Long-running .NET talk with real engineering grit.
.NET Rocks! follows Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell through brisk, deeply technical conversations with people building and explaining Microsoft-adjacent software work. Recent episodes range from agentic RAG and local AI models to ASP.NET Core, Razor tooling, Visual Studio, DevOps, and practical AI-assisted coding.
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.NET Rocks! is a veteran developer show built around the daily concerns of people working in and around the Microsoft stack. Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell keep the room informal, but the conversations regularly get specific fast. Recent episodes spend a lot of time on AI as it actually lands in software teams. Rob Conery talks through AI-assisted development in terms of team adoption, technical debt, ETL work, and the human resistance that appears before people see a useful win. Ed Charbeneau frames agentic RAG around the need to notice the technology that could change a career before complacency takes over. Joe Finney pushes past the idea that AI only means large language models, pointing toward OCR, image segmentation, object detection, Hugging Face, ONNX, and local model tooling. James Montemagno compares coding models as different working partners, with distinct strengths for tickets, context gathering, bug fixing, and codebase exploration. The show also keeps one foot firmly in classic .NET platform work. Daniel Roth gets into ASP.NET Core, Blazor, WebAssembly runtime consolidation, CoreCLR, Minimal APIs, source generation, Razor compilation, and cross-stack collaboration. David Wengier’s Razor tooling discussion digs into LSP, Roslyn, project systems, duplicated file monitoring, and the co-hosting approach. That is the show’s real texture: relaxed surface, dense technical middle. It does not treat developers like beginners, but it also does not turn every episode into a lecture. There are quick asides, conference updates, sponsor blocks, old-show milestones, and bits of long-running rapport. The pacing is brisk. The assumptions are technical. The best episodes feel like sitting near experienced developers who can remember the old architecture, explain the new one, and still laugh at the awkward parts. For .NET engineers tracking AI tooling, Visual Studio, ASP.NET, Blazor, DevOps, and security conversations, it is a familiar but still current signal.
Made for: Working .NET developers, Microsoft-stack engineers, developer advocates, and technical leads who want practical context on AI tooling, ASP.NET Core, Visual Studio, Razor, Blazor, DevOps, and security.
What sets it apart: The show pairs old-platform memory with current implementation detail. It can move from Y2K stories and conference chatter into Roslyn, WebAssembly runtime consolidation, local models, and coding-agent behavior without changing rooms.
.NET Rocks! is an Internet Audio Talk Show for Microsoft .NET Developers.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
.NET Rocks! makes changes in developer tools and AI legible by following them down to codebases, runtimes, and team workflows.
.NET Rocks! turns software development into a working conversation between Carl Franklin, Richard Campbell, and guests with concrete systems to explain. The talk moves from ASP.NET Core runtime work and Razor's relationship with Roslyn to coding agents and local AI models.
From Razor plumbing to AI coworkers, your developer curiosity gets the full diagnostic workup.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A practical AI discussion about speed, team resistance, and what happens after the time savings show up.
The discussion keeps its feet on the ground. It leans on what AI changes in day-to-day development work, especially when the job is repetitive and slow, instead of turning into a victory lap.
A reminder to stay alert as the platform keeps moving.
Episode 1997 keeps its focus on staying alert while the platform shifts underfoot. Ed Charbonneau treats that as a habit, not a theory, and the mix of developer-advocate perspective, the War of the Worlds quote he likes to use, and the look back at responsive web work gives the…
A clear look at how ASP.NET Core stays tied into the wider .NET stack.
ASP.NET Core comes across as one part of the .NET stack, not a standalone web framework. Daniel Roth walks through runtime async work landing in .NET 11, the push to bring the WebAssembly runtime toward CoreCLR, and the constant handoff between ASP.NET, C#, language features,…
A practical reset: local AI is broader than chatbots and easier to approach than the hype suggests.
Joe Finney gives Richard and Carl a practical reset on local AI. The conversation is clearest when it moves past chatbot talk and into the wider model stack, with Hugging Face framed as a large repository and real tasks like OCR, image segmentation, image detection, and object…
A practical comparison of coding models for developers using AI tools.
The episode weighs how different coding models behave in ordinary work. It draws a useful contrast between GPT models, which are quicker and fit a specific ticket, files, and specs, and Sonnet models, which tend to explore a codebase more deeply.
A focused look at how Razor tooling and Roslyn share the same project-system burden.
This episode offers a practical look at the project-system burden behind Razor tooling. David Wengier lays out how Razor has to understand the project, follow references, and monitor file changes, while Roslyn handles much the same work for C# alongside it.
Long-form interviews on AI coding agents, infrastructure, and security, plus a recurring SED News roundup.
Founders and engineers on AI coding agents like Claude Code, and supply chain security.
Stack Overflow's Ryan Donovan interviews founders and engineers on AI agents, protocols, and dev tools.
Michael Kennedy interviews Python maintainers on packaging, security, web tools, and AI.
Michael Kennedy and Brian Okken run down the week's Python tooling, typing, and packaging news.
Matt Stratton interviews DevOps practitioners on security, platform engineering, and trusting AI-written code.
Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell use .NET Rocks!
Ed starts with complacency.
Daniel Roth joins .NET Rocks.
Local AI gets room to breathe.
AI coding models behave like coworkers, which is the useful bit here.
Razor tooling has carried two jobs.
The hosts discuss Cybersecurity Intersection, a new security-focused conference featuring top speakers like Paula Januszkiewicz and Microsoft experts covering topics such as secure coding, Azure security, and Blazor server applications.
The hosts discuss upcoming tech conferences like Dev Intersection, covering DevOps, cloud development, AI, and cybersecurity, with mentions of guest Michael Levan.
This episode of .NET Rocks features an interview with Diana Mounter about design at GitHub, starting with a segment on trending GitHub repos.
The hosts introduce guest Dustin Campbell and begin discussing Fusion Cache, an open-source hybrid cache framework for .NET, comparing it to Microsoft's offerings.
This episode of .NET Rocks features a discussion with Michael Howard on application security, spanning thirty years of experience in the field.
This episode of .NET Rocks features a discussion with Billy Hollis about improving legacy applications in the .NET ecosystem.
The hosts introduce the show and prepare to discuss a .NET framework topic with a guest.
Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell introduce a discussion about AI and the attention economy with guest Mark Seaman.
This episode of .NET Rocks features an interview with Lemon discussing Progressive Web Apps in 2025, along with humorous anecdotes about PubConf and vocal dyslexia.
The hosts discuss agentic AI coding experiences and new Microsoft developer features from Build.
The hosts banter about episode number coincidences and quantum theory before introducing a guest at a developer conference.
Carl and Richard interview Imagine Cup finalists at the Build conference and discuss a framework.
Carl and Richard discuss .NET development, recent events, and historical trivia from 1955.
Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell kick off a live episode from Microsoft Build, discussing the conference and their surroundings.
The hosts introduce the show from Microsoft Build, discuss the episode number 1953 referencing Mount Everest, and prepare to interview Scott Hunter.
Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell discuss .NET development, Build conference, and a trending GitHub repository of public APIs.
This episode of .NET Rocks features Chris Woodruff discussing C# networking topics, including ASPNetCore diagnostics and health checks, with hosts Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell.
The hosts discuss preparations for the Build conference, including organizing podcasters and studios, and briefly mention a sister podcast called Security This Week.