Betatalks the podcast

Onze vriend in deze aflevering is Jan de Dobbeleer, een Microsoft MVP, GitKraken Ambassadeur en bedenker van Oh My Posh. We praten over hoe Oh My Posh - de prompt theming engine voor PowerShell en daarbuiten - begon en zo populair werd. Wat zijn enkele van de dagelijkse uitdagingen waar hij voor staat? En hoe is hij hier terechtgekomen na horlogemaker, Android-telefoon hacker en Windows Phone ontwikkelaar te zijn geweest? Verder benadrukken we het belang van het bouwen van een open cultuur; het pushen van open source, bijdragen en het hebben van een holistische mindset. En we eindigen met het bespreken van de Windows Phone, met herinneringen aan de geweldige functies en hoe het zijn tijd ver vooruit was.

Over deze aflevering, en Jan in het bijzonder: je kunt @jandedobbeleer vinden op Twitter of kijk eens naar zijn prompt theme engine voor elke shell: Oh My Posh.

Over Betatalks: bekijk onze video's en praat mee op ons Betatalks Discord kanaal

00:00 - Introduction
01:50 - Friend of the day
03:02 - Oh my posh
10:53 - From watchmaker to developer
16:27 - The day to day life of Jan
27:45 - Totally random question
29:58 - Windows Phone
36:07 - Closing

Introduction - 00:00

Rick 
Hey there, welcome to Betatalks the podcast in which we talk to friends from the development community. I am Rick.

Oscar 
And I am Oscar. Hey, Rick, what you've been up to?

Rick 
Well, I've actually been given quite a lot of trainings lately. So we do the OWASP security training, where we actually, I think, more teach a hacker mindset and, and explain the two OWASP. Top 10 is yet we have nowadays and try to educate people on how to think like an attacker, and then transform that back into an integrated development story to make sure that they tend to keep those hackers out.

Oscar 
Yeah, we been to some of those trainings in the one of our colleagues gave. Also, a couple of years back, we had Troy Hunt over giving us our hack yourself first workshop.

Rick 
I still wear the sweater.

Oscar 
But you really see like, end of the day, it's hard to close those things. Like if you have an excited group, the end of the day, they just go back to the places and continue hacking. Yet it's done.

Rick 
Okay, I'm going to leave now.

Oscar 
But all that excitement is it's really fun.

Rick 
And then next to that, I do quite a few Azure trainings, where I give quite a few Azure training. So for DevOps and for architecture and for developers, so that's actually awesome, then most of the times, I do need something that looks like a command line to open up and do some stuff from there. And then nine out of 10 times I get that question, where did you get that awesome looking, CLI.

Friend of the day - 01:50

Oscar 
But on that note, who's our friend of the day, Rick?

Rick 
Our friend today is Jan de Dobbeleer.

Oscar 
Jan is a Microsoft MVP, get cracking ambassador, and creator maintainer of oh my posh, a prompt theming engine for PowerShell and beyond. He originally started out as a watchmaker, but transitioned into software development to pursue a passion he had growing up. The Baby Steps he took as a Windows Phone developer, moved him into interesting positions as developer team lead all the way to managing more people and teams. In 2016, he created a prompt utility for his own needs as the only Windows developer between Unix aficionados, which to this day, brings joy to a lot of terminals around the world. Welcome, Jan.

Rick 
Welcome.

Jan 
Hi, everybody. Thanks for having me.

Rick 
Well, it's so good to have you here. Because what we already talked about a little bit in the intro, I think most developers that are really active on using CLI or using Windows terminal or PowerShell, will probably work with one of your products. Now, that must be impressive, and may be a bit scary.

Oh my posh - 03:02

Jan 
Yeah, for sure. It's true. No, it's true. Especially looking at that never really was the original goal. And I think you shared it in the introduction is initially I wanted to do something for myself, because I wanted to prove to everybody that Windows is a platform where developers can be at home. And obviously, you know, these hardcore Linux enthusiasts always look at CLI and their terminal, which is print using a plethora of tools, which to be honest, looking back in 2016, it wasn't really possible on Windows. So I took that mission purely for myself and to teach them a lesson because I really believed that you know, Windows could be your home. So I set out, let's see if I can fix that published it in the PowerShell Gallery. After a while I think I still have that first screenshot of the first starting point of oh my posh, which was at that point called BS agnoster, because the prompt style is actually called diagnoster. So the ones you see with those powerline glyphs, and it kind of took off from there and exploded.

