamentals still matter, how multi‑agent workflows mirror traditional roles, and why testing, governance, and clarity of intent become more important—not less. We also discuss the future of junior engineers, the risk of everyone reinventing the same solution, and why value—not code generation—is becoming the real differentiator. Links we discussed https://www.linkedin.com/posts/wolfgangheider_productmanagement-softwareengineering-ai-activity-7425746505883607042-D1OZ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/machines-making-wolfgang-heider-5mvsf https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-built-app-between-final-stranger-things-episodes-wolfgang-heider-5penf/ https://futurelab.studio/ora/  https://futurelab.studio/htmlctl/

    44 min
  4. Resilience in the Age of AI and Why we Still Suck at it with Adrian Hornsby

    MAR 2

    Resilience in the Age of AI and Why we Still Suck at it with Adrian Hornsby

    Why do we still struggle with resilience in 2026? Is it the growing complexity of systems, the pressure to ship fast, or a lack of education around resilient design? In this episode we welcome Adrian Hornsby from Resilium Labs to explore these questions and learn about chaos, complexity, and the importance of continuous learning! Adrian has learned his chaos engineering skills while working at AWS for many years. He shares insights from his upcoming book and his experience helping organizations embrace resilience as a continuous learning practice. We discuss: Why traditional chaos engineering assumptions break down when AI starts writing your code.The rise of AI-powered SRE agents—are they a blessing or a missed learning opportunity?Organizational challenges and the importance of tracking near misses.Links we discussed Adrians LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adhorn/ Resilium Labs: https://www.resiliumlabs.com/ Upcoming Book: https://leanpub.com/whywestillsuckatresilience

    52 min
  5. From Zero to Open Source Contributor with Diana Todea

    FEB 16

    From Zero to Open Source Contributor with Diana Todea

    Contributing to Open Source is easier than ever - especially because contributions are needed for documentation, demos, tutorials and code. But how to get started? Where to look for "first good issues"? Is everyone welcome? What are the prerequisites? Tune in and hear from Diana Todea, Developer Experience Engineer at Victoria Metrics, on how within a year she made it from Zero to Developer and receiving the Contributor Award for OpenTelemetry 2025 at KubeCon Atlanta. Diana shares her journey, how she started, how she found the right topic and how she keeps herself motivated. Diana is also the Co-lead of the Neurodiversity CNCF Working Group and gives us insights into the Merge Forward community.  And don't forget: Call for Papers for Cloud Native Days Romania and Austria are open and both Diana and Andi would be glad to see your proposals! So - what are you waiting for? Links we discussed: Diana's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/diana-todea-b2a79968/  From Zero to Developer Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPrxpEE5GpY  Contributor Award: https://siliconangle.com/2025/11/13/accessibility-meets-open-source-collaboration-kubeconna/  Her latest CNCF Blog Post: https://www.cncf.io/blog/2025/12/04/my-first-kubecon-cloudnativecon-a-journey-through-community-inclusivity-and-neurodiversity/ Start contributing to Open Source: https://contribute.cncf.io/contributors/getting-started/  Diana's Conference Talks: https://github.com/didiViking/Conferences_Talks  Diana on Medium: https://medium.com/@dianatodea/  Articles on OpenTelemetry for beginners:  https://medium.com/@dianatodea/the-unofficial-guide-to-contributing-to-opentelemetry-where-to-look-and-who-to-talk-to-9de04ae75fe0  CNCF Merge-Forward: https://community.cncf.io/merge-forward CNCF Neurodiversity initiative: https://community.cncf.io/neurodiversity  Cloud Native Days Romania: https://cloudnativedays.ro/ Cloud Native Days Austria: https://cloudnativedays.at/

    47 min
  6. The many facets of an SRE with Alexandra Franz

    FEB 2

    The many facets of an SRE with Alexandra Franz

    From Systems Engineer in Aeronautics via many clouds to becoming an SRE in Observability! That's the path from our guest, Alexandra Franz who is a Lead Product Engineer in SRE at Dynatrace. Tune in and learn how their team plans ahead for expected high traffic around Black Friday, Cyber Monday or the Super Bowl. We discuss how regional traffic patterns and differences in available hardware get factored in for capacity management and cost control. We also learn why global cloud outages are stressful - but - how those incidents can also be the reward for a good SRE. Make sure to connect with Alexandra on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandrafranz/

    49 min
  7. 10 Fundamentals to get Vibe Coding right with Jeff Blankenburg

    JAN 19

    10 Fundamentals to get Vibe Coding right with Jeff Blankenburg

    If you are still treating your AI Coding Agent like a chat bot and not like a development team then this is one more reason to tune into this episode. In his blog post series 31 Days of Vibe Coding, Jeff Blankenburg walks us through all the lessons learned when bringing an idea to life just with vibe coding. His idea was building a website for collectors of baseball cards. With now more than 950k cards from almost 10k players, he has proven that vibe coding, when done right, can truly boost the output of software engineers.  Tune in and learn about how to effectively use Git Issues as the backlog for your AI, the importance of going through different phases in your conversation with the AI and why it is important to ask the AI the question: "Do you have any questions for me?" Links we discussed LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffblankenburg/ 31 Days of Vibe Coding: https://31daysofvibecoding.com/ Collect Your Cards: https://collectyourcards.com/ Claude: https://claude.ai/

    55 min
  8. Semiotics - A Future of Observability we are yet to see with William Louth

    JAN 5

    Semiotics - A Future of Observability we are yet to see with William Louth

    How many people have you met that implemented distributed tracing in the early 2000s? Make it one more after you have tuned into our latest podcast with William Louth.  William, who can't seem to escape the observability space even though he keeps trying, has a track record in the space. He is an innovator and tool builder and is currently reimagining intelligent systems by shifting the focus from data collection to meaning-making. In our conversation we learn about situational awareness and how systems should use symbols to show their current state by also taking into account everything they are aware of happening in their ecosystem. This podcast episode has been long overdue and opens a fascinating new world beyond metrics, logs and traces! Links discussed Williams LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/william-david-louth/ Humainary Research: https://humainary.io/research/ Humainary GitHub: https://github.com/humainary-io Serventis Signs: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/humainary-io/substrates-api-java/refs/heads/main/ext/serventis/SIGNS.md

    53 min
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5
out of 5
10 Ratings

About

The brutal truth about digital performance engineering and operations. Andreas (aka Andi) Grabner and Brian Wilson are veterans of the digital performance world. Combined they have seen too many applications not scaling and performing up to expectations. With more rapid deployment models made possible through continuous delivery and a mentality shift sparked by DevOps they feel it’s time to share their stories. In each episode, they and their guests discuss different topics concerning performance, ranging from common performance problems for specific technology platforms to best practices in development, testing, deploying and monitoring software performance and user experience. Be prepared to learn a lot about metrics. Andi & Brian both work at Dynatrace, where they get to witness more real world customer performance issues than they can TPS report at.

Information

  • Creator
    PurePerformance
  • Years Active
    2016 - 2026
  • Episodes
    334
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Dynatrace LLC
  • Show Website
    PurePerformance

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