Building an AI App with Calum Simpson

Building an AI App with Calum Simpson

Author: Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell December 4, 2025 Duration: 1:00:00
What's it like building an AI-centric application? Carl and Richard talk to Calum Simpson of SSW about their product YakShaver. Calum talks about building a tool that speeds reporting on issues and ideas, so you can spend more time focusing on key issues rather than "shaving the yak." The use of LLMs makes YakShaver far more capable, and the upcoming V2 uses Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers to expand functionality and feed information directly into bug reports, such as GitHub issues and feature requests. The conversation also turns a bit more philosophical, focusing on innovative uses of LLMs, properly constraining these tools, and maintaining a transparent chain of responsibility for your code.

Hosted by Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell, .NET Rocks! is a long-running conversation with the people building the future of software. This isn't a dry lecture; it's a lively, technical deep dive where two seasoned developers explore the vast ecosystem around Microsoft .NET, Azure, and modern development practices with a diverse roster of expert guests. Each episode feels like you're pulling up a chair in a room full of brilliant minds, listening to unfiltered discussions about real-world coding challenges, architectural patterns, and the tools that shape our daily work. You'll hear practical advice, war stories from the trenches, and forward-looking insights that go far beyond the documentation. Tuning into this podcast means connecting with a community of professionals who are as passionate about the craft as you are, offering perspectives that can transform how you approach your next project. Whether you're deep into C# or just curious about cloud-native development, these conversations provide a valuable blend of knowledge, humor, and genuine enthusiasm for technology.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 1000

.NET Rocks!
Podcast Episodes
A Very Serious Bot with Phil Haack [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 53:40
Can a chatbot make your team development process better? Carl and Richard talk to Phil Haack about his work building Ab.bot, a chatbot designed to work in Slack and Discord to help with building software - call it ChatOp…
Blazor Static Web Apps with Jeff Fritz [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 56:43
What's a Blazor Static Web App, and why should you care? Carl and Richard talk to Jeff Fritz about how the new Azure Static Web App service can be combined with Blazor to do dynamic things on the client, without any clie…
Entity Framework Core 5 with Julie Lerman [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:04:14
What's new in Entity Framework Core 5? Carl and Richard chat with Julie Lerman about the latest in EF Core, stories from the trenches of data development and more! Julie talks about there not being an EF Core 4 (to avoid…
Containers on Azure with Tom Kerkhove [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 49:46
How many ways can you run containers on Azure? Carl and Richard talk to Tom Kerkhove about his experiences working with Azure container solutions. The conversation starts out talking about Azure Functions, which under-th…
IdentityServer Update with Dominick Baier and Brock Allen [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 56:42
Time for an Identity Server update! Carl and Richard talk to Dominick Baier and Brock Allen about Identity Server. The conversation starts out focused on the evolution of security over the internet in the first place, in…
The State of Security in the Octoverse with Maya Kaczorowski [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 50:54
How secure is your software? Carl and Richard talk to Maya Kaczorowski of GitHub about The State of the Octoverse Security Report - one of three annual reports coming from GitHub about how software is being built. Maya t…
Geek Out 2020 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:12:32
Happy New Year! To ring in the New Year, Carl and Richard talk Geek Out for a couple of hours! Topics include the Pandemic, Renewable Energy, the latest in Space and Electric Cars. Yeah, that's right, all the hits in one…
.NET 5 with Scott Hunter [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 53:39
.NET 5 is shipped! What happens now? As part of the .BLD() Tech Talks XXL event in the Netherlands, Carl and Richard streamed interviewing Scott Hunter about .NET 5. The conversation turns to how the scope of .NET 5 focu…
Building a Flight Simulator in C# with Laura Laban [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 54:24
What does it take to make a flight simulator in C#? On a smartphone? Carl and Richard talk to Laura Laban about her experiences building Infinite Flight - starting with the Windows Phone in 2011! The conversation follows…
Building a TwitchBot in Blazor with Georgia Nelson [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 54:59
What can you use Blazor for? Carl and Richard talk to Georgia Nelson about GifBot, a Twitch bot Georgia has built using a variety of tools and languages (including Java) and today is C# and Blazor. Georgia talks about ev…