There are two pillars in this episode. We start with the Technical Platform at bol.com. We'll explore what type of software engineering these teams are working on and what they are trying to achieve for the rest of our engineering community.T

Elastic Search to the Cloud

Jun 5th, 2023 45m 10s

Moving Elastic Search to the Cloud. Elastic is one of the core components of the eCommerce Tech Platform. It powers the search engine as well as other trivial functions. In our own data center it has the biggest footprint. Time to discuss how

DDoS - specific attacks require AI powered washing solutions

Apr 11th, 2023 48m 8s

If you look at the title of this episode, you might think that we are going to unveil our details about how we protect the bol.com platform against DDoS attacks. We should be clear about this, we just can’t in the current world we live in. But

The Buying Drip - A scoop of the 2nd book of Chantal Schinkels

Mar 30th, 2023 58m 46s

Chantal is on a mission. To make people aware of the buying drip or in Dutch "Koopinfuus". Together with Chantal we dive into this phenomenon and discuss what it is. We find out what the three pillars are that contribute to this drip. We make t

Tech Radar - hard discussions lead to transparency

Mar 9th, 2023 54m 12s

The Tech Radar is a tool to inspire and support Engineering teams at Bol.com to pick the best technologies for new projects; it provides a platform to share knowledge and experience in technologies, to reflect on technology decisions and contin

Neurodiversity - Two brave guests sharing their personal stories

Feb 7th, 2023 1h 10m

Neurodiversity is the idea that neurological differences, such as autism, ADHD, Tourette syndrome and dyslexia, should be recognized and respected as a natural form of human diversity, similar to cultural and ethnic diversity. The neurodiversit

Data Build Tool - a tool to build data

Jan 24th, 2023 39m 47s

The guest of our show presented the Data Build Tool, DBT, in one of our knowledge-sharing sessions. Especially the fun part is what I recognize when I look at this knowledge-sharing session. The guest of the show presented it in an enthusiastic

The IT Girl - Chantal Schinkels

Dec 13th, 2022 50m 45s

Five years ago, Chantal found out she got a lower salary than a male colleague with less experience. Till that moment she was ok with the male-dominated Tech world. But this triggered her. She started reading about this topic, interviewed many

Order Sourcing Simulation with Data Science

Nov 30th, 2022 45m 50s

Order Sourcing Simulation is needed to enable capacity steering over our warehouses, network of sellers and logistical partners. Data Science is used to predict customer behavior and simulate capacity impact. What this episode coversWhat is:O

Product-led the engineering perspective

Nov 4th, 2022 46m 42s

What is a product-led organization? If you google it you will find a definition in the 1.4 billion answers similar to this:Product-led means being guided by the potential of products and product teams, and breaking down the silos between “the

Bye bye boring retrospectives

Oct 26th, 2022 47m 48s

Many know the retrospective from the agile way of working. It's one of the most important sessions in working agile. If done correctly and followed up it will make you better step by step. This is also the reason many people use it as instrume

Growing quality in our webshop

Aug 29th, 2022 41m 40s

With 2 of our engineers, we look into how we keep enhancing the quality of our webshop using canary testing and analysis, contract testing and end-to-end testing in isolation.What this episode coversWe have quite some communities within bol.com

Tech Culture Month and the Tech Culture Manifesto

Aug 26th, 2022 38m 2s

In the introduction mail, it said: “Having a culture in which we all can thrive, is one of our most valuable assets. To celebrate and cherish our unique tech culture, we are organizing events throughout the month of June. ”From Meetups to Gam

Demo-time; Google Glass capabilities in a pop-up Warehouse

Jul 6th, 2022 50m 6s

This experiment triggered so many questions with us: Creating a pop up warehouse with Google Glass implementation, how much time does it cost? Why are we doing this? Is this totally new in the market?What this episode coversWe dive into the e

Golang as simple as

Jun 13th, 2022 57m 46s

Over three years ago we published our third podcast episode. The topic of the episode was the Go programming language. We noted, “When you listen to the stories our two enthusiastic guests share in this episode, you might even believe Go is the

Product Led - Easier when done together

May 13th, 2022 46m 59s

We discuss the way of working of the Tech Lead and Architect in the Marketing Domain. Functional- and Technical aspects need to be taken into account when defining the direction of the development teams.From our guests Alexandra and Lennart,

To indie game developer and back

Apr 4th, 2022 47m 55s

A few months ago we noticed a message that stood out on our internal platform. Basically, it stated: "I'm back". Naturally, it happens every now and then that employees explore their horizons but still return to bol.com.What this episode covers

Front-end Framework Journey

Mar 16th, 2022 39m 25s

Everybody can go to bol.com and check the Front-End of our webshop. But what if you are a seller, supplier, partner or internal employee? What is your view when interacting with our IT systems? In general, you will use one of our Portals. These

Inclusion of Introverts

Feb 25th, 2022 1h 1m

Welcome to episode number 100!A special show with a very interesting topic: Inclusion of Introverts and Introversion. We asked our CEO Margaret Versteden for a quote for this number 100. She surprised us with the fact that this topic is so im

Transforming your experimentation knowledge into a book

Feb 9th, 2022 51m 40s

We are not only the hosts of the show but so far we also do the selection of the topics ourselves. Research what’s interesting. Find diverse subjects and guests, etc.What this episode coversAnd sometimes guests make it easier for us. They post

2021 Wrapped

Dec 29th, 2021 34m 55s

This episode is 2021 Techlab Wrapped. Inspired by one of the platforms that host our podcast Spotify.It is the end of Season 3 and the end of 2021. Time to look back and to look ahead.What this episode covers2021 Wrapped and maybe a glimpse i

Load testing with Locust

Nov 25th, 2021 41m 21s

During the recording of this episode, we are in the week of Black Friday. An exciting week for people hunting for bargains. And also for a lot of our colleagues.What this episode coversWhether that is from a commercial point of view or an engin

How could this happen

Nov 19th, 2021 48m 6s

If you are a regular listener to the podcast or an e-commerce watcher, you know “the season” is very important for us. It is a yearly recurring theme in the podcast. You are probably also aware that uptime and responsiveness of our app and webs

AI for Retail Lab on recommendations

Nov 3rd, 2021 46m 14s

In this episode, we virtually visit the AI for Retail Lab and dive with two members into the world of recommendations. The AI for Retail (AIR) Lab Amsterdam is a joint UvA-Ahold Delhaize industry lab and conducts research into socially responsi

Warehouse Mechanization

Oct 28th, 2021 45m 12s

Warehouse mechanization is a part of our IT landscape where our IT meets the physical world. It is one of those places where we encounter that while we could scale our IT almost indefinitely in the cloud, the physical world and warehouses don't