Rick 
Yeah, it really did explode, because I'm not really sure which, which timeframe, it was, I think it was 2019, where Windows terminal was announced with this really awesome video. And then it was taken offline because there was some music in there that shouldn't be there. And then it came back. But then even Scott Hanselman has a couple of blog posts dedicated to setting up your tool in PowerShell. Yeah, that's, that's pretty...

Oscar 
That's pretty massive yeah.

Rick 
Yeah massive.

Jan 
It's, it's really weird. It's one of my heroes, and I can be very open about that. And I really respect him for what he does, how he brings it all looking at all inclusivity and making things accessible for everybody. And the fact that he jumps on this what it has been part of the, you know, the growth, to be honest. I call it the Scott effect. So if he starts talking about oh my gosh, I noticed almost right away in numbers and in activity around, you know, issues or anything else that pops up. So these spikes in activity on oh my posh are definitely thanks to him. But yeah, it's, it still feels really weird to be honest, as if this is some kind of magical ride, and I'm on that.

Rick 
So you're, you're pinching yourself every now and again, to make sure you're still awake, right?

Jan 
Yes, true. Because you know, a lot of the things that I've been able to achieve in the past year even, because that's been pretty significant from my posh too looking at the evolutions. And always, mainly thanks to, which is my belief is thanks to both Scott and obviously, Windows terminal.

Rick 
And the fact that it's actually something that works, right, because if you create something that doesn't really work, then then nobody will make these blog posts about it. So in the end, it all boils down to the fact that it works. And it's really nice to have a CLI that looks like whatever you want it to look like.

Jan 
That was that was interesting to know, initially, when I started out, it was just okay, let's create one prompt, right. And I ended, I think that's part of the success too, that cannot be underestimated. I from the Start did that open in the world. So it was from day one was open source. And you can get a conversation started with a lot of people around, you know, a tool, and in this case, it was, you know, other people bring their use cases, to me, because I only needed something that looked nice, showed me my Git information, and maybe some other stuff, but it wasn't specifically the era before 2019, it wasn't as elaborate as it is today. But um, you know, over the course of the years, now, I want to make it look differently, I have this, I want to make this visualization, I want to show this data. So that grew like a backlog of a lot of tasks that I needed to solve, which, you know, in all honesty grew the project quite a bit. And the scope also quite a bit sort of blowing up was not just in adoption, but also feature wise, it's really interesting to have a chance to offer the possibilities to everybody, and especially looking at a rewrite that was done roughly or started roughly two years ago, to even provide an answer to that, to that if to do these things even more efficient. Just you know, let's add something to the mix. But make it really straightforward to do it and extend it architecturally and technically. And that's how it really started blowing up in the past year. So it's a significant part for my posh as well the fact that it's open, and we can just accept feedback and iterate on it like crazy.

Rick 
Yeah, and I can actually imagine that, I mean, we all know the tools that we built for ourselves just to make sure that something works better or, or is automated. They normally not always are the best examples of architecture and modularity and reusability. So I can imagine that as soon as stuff like this gets out, and is actually recognized and is being used a lot and that it also forces you to rethink the structure of how you made it, and maybe even we architect for future versions.

Jan 
Yeah, it was a bit of the same as in, although there's a little bit of differences, we see this during work as well, right. So you build something based on initial assumptions, then you put it out there, people use it, your assumption gets challenged, or you see the limitations of what you thought you should have built. Or maybe it's also based on knowledge that you had at the time we all grow. So that happens both professionally. And in this case, you know, after hours as well, the only challenge is that, you know, being it, it is still an after hours project, the time that you're able to spend on it is limited, right? So you need to ideally have something that is flexible, that is easy to work with, or some people have a request or there is an issue that you are able to quickly pinpoint it. I did a lot of work in the past two years, looking at the rewrites from PowerShell. And to go obviously, that's one step. But it's more on how do we cater all of these requests in a way that is maintainable all the way to how do we then in you know, with all these use cases, have an architecture and an app architecture that's also extensible, easy to contribute to for other people as well and understandable. It is key to making sure this can stay alive and that I can stay motivated to keep doing changes. But to be honest, it I really pleased with where it is today architecturally and it's not perfect, right. There are places where I'm like scared to sometimes go into but not a lot. Maybe a dragon really? Yes, it's really, really limited today in use case, because I, you know, I really choose wisely and I'm not afraid to refactor, because it's necessary to make sure that I can keep maintaining it. But it is very, very, very important. Yeah, you can't build something like this, if it's not also properly architected. And that's an evolutionary thing, right? You get new requirements and requests. But um, I always say you can identify good architecture, if you get requests, and you're able to provide an answer reliably and efficiently. And we're there, you know, for my push today, that's the fact. And yet there are small parts that I would rather not touch or rewrite, because it's not going to bring additional value, but they're really isolated. And they're efficient, and it works. So

