A podcast from the minds of Shane Swenson and Dave Smith

This podcast explains how things work, from the minds of two engineers. Our promise is we will only present topics we know well. No faking!

To listen:

Episodes

Episode 19: High Performance Driving

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In episode 19, Shane and Dave explain high performance driving:

  • How to drive at the performance limit
  • The physics of racing
  • Racing strategy

Episode 18: How NAT works on the internet

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In episode 18, Shane and Dave explain how the internet inventors were able to cram billions of IP addreses into a much smaller space. And, this is how your home internet connection works too!

Episode 17: Rainbows

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In episode 17, Shane and Dave explain the surprising science of rainbows. Can you touch one? Does everyone else see the same rainbow that you see?

Episode 16: ChatGPT

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In episode 16, Shane and Dave explain how GPTs work. GPTs are a type of large language model, and the most famous is ChatGPT.

Episode 15: DNS on the Internet

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In episode 15, Shane and Dave explain the Domain Name Service, which is how your web browser figures out the IP addresses to use for domain names like google.com

Episode 14: Alexa

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In episode 14, Shane and Dave explain how Alexa works. Alexa is the most popular household voice assistant. Find out how Alexa works on the inside!

Episode 13: Telecommunications part 5, reliable communication with TCP

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In episode 13, Shane and Dave explain how the internet ensures that data is delivered between computers reliably and in order.

Episode 12: Telecommunications Part 4, the internet!

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In episode 12, Shane and Dave continue explaining the saga of telecommunications. Computer networks! How the technologies work that power the internet.

Episode 11: Explaining Computers Part 2

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In episode 11, Shane and Dave continue explaining computers. This is the 2nd part in a to-be-determined-length saga.

Episode 10: Explaining Computers Part 1

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In episode 10, Shane and Dave start to explain how computers work, from the very bottom: transistors, digital logic, binary, math, and much more. This will be the first part of an awesome saga!