Developer Interviews: Justin Podzimek

What do you do and how long have you been at bbcom?

I’m currently a Principal Software Engineer and have been working at Bodybuilding.com for about 8 years now. In addition to normal development, I’m responsible for helping my team of client-side engineers, software engineers, and QA in whatever project we’re currently working on. I also have a helping hand in guiding the technology we use at Bodybuilding.com along with the other technical leaders.

Linux or Mac?

Mac, but only slightly. There are some applications and utilities on my Mac that just aren’t there, or aren’t as good, on Linux. That being said, a good portion of my work is spent in the command line, so as long as it’s not Windows, I’m not super picky.

What is a typical day like for you?

The mornings are fairly consistent, with a daily scrum to discuss what we’ve been working on and what’s coming up. After that, my day is spent in a combination of working with the other members of my team, meetings, and heads down with my headphones on getting some work done.

What is in your developer tool box?  

#1 - An IDE. Depending on what I’m working on, it’s either IntelliJ or Sublime Text.  #2 - Slack. Getting push notifications on my phone when someone needs me and I’m not online is a huge help. #3 - Google Chrome as my preferred browser.  #4 - Spotify. Music is important to my development mojo.  #5 - Terminal.

What are your favorite pro tips?

alias yolo=‘git commit -am “Deal with it” && git push  -f origin master’

Kidding. 

Honestly, the best tip I can give is "stay in the flow”. It’s tough to get back in once it’s broken, so do everything you can to minimize distractions.

What did you code up today?  

We’re currently in the process of migrating upwards of 28,000 articles to a new CMS system living in Amazon Web Services (AWS). Today, I continued on with the migration script to download every image from an article and upload it to S3. In addition, tweaking and fine-tuning the process to make sure the cutover is as seamless as possible to our readers.

What has been the most challenging problem you’ve had to solve?  

Last year, we update the wrapper (header, footer, and sidebars) across our entire site. This was a HUGE project. Every technical team was involved in updating around 15 different Java and PHP applications, migrating our front-end code to use a new build system and AngularJS, site-wide feature enhancements like search and a new navigation, and countless other features. This was all completed in just a few months before the holidays. In all my years working at Bodybuilding.com, never have I seen collaboration between such a large group work as smoothly as it did.

Any crazy Bbcom stories?

The only one that comes to mind is the “poo-nami”. I think that one should be left up to the imagination.

What is the best thing about working at Bbcom?

You get to work on the coolest, most cutting edge products, with the coolest, most knowledge people around. There’s a lot to love about working at Bodybuilding.com.