From watchmaker to developer - 10:53

Rick 
taking a few steps back, we read in your bio, that you actually started out as a watchmaker. So was that personal interests? Or was it because of environment?

Jan 
No, definitely not environment. I've always been, how do I put this properly? It's been difficult for me even as a kid to identify what I really wanted to do. And if you look at my track records, you know, I always worked with computers, but it never really came to my mind to do something with computers professionally, but at least not around my 17 to 18 years. So I was really struggling to figure out, you know, Where do I belong in this world? I love playing with Legos. I think a lot of people can really openly relate to that nowadays. But back then, and we're talking 20 years ago, that was a bit of a shame, too, acknowledge that you love doing that as a 16 to 18 year old right now, it's all fine. But back then my parents didn't really accept that because there was no future that although it meant I love being able to work with my hands as well as with my mind, you know, just build stuff from your, you know, your building blocks and just building things. And I came across an article about watchmaking. And I looked at that assemble that looks pretty interesting. So mainly focused on mechanical watchmaking and I enrolled in the course, did it for three years was I really loved doing it, because it's very challenging. It's there's, there's a technical aspect to it, you need to be handy, because it's very small, you need to know what you do. There's physics involved mathematics involved, so challenges your brain as well as your, what you're able to do, physically. And I went that way. And in all honesty, sometimes I do still miss it. But it's very, it's very similar to software engineering is especially the debugging part, right? You have a problem, you want to fix the actual problem that work around it. Well, you can do the same in a mechanical watch, just as you would do in a car or anything else, right? You could patch it pretty good, figure out where is the issue and then really fix it. So that mindset for me was like a very natural transition into engineering and I took that decision, mainly because watchmaking is a very traditional world. I love, you know, repairing watches, and you know, being busy doing those things, because you're in your own small, isolated world, and everything else is just gone. It's just you and the watch just looks like it's you and your software, to be honest, it's very safe space, I think a lot of people can relate to and it's also very 01, right is the truth because it's a physical thing, there's nothing else that influences it. So that that was really cool for me, but there's no career paths in watchmaking unless you really go abroad, etc., which there at a time just wasn't an option. So with the advice of a few friends, I went in a different direction. And I wanted to become an Android developer. That was the initial plan, or let's say, I was hacking Android phones as a passion. That was pretty cool. But they told me go study something very broad because IT is very broad landscape, you have no idea what you get what you like today is also what you'll be doing tomorrow, which was the best advice I've ever been given back then. So I went in that direction became a Windows Phone developer. And the rest is history, I guess.

Rick 
Well, I actually think that there's this really nice parallel to what you're saying that with software development, it is a bit like watchmaking, I mean, you need to be meticulous, but also watchmaking is a real craft. And I think through software development is also a craft. That's not the not that does not come easy. And I do think that it's relatively simple to start developing software but mastering it, I think nobody really, really masters the entirety of social development. Right?

Oscar 
My mind is still going on, because he mentioned batching in a watch, like, and I think there's also the difference, like, software, it's easy to not have it as a craft and make it work. Yeah. It's less so I think with a watch, I think hacking it together, make it kind of work doesn't count.

Rick 
But it's strange if you have all these extra parts hanging out of the watch to make it work.

Oscar 
But, but in the end, what you say Rick, the actual craft is, like, you go into some kind of flow with your world. And you also know it's your fault if it doesn't work. And actual good coding is really a craft, and you need to know so much about everything, to be able to deep dive a bit deeper into one part. So yeah, I can imagine that the Yeah, in your zone in Lego in your zone, like whatever, you know, like it's the same type of person enjoying that?

