The MonkCast

RedMonk

Join the developer-focused industry analysts at RedMonk as they discuss news and trends in the software space with leaders and practicioners in cloud, AI, IaC, security, DevOps, developer relations, observability, data, and more. Can't get enough of the Monks? Visit the RedMonk YouTube channel or check out our research at RedMonk.com. You can also follow RedMonk on Bluesky, Twitter (X), and LinkedIn. Meet RedMonk's AnalystsJames Governor, Principal Analyst & Co-founder @monkchips, LinkedIn, Blog Stephen O'Grady, Principal Analyst & Co-founder @sogrady, LinkedIn, Blog Rachel Stephens, Research Director @rstephensme, LinkedIn, Blog Kate Holterhoff, Senior Industry Analyst @KateHolterhoff, LinkedIn, Blog

  1. 2d ago

    Why ChatGPT Recommends Your Competitor: LLMs & the Future of DevTool Marketing with Adam DuVander

    Why does ChatGPT recommend one DevTool over another, and what can founders do about it? In this RedMonk Conversation, Kate Holterhoff sits down with Adam DuVander, Principal Consultant at EveryDeveloper and author of Developer Marketing Does Not Exist, to explore how AI assistants are transforming software discovery. They discuss Adam’s LLM Rank research, which tracks how models like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini recommend developer tools, and why those recommendations often differ. The conversation covers the practical steps DevTool companies can take to improve AI discoverability, from documentation and developer experience to use-case positioning and contextual content. Along the way, Kate and Adam examine the expanding definition of “developer,” the rise of AI-assisted builders, and why developer marketing is evolving rather than disappearing. Whether you’re building a developer product or rethinking your go-to-market strategy, this episode offers a practical framework for succeeding in an LLM-first world. Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/adam-duvander/ Chapters 00:00 Defining the Modern Developer 04:25 The Role of Every Developer 09:38 Marketing to the New Breed of Developers 12:37 Understanding LLM Rank and AI in Development 19:57 The Evolution of Documentation and Developer Experience 22:06 Understanding Developer Context and Use Cases 25:31 Navigating AI Recommendations for Developer Tools 28:55 The Importance of Language and Phrasing in Queries 31:50 The Long Game of SEO and LLM Rankings 36:44 Addressing Outdated Documentation and Bad Advice 42:20 The Distinction Between Discoverability and Developer Success 47:51 The Future of Developer Marketing in an AI World

  2. Aug 27

    Why AI Agents Are Blowing Up Your Telemetry Bill with Nikhil Mungel

    Most conversations about AI agents stay on what agents can do. Less attention goes to what they leave behind: logs, traces, and tool-call chains at a volume nobody's pipeline was built for. Nikhil Mungel, Head of AI R&D at Cribl, talks with Kate Holterhoff about why that is becoming observability's cost and noise problem. They discuss why token prices keep falling while total spend climbs, how employee spend differs from the tokens a product burns serving customers, credit-based versus outcome-based billing, why users always reach for the priciest model, and how the Open Cybersecurity Schema Framework (OCSF) standardizes what agents emit. Underneath all of it sits the question the industry keeps dodging, which is whether to keep scaling the backend or get stricter about what gets collected at all. This RedMonk conversation is sponsored by Cribl. Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/nikhil-mungel/ Chapters 00:25 Leading AI research and development at Cribl 01:46 Token prices fell, token bills grew 03:39 The research agent that thought all night 06:54 More software, more agents, more telemetry 09:37 Employee spend versus cost of goods sold 12:05 Credits, outcomes, and other ways to bill for agents 14:46 Shadow AI and the cloud governance rerun 17:00 Writing policy: cost, access, and blast radius 17:49 Local models and regulated industries 18:40 What Cribl collects, plus Cribl Guard 21:24 Token gateways as the enforcement point 24:56 Model anxiety and automatic routing 27:29 What OCSF is and why it caught on 30:15 Observability as an information compression problem 33:48 Zero data retention versus model safety 35:45 Should agents know what they cost? 36:35 Where to find Nikhil and Cribl's research

  3. Aug 13

    Evidence Over Certificates: John Ellis on the Eclipse Trustable Software Framework

