Selenium, AI Agents, Performance Reviews, and Booze!

The current state of social media is ???! Nowhere feels quite like home anymore and the algorithms are controlling which of you even get to see my content. So I'm going back to writing directly to you via a newsletter. This will essentially be a monthly aggregate of what I'm up to. So be sure to subscribe, and the newsletter will be sent to you via email.

Oh Selenium, How I've Missed You

The majority of my tech career has been spent automating things with Selenium. However, I joined Block three years ago to explore some other areas in tech. I've learned a ton and have grown a lot as an engineer and leader, but boy do I miss my old tools.

I've now been given a bigger scope at Block and one of the tools I'm working on is Goose, an AI agent that automates developer tasks for you. Isn't that funny how I've ended up right back in automation?! ?? But wait, this gets better... Goose uses Selenium under the covers to automate any browser-related tasks! So, I get to explore these new AI capabilities with my old favorite tool. How cool is that? I won't get into it too much here because I'm actually going to tell you all about it during my keynote at the Selenium and Appium Conference next year in Valencia. The title is "Air Fryers, Automation, and AI" (pretty good, right?!). I can't wait to see you all and hear all about what you've been up to.

I've also launched a brand new Selenium WebDriver course in Java! This one covers some of the newer capabilities provided in Selenium 4.

AI Then, AI Now

Applitools, the last company I worked for, also builds AI tools so I was working in this space before generative AI became mainstream. And now here I am again working on cutting edge tech - this time AI Agents. As just about every company is scrambling to figure out their AI strategy, there's a desperate need for standards. Open standards were a huge part of the work I did on TBD at Block, so I have a deep appreciation for the importance of them and what they enable.

Anthropic has authored the Model Context Protocol (MCP) and it's generating a ton of buzz in the industry. I wrote about how it provides a standard way for AI agents to connect to the data sources they need to automate tasks.

Performance Reviews

It's the end of the year, which means it's time to start reflecting on your accomplishments and presenting them to management for a performance review. At my company, one of the criteria we rate employees on is Betterment. As I was traveling last month, I saw a perfect analogy to assess betterment. This has gotten quite the reception on Blue Sky and is something I've since been referencing at work and home.

I've also put together 5 quick tips to help you as you craft your self-assessment.

All Things Open

In October, I had the pleasure of speaking at one of my favorite conferences, All Things Open. It always feels like a reunion whenever I go, and this time was no different. I made my rounds with a talk titled How I Bought Booze with a JSON Web Token...

... a short podcast episode of We Love Open Source...

... and a longer podcast episode of Whiskey, Web, and Whatnot...

NOLA Stand Up

During the 2020 pandemic, my husband and I decided to move back home to New Orleans - somewhere we've not lived since we left for college. While I've always wanted to live in New Orleans again, it wasn't realistic for me because there was no tech scene. But that's beginning to change thanks to organizations like NOLAvate Black . So, it was quite the honor to be recognized by this organization this month ??

Things That Make You Go Hmmm

Gonna close this out with a little insightful fun! ??

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and happy holidays!!! ??

~Angie