Jan 
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. For me, it really felt like just a natural evolution. Just the next step. Rather than get I'm going to do structurally something really different. Now, it was just from Legos to watches to software engineering. And it's all the same, at least mindset wise is identical.

The day to day life of Jan - 16:27

Rick 
It is I think it really is. What is your day to day Jan, because, I mean, most of the people probably know you because of Oh, my posh, but you do more for understanding...

Oscar 
He's just full time open sourcing, talking to Scott. Probably, however.

Jan 
That will be really cool. There is a lot of Scott talking involved, I'll admit it. But no, I'm a CTO at a company. So I'm responsible for 60 to 70 software engineers divided into multiple teams. And the company is called trendminer, where we built analytic software for the process industry. So you have to think of this as the Google Analytics on steroids for time series data, so we do root cause analysis, predictive analysis, etc. That's what we focus on today. And I'm there to you know, help them achieve results, and figure out how to do things. That's what I do in my day to day and then after hours, I put on my cape, and I become an open source maintainer to frustration of my family at times, because I do spent way too much time, but I love doing it, because it's also very, very rewarding. And in all honesty, what I learned in open source, is what I can also apply at work. And people often underestimate that, but the fact that you are solely or with a little group of people responsible for something that's out in the open, makes you change the way you look at software engineering. And a lot of companies really underestimate the positive impact that mindset that way of working can have on your internal deliveries, it would really literally change the world, if we would all work that way. To be honest, both in ownership and quality, etc.

Oscar 
It is it is the end to end holistic view you need to have on the system, especially if it's if it's used by anyone else, like otherwise might not help you that much. But thinking like writing in the open, like I'm really pushing open source also in the in our companies and even at clients. Because we're using it a lot. The quality with writing in the open that you need to push on yourself to indeed holistic thinking about a system like what does it mean to bring it all the way to production? I think every junior developer will be a step up in the world if they are doing something there or yeah, contributing somewhere. And do you get any contributors there in oh my posh, a lot.

Jan 
Yeah. And it's very, it's really interesting, because, you know, people just pop up all of a sudden, it's, it's weird how that happens. But we have we've had a few people really actively contributing, who also just my perception is they see this as some kind of mission to, you know, really properly contribute and have a good impact. So we've seen two people in the past and have been really actively also doing things. And then all of a sudden, you know, other elements pop up in their lives. So they go to the background, but they really made a significant impact. And now there's a new person really actively. His name's Lewis, I think you can see it if you go to the project on GitHub, you will see the contributors there, is one of it's also Belgian, by the way, which is a coincidence. I don't know him personally. But he really started contributing as well, I really also brought forward. And it's good because one, you have to understand. And this is a bit of a gamble that I took, I went from PowerShell to go, which looking at the ecosystem we're in, and still mainly Windows focus, because that's where the history is, that's not a given for people to then all of a sudden contribute to a tool they might use of Python, they also have to learn go, but the project has actually helped people get up to speed with go up to speed with development processes, because to be honest, the entire workflow round oh my Posh is heavily opinionated coming from me, I have a very strong opinion on how I feel we should deal with a project in terms of automation, branching, etc. So it could be tricky, if you really knew, but it really helped people on board. And I hope it was a good question, I should ask them once that it also really helped them professionally, I would expect, for me, at least it did open source built my career, I can be very, if I didn't, if I hadn't done this, I wouldn't be where I am today.

Rick 
I think that's a powerful statement that needs to get out there. Because like Oscar already said, Open Source is such a big part of what we do in our day to day, that it would be no more than oil, it should be no more than normal, that people working in software development, also contribute back. And I think companies should also enable their employees to do so because there's so much knowledge that you pull in when you pull in a package, that it's also good to contribute back as soon as you find that issue or have something that you fix yourself, because you need to why not provide it back to the community and give it back to the open source project.

