Lone Wolf Dev turned Open Source Super Contributor Tom Mondloch [Podcast #190]

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Tom Mondloch quit programming after he finished community college. After a few years of odd jobs, he decided to get back into programming and discovered freeCodeCamp.

He was just learning his own way, and didn’t think freeCodeCamp’s linear curriculum would be worth his time. But he stuck with it, got good, and ultimately started contributing to our open source project.

He’s since joined freeCodeCamp’s staff and archetected freeCodeCamp’s entire relational database curriculum, which you can run in your browser or right inside your VS Code editor.

Tom shares tips for:
– Brushing up on your programming skills if you’ve taken a few years off
– Contributing to open source
– Using AI codegen tools sensibly and not relying too heavily on them

He also talks about the role of vocational college, his love of the outdoors, and how working remotely allows him to continue to live in small town middle America without the need to move to a big city.

A huge thank you to the 10,889 kind folks who make this podcast possible by supporting freeCodeCamp through a monthly donation. Join these kind folks and help our mission by going to https://www.freecodecamp.org/donate

Links we talk about:
🔗 freeCodeCamp’s daily coding challenges in Python and JavaScript: https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/introducing-freecodecamp-daily-python-and-javascript-challenges-solve-a-new-programming-puzzle-every-day/
🔗 Mrugesh’s article on AI Assisted Coding (that Tom used for his hackathon project): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/how-to-become-an-expert-in-ai-assisted-coding-a-handbook-for-developers/
🔗 Jessica Wilkins who helped Tom with his hackathon project on the freeCodeCamp podcast episode #111: https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/podcast-jessica-wilkins-classical-music-learning-to-code/

News items:

1. freeCodeCamp just published this comprehensive front end development course where you build your own browser-based code editor. You can code along at home and build your own single page app development environment with tabs for editing your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Along the way, you’ll learn some intermediate JS techniques that allow for instant live preview, so you can see the results of your code changes right away. (4 hour YouTube course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/code-your-own-code-editor/

2. I also made a quick announcement about some big improvements to our core Full Stack Development curriculum. In short, we’re breaking down our new coursework into a series of six new certifications you can earn along the way to the capstone cert. These include Python, Relational Databases, Front End Libraries, and more. (5 minute read): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/introducing-freecodecamp-checkpoint-certifications/

3. freeCodeCamp also just published this new course that will help you pass the Databricks Data Engineer Associate certification exam. Andrew Brown is a CTO who has passed practically every DevOps exam under the sun, and he teaches this course. He’ll introduce you to key concepts like Clusters, Structured Streaming, Data Lakes, and more. (8 hour course): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/prepare-for-the-databricks-data-engineer-associate-certification-exam-and-pass/

5. Enjoy this breezy read about Cosine Similarity and the role it plays in Large Language Models. As its author, Manish, says, Cosine Similarity is “a bridge between human language and machine understanding. It allows a model to treat meaning as geometry, turning questions and answers into points in space.” Not only will you learn the math involved, you’ll also see it implemented in Python code. (10 minute read): https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/how-does-cosine-similarity-work/

6. Krazam America’s Next Top Model Context Protocol Server skit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVrCPo8eB3A

Song of the Week: A Taste of Honey: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhD58dP9kq8

Chapters
0:00 – Introduction
0:08 – Community News
0:13 – Front End Development Course
0:56 – New Certifications
1:34 – Databricks Certification Guide
2:03 – Cosine Similarity Tutorial
2:34 – Developer Comedy
3:10 – Song of the Week
3:42 – Interview with Tom Mondloch
4:50 – Daily Coding Challenges
8:20 – The Hardest Part of Creating Challenges
11:05 – Future Features for Challenges
15:00 – LLMs vs. Daily Challenges
15:47 – Tom’s Programming Journey
17:05 – Returning to Programming
19:56 – Transition to Open Source Contributor
23:24 – Relational Database Curriculum Development
27:33 – Language Curricula
30:33 – AI Assisted Development
33:11 – MAME Machine Project
35:52 – Advice for Open Source Contributions
36:25 – Hopes for 2026 Read More freeCodeCamp.org