#479 – Dave Plummer: Programming, Autism, and Old-School Microsoft Stories
8/29/20250 min
Dave Plummer is a programmer, former Microsoft software engineer (Windows 95, NT, XP), creator of Task Manager, author of two books on autism, and host of the Dave's Garage YouTube channel, where he shares stories from his career, insights on software development, and deep dives into technology. Thank you for listening ❤ Check out our sponsors: https://lexfridman.com/sponsors/ep479-sc See below for timestamps, and to give feedback, submit questions, contact Lex, etc.
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EPISODE LINKS: Dave's X: https://x.com/davepl1968 Dave's YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DavesGarage Dave's Secondary YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@davepl Dave's GitHub: https://github.com/PlummersSoftwareLLC Dave's Books: https://amzn.to/41qd5IB
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OUTLINE: (00:00) - Introduction (01:14) - Sponsors, Comments, and Reflections (10:16) - First computer (15:54) - Dropping out of high-school (23:35) - Joining Microsoft (25:47) - MS-DOS (28:59) - Windows 95 (35:46) - The man behind Windows (40:42) - Debugging (45:59) - Task Manager (51:08) - 3D Pinball: Space Cadet (56:07) - Start menu and taskbar (1:07:06) - Blue Screen of Death (1:09:15) - Best programmers (1:17:16) - Scariest time of Dave's life (1:24:44) - Best Windows version (1:26:34) - Slot machines (1:30:17) - Autism and ADHD (1:49:37) - Fastest programming language (1:53:42) - Future of programming
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Clips
Transcript
9 sentencesLex Fridman· Host0:00
The following is a conversation with Dave Plummer, programmer and an old school Microsoft software engineer who helped work on Windows 95, NT, and XP, building a lot of incredible tools, some of which have been continuously used by hundreds of millions of people, like the famed Windows Task Manager. Yes, the Windows Task Manager, and the zip/unzip compression support in Windows. And he ported the code for Space Cadet Pinball, AKA 3D Pinball, to Windows. Today, he's loved by many programmers and engineers for his amazing YouTube channel called Dave's Garage that you should definitely go check out. Also, he wrote a book on autism and about his life story called Secrets of the Autistic Millionaire, where he gives really interesting insights about how to navigate relationships, career, and day-to-day life with autism. All this taken together, this was a super fun conversation about the history and future of programming, computing, technology, and just building cool stuff in the proverbial garage. And now a quick few-second mention of the sponsor, check them out in the description, or at lexfriedman.com/sponsors. It's the best way to support this podcast. We got Uplift Desk, which is an incredible company that has been my go-to for a long time for all my office