Jan 
I tried to actively promote it or within the company and outside. But it's difficult, because it's, let's be completely honest, if you're in a company, deadlines are always there, it's always challenging to meet them. So we have to find ways to make that work. Building a culture within a company where that is also part of how what you do be part of your culture, basically, I think is key would really help. Although the challenge always goes back to the original maintainer, obviously, because that person has to manage, you know, the influx of all of these proposals, look at more requests or visions or anything else. So it's difficult. But I feel like yeah, we can do a lot more from companies to, you know, no longer just be leeches on open source work, but actively, you know, help that world become a sustainable place for people to be in which today, to be honest, it's not right. If, if I at one point in time, have a discussion, for example, at home that I spent too much time on it, you will see the improvements or progress on oh my posh go down, because I can't live from it. To be honest, it's all voluntary basis.

Rick 
And that's where were things like get up sponsors or something could or maybe should jump into to provide sponsoring for these types of projects, since we are so heavily dependent on them.

Jan 
Yeah, and that is definitely a step in the right direction and GitHub is really trying to figure out how to make that world also sustainable. But it's not an easy task.

Oscar 
I think it also started especially when you want a culture within a company, and I think you should want it to promote the use and openness. I think the essential is that teaching people to communicate in the right way to ask questions on the right spot. And also know that there are some, yeah, some dedicated person behind that, like what you say about coming in. It's all up to the maintainer. But then it's a hobby, in some cases, or most cases, even, I think, where I would start where I start is trying to get the team's as far as that they will contribute but focus on communication. Ask before you start the pull request. And he's like, Hey, here's a batch of code because that will ruin someone's week to go through it. Make it small, ask if the feature is needed or someone else's already working on it, small things like that. And I see some disrespectful comments sometimes, which I really threw boils my blood.

Rick 
I do think that the addition of q&a on GitHub that actually now enables you even more to do discussions and that kind of stuff. I think that will also help in in enabling people to define if what they're trying to do actually see the value of the project that you're that they're working on or looking to work on. So is oh my posh, already using q&a?

Jan 
Yes, definitely. You mean the discussion? Right? Yeah, definitely. Although I do see, and it's a conversation with me and GitHub as well. So people don't really find their way. So it's, you have to remember, in open source you mentioned, it's like a hobby, but it's more than a hobby. If I have to look at myself, it's really a passion. If it was just a hobby, I could also put it a bit on the on the Download sometimes, but I really don't, it's even more important than that my hobbies, which is weird, and maybe at some point, really sadomasochistic, because it's not easy to keep doing it that way. But somehow I have this mission, right? Maybe that's the right word I'm looking for you, you want to achieve something both for yourself, let's be open about it, there's definitely an ego part there. Because getting attention for something that you've built is always nice. But then also, you know, trying to grow that and build it even further and see how far this could go. There isn't sort of mission there. And the thing to remember and think that's important for other people as well trying to contribute is that you're actually entering someone's house. That's, I think, a very good comparison. You don't have to follow their rules, you're in their space, it's not up to you to define how things happen. And I even noticed that when I do contributions to other repositories that you know, there are different rules, I need to understand the rules of engagement. Hopefully, they have that written down somewhere, you have to respect that, you know, I don't care what you think. Respect that person's opinion and how they work. Even though you might not agree with it. It's not important.

Oscar 
I think that's all the way getting back is this is a really good way to help people grow in software, because they go to their day job, stuff happens in certain way. And maybe in a way they defined or it's normal for them. Having the opportunity to outside of work also contribute somewhere with someone with a different opinion, or something that had a natural evolution into a different direction that they're used to. It's also setting them up for success for even a next job or maybe more insights in their current job.

Jan 
I wholeheartedly agree the whole soft skills part is the most challenging element in software engineering. If you're in the technical challenges, we can solve them. We're all smart people, right? Or you find a way eventually, even if you don't see it today, but communication interaction with people respect, I think that's where we can learn a lot of the open source world.

Totally random question - 27:45

Oscar 
Definitely. Hey Rick, do you know what time it is? 

Rick
Is it time?

Oscar
For a totally random question?

Rick
Jan this one is totally random. Who is your favorite Disney princess?

Jan 
Oh, that's a good question. A really good one. Let me think I really loved Encanto lately. Is that a princess? Can we call her a princess?

Rick 
This strong female lead. So I think we can we can go with that one.

Jan 
Yeah I would go with that one

Rick 
You're talking about the main character Mirabell right?

Jan 
Yes indeed, Mirabell

Oscar 
Yes because we don't talk about Bruno

Rick 
No. Wow. Were you waiting for that one?