    What does it mean to trust software? For this RedMonk Conversation, Kate Holterhoff sits down with John Ellis, President of Codethink and the contributor to the Eclipse Trustable Software Framework, to pull that question apart. Ellis leans on an old image: the bridge builders who once slept under their own bridges to prove the work was sound. Modern software rarely faces that kind of test, even when it steers a car or flies a plane. He explains where trust tends to break, especially the integration step where hidden dependencies finally show themselves, and points out that a safety certificate almost never uses the word "safe." Rather than pass-or-fail box-ticking, the framework asks teams to state their confidence and back it with evidence that others can inspect and challenge. They also dig into AI-written code, the EU Cyber Resilience Act, and why rising software recalls suggest current habits fall short. This RedMonk video is sponsored by the Eclipse Foundation. Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/john-ellis/ Chapters 00:04 Introduction to the Eclipse Trustable Software Framework 02:57 Understanding Trust in Software 05:59 The Integration Moment of Truth 08:54 Challenges in Software Development Lifecycle 11:25 The Role of the Eclipse Trustable Software Framework 14:39 Managing Change in Software Development 17:20 Versioning and Continuous Improvement 20:01 Risk Analysis and Trustworthiness in Software 24:39 Automating Testing and Confidence in Software 25:23 Bridging the Gap with Regulators 27:15 The Complexity of Software and Safety Standards 29:18 Understanding Certification and Safety Claims 31:12 The Need for a Shift in Mindset 32:16 The Role of the Eclipse Trustable Software Framework 34:18 Navigating the EU Cyber Resilience Act 37:41 The Journey of Compliance and Awareness 39:16 AI's Impact on Software Provenance 43:34 Future Directions for the Eclipse Trustable Software Framework

  4. Aug 6

    Dealing with the Next Bottleneck: Build Management at AI Scale with Helen Altshuler

    AI agents are writing code faster than anyone can build, test, and ship it. James Governor talks with Helen Altshuler, CEO and co-founder of EngFlow, about why the bottlenecks that once happened at Google scale are now showing up everywhere. Helen traces the story back to Google's 2008 push for five-minute builds, which produced Blaze and eventually Bazel, and explains why that system is finally having its moment a decade after it was open sourced. The numbers are hard to ignore: EngFlow's customers went from 250 million build actions a week to nearly 2 billion in a single year. Companies like Snowflake, Databricks, and Tinder are using Bazel, managed by EngFlow to keep up. James and Helen also dig into agent-ready documentation, why verification is increasingly automated or even ignored, and what happens once people stop using pull request workflows. We're about to hit a wall of AI created scale, and companies are going to fundamentally rethink architectures and approaches if the want to make it. This RedMonk video is sponsored by EngFlow. Show notes: https://redmonk.com/videos/helen-altshuler/ Chapters 00:04 Introduction and Context Setting 01:25 Challenges of Build Management at Scale 04:29 Google's Historical Perspective on Build Management 07:15 The Impact of AI on Software Development 10:19 Bazel's Role in Modern Development 13:23 Community Growth and Open Source Collaboration 16:36 Enhancing Developer Experience with AI 19:22 Customer Insights and Scaling Challenges 22:34 Bazel's Unique Advantages and Market Position 25:21 Multi-Cloud Strategies and Infrastructure Flexibility 29:36 Scaling Software Development with Data 33:06 Investing in Developer Infrastructure 36:37 Embracing GitHub and CI Challenges 42:13 The Evolution of Code Review Practices 47:11 The Future of Build Management at Scale

About

Join the developer-focused industry analysts at RedMonk as they discuss news and trends in the software space with leaders and practicioners in cloud, AI, IaC, security, DevOps, developer relations, observability, data, and more. Can't get enough of the Monks? Visit the RedMonk YouTube channel or check out our research at RedMonk.com. You can also follow RedMonk on Bluesky, Twitter (X), and LinkedIn. Meet RedMonk's AnalystsJames Governor, Principal Analyst & Co-founder @monkchips, LinkedIn, Blog Stephen O'Grady, Principal Analyst & Co-founder @sogrady, LinkedIn, Blog Rachel Stephens, Research Director @rstephensme, LinkedIn, Blog Kate Holterhoff, Senior Industry Analyst @KateHolterhoff, LinkedIn, Blog

You Might Also Like