In this episode of Señors @ Scale, Dan sits down with Bramus Van Damme, Chrome Developer Relations Engineer at Google, and one of the driving forces behind View Transitions, Scroll-Driven Animations, Anchor Positioning, and CSS Custom Functions.Bramus brings a rare perspective from inside the browser engine itself. From helping shape CSS specs at the standards level to building the demos and tooling that developers rely on every day, he has a front-row seat to how modern UI engineering is evolving.We go deep into how the new CSS works in practice — beyond the marketing, straight into the mechanics of performance, rendering, and real-world API design.We break down how these capabilities actually work:How View Transitions calculate DOM deltas and morph shared elements across pages,How Scroll-Driven Animations run on the compositor instead of the main thread,How Anchor Positioning finally fixes popovers, tooltips, and dropdowns without JavaScript,and how CSS Custom Functions and Mixins push the language closer to a full programming environment.Bramus also explains the browser-internals most teams never see — interop, working with the CSS Working Group, and the engineering cost behind features that take 5 to 10 years to land across engines.The conversation goes beyond features into the realities of framework timing, React’s virtual DOM, when animations fall back to the main thread, and why modern CSS is becoming the foundation for UI systems at scale.If you’re building modern frontends, maintaining a design system, or leading platform engineering for UI, this episode is a masterclass in what the next generation of the web actually looks like.Chapters00:00 The Journey into Web Development01:02 Best Practices for View Transitions07:46 What Chrome DevRel Actually Does10:33 How Browser Features Get Prioritized13:38 Why Styling Forms Has Been Broken for Years17:18 Inside View Transitions and Cross-Document Animations22:11 Motion, Accessibility, and Reducing Overuse23:44 Integrating Browser Features with React, Vue, and Frameworks27:46 The Popover API and Pattern-Driven Standards30:48 How React and Chrome Collaborated on View Transitions31:46 The State of Scroll-Driven Animations34:25 Triggered Animations and What’s Coming Next35:50 Why JS Scroll Handlers Cause Jank37:17 GPU-Accelerated vs Main-Thread Animations40:10 The Coolest Demo: Scroll-Driven View Transitions44:24 Anchor Positioning and De-JSifying UI Patterns48:23 Developer Feedback, Interop, and Spec Evolution51:19 Custom Functions and the Future of CSS as a Language54:58 Mixins, Preprocessors, and Platform Evolution56:43 Books, Blogs, and Where Bramus Learns58:11 Closing Thoughts and Call for FeedbackFollow & Subscribe:📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/senorsatscale/📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neciudev🎙 Podcast URL: https://neciudan.dev/senors-at-scale📬 Newsletter: https://neciudan.dev/subscribe💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/se%C3%B1ors-scale/Additional Resources🌐 Bramus’ Blog: https://www.bram.us🌐 View Transitions Demos: https://view-transitions.chrome.dev🌐 Scroll-Driven Animations Course: https://scroll-driven-animations.style/🌐 Anchor-Tool by Una: https://anchor-tool.com#css #webdevelopment #frontend #javascript #chrome #softwareengineering #uiux #devtools #animations #react #performance #softwarearchitecture #señorsatscaleDon’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more engineering stories from the front lines.

In this episode of Señors @ Scale, Dan sits down with Liran Tal, Director of Developer Advocacy at Snyk, GitHub Star, and one of the most influential voices in modern application security. Liran has spent decades at the intersection of open-source ecosystems, Node.js, supply chain security, and now AI agent security, helping developers ship fast without exposing themselves to silent, catastrophic risks.

He breaks down the real stories behind today’s security landscape — from NPM malware and maintainer compromises to MCP attacks, toxic flows, and the hidden vulnerabilities emerging from AI-driven development.

We dig into what “security at scale” actually means: how attackers compromise maintainers and publish worm-style malware, how invisible Unicode payloads bypass human review, why AI-generated code is statistically insecure, and how developers can build guardrails directly into their workflows with tools like Snyk, NPQ, and MCP scanning.

Liran also reveals the problems teams consistently underestimate — developer ergonomics, dependency trust, package governance, CI risk, and why blindly upgrading dependencies is one of the most dangerous patterns in modern engineering.

The conversation goes far beyond theory — into secure coding, package hygiene, NPM ecosystem fragility, MCP prompt injection, SQL and command injection patterns, and what real-world breaches teach us about resilience.

If you build software, install dependencies, or use AI coding agents, this episode is a masterclass in defensive engineering, supply chain awareness, and the new security realities shaping our industry.

Chapters
00:00 Security at