Oscar 
Oh, definitely. But I have a little girl. Definitely watched it a few times by now. So the song is in my head any moment.

Rick 
I have two boys and the youngest is 10. But we we've watched it too. So yeah. Well, that's a good movie. It's, it's upbeat. And I think that's actually something that throughout the entire world, maybe even we're becoming more and more inclusive and looking at all of the people that are part of our little globe. And I think that's something that Encanta also brings out because it's a female character and the lead. I mean, it fits in the in the time that we're in.

Oscar 
Yeah, I think there a lot of messages in there.

Rick 
Yeah, some hidden some not so hidden.

Oscar 
But, yeah, I think it's it counts as Disney princess. Maybe the question was too specific.

Rick 
I'll allow it.

Jan 
Maybe. Maybe she redefined the definition of Disney princess.

Rick 
Yeah. That's kind of deep actually.

Jan 
I hope so to be honest, because I think it's the right evolution.

Windows Phone - 29:58

Rick 
Yeah, yeah, probably. And um, now, I am going back to I am going back to tech because this was this was totally random.

Oscar
That was very random.

Rick
Okay. But going back to tech now, it does read in your bio. And I am going to call it that once again, that you started with baby steps as a Windows Phone developer. Now, I I'm looking at Oscar right now. And he I almost can read in his eyes or no, not again. But as far as I'm concerned, Windows Phone was probably one of the better mobile operating systems out there. It just lacked a lot of apps.

Jan 
And I wholeheartedly agree.

Rick 
How was your experience from Windows Phone developer to now? I mean, you also do app development, or have done app development?

Jan 
I Yeah, yeah. It To be honest, I have a I actually stopped doing app development, one Windows phone died, because I know because I couldn't do anything else because time was moving into a management position. So but I really missed that error. Sometimes. To be honest, it was so simple getting an app running and shipped to your phone straightaway.

Rick 
Yep.

Jan 
Yes.

Rick 
Yeah, I did think that the current evolution of Xamarin, now being called Maui will most probably bring a lot of that back to also Android and iOS devices. I It's not entirely there. But I mean, with the emulator, there is now a F5ing into an application running on an Android emulator. Or if you have a device attached, just F5. And into that actual device.

Oscar 
That’s the thing I think we had that in 2012 already with Windows Phone.

Rick 
Yeah. But I also I also remember Bill Gates being on a stage somewhere with a watch where he said here, you can see the weather on your watch. And everybody was like, what is this guy talking about? And then fast forward five or 10 years? And then smartwatches came out? Right? I mean, sometimes they were actually too, too early with some stuff.

Jan 
Yeah. Can I make a statement here because you triggered me, Windows Phone still today is ahead of anything else that is happening in the mobile development space today, looking at Android and iOS, they've always lagged behind and they still lag behind in some regards, architecturally ease of deployment, ease of debugging, you know, just how you can build an app. I'm sorry. I did. I did all of it. So I had a team where I was the only Windows Phone developer, then we had two Android developers, two iOS developers, and I was still faster than all of them, because the platform, A forced me in a way to do it architecturally better, and also have a lot more power and capabilities to really build a very reactive UI. Working with zamel compared to what iOS had back in the day, but even today, it's I mean, I feel like an idiot, and I have to build an iOS app every time again, because the hell who invented this drag and drop stuff to you know, luckily, we're moving beyond that. But I still remember having conversations with iOS developer about MVVM. Whereas that was just a standard. If you weren't doing that back in the day in 2016. People were laughing at you, to be honest. But, you know, even in 2020, there were talks or 2021. There were talks about, you know, that's VM interesting pattern. Like, what the hell are we talking about? Yeah, we know, seriously. So it's still ahead in a lot of ways. And it's a pity that it never got to see. I don't think that a lack of apps is necessarily what killed it. I think Microsoft, at one point in time, didn't really care anymore. I think they just denied... The 950, they gave up the what is it when the 950 came out, right? I think that was a boss device. I had that one. And it really felt like so much potential, but you ruined it. Because it wasn't ready. Right? But so much, but the analog of the things that we saw there, come back today, you can use your phone as a as a laptop while my 950 could do that.

Rick 
Yeah, I know.

Oscar 
I still have my 950 in my drawer somewhere.

Rick 
I think I lost those, I moved house. I think I lost all of my old devices, but or maybe explicitly threw them out. But yeah, like you said Jan, I mean, it was it was possible to just add one cable to your phone. And then you would have a mobile device connected two ways. mouse, a keyboard, an external screen even you could just run from there.

Jan 
And it worked.

Rick 
And it worked.

Jan 
It just worked. And you could run Android applications. I mean, what the hell was the app gap about? We had everything we needed. It still, it's still pretty I think.

Rick 
I feel like we need to have a support group for Windows Phone lovers. We get together once every two three months.

Jan 
I don't I think I've met a single person maybe so but not all of us who had a Windows Phone and really strongly feel like it deserves to go away.

Oscar 
I never know if that's because we had one. And we needed to defend it for years that we had something odd that we're still opinionated or it was that good in my memory. It was a good, I don't know.

Jan 
It was good.

Oscar 
I think it was, the developer flow was good. The whole hub, the people help thing in there was perfect.

Rick 
I mean, Live Tiles Come on.

Jan 
Live Tiles was amazing. You know, the widgets don't even come close. If you look at what you could do with Live Tile, you know, I have an iOS device for years now also use Android devices. It wasn't it's not the same. It's honestly, it's not out there. It's but you know, enough about memory lane trip?

Rick 
Well, sometimes those are nice, right.

Jan 
I just wanted to make that statement, because I feel like people really underestimate that today.

Rick 
Yeah, yeah. Well, we agree. Right?

Oscar 
Yes, definitely.

Closing - 36:07

Rick 
So looking at what we talked about today, is there something that you would like to get back to or something that you would like to add or maybe some final statement you would like to make, besides the fact that this phone is still the better OS?

Jan 
No, I think I just want to invite people to, you know, help me figure out good ideas or good additions to looking at Oh, my posh, I mean, my use cases are obviously limited, as are everybody's but it can only grow based on input. I recently, and this may be interesting to state deprecated, the PowerShell module. And it's important to understand why because obviously, some people feel annoyed by that. And, you know, it was there since the beginning. But PowerShell modules are difficult to work with, if you look at it from an executable point of view, which Oh, my posh, is today. And it was it only was a wrapper around you know, let's make sure we can also download the executable for your system, etc. But we all know that PowerShell modules, if you have PowerShell, five, or, or core installed next to each other on the same machine, you also have twice the same module. So that makes it really challenging keeping things in sync, which obviously brings more pressure to me as a maintainer that I didn't really need, because there are a lot of different means to install. So we moved everything in favor of winget today as our preferred installation means on Windows as that's, in my opinion, the future. That's also one of these things where I feel like Microsoft is really, really going in the right direction. So we want to piggyback really good there, we have a good relationship with the team, they're amazing. So important to know.

Oscar 
Will this winget, will this install only the.... Is it the replacement for only the powershell or will it install in all your prompts?

Jan 
It will install it everywhere. So that's also one of the challenges with module is that it was purely tails in the PowerShell. Whereas oh my posh, can you know it can just run in any shell. And out of the box has support for Bach at this age, which also is available natively on Windows if you want to go really crazy. I'm not, you know, oh my posh not opinionated, but sometimes I am most only human. It can run WsL everywhere. So you know, it's interesting to just have that one executable that you can reuse everywhere and get the same consistent look and feel for your CLI regardless of the shell you use. Because I think that's maybe a mind shift that is interesting for people to be aware of, you know, every shell has its advantages. PowerShell is amazing, because you're good objects so that other shells are amazing, because they offer other advantages, or maybe easier to use, or whatever the use case is. So oh my posh, allows you to switch between all of these and still feel at home. Just leverage it for whatever tasks you have at hand. That's what I want to achieve with it. I'm looking at Windows today with WsL Windows terminal. I feel like the moment is now to really expand your horizon and try anything see what works for me what works for you.

Rick 
I think those are powerful words to conclude with for today. I would like to thank you very much for being our guest. I had a lot of fun. Thank you very much.

Jan 
You're welcome. It was my pleasure.

Oscar 
Thank you for listening to Betatalks the podcast we publish a new episode every two weeks.

Rick 
You can find this on all the major streaming platforms like Spotify and iTunes.

Oscar 
See you next time.

Rick 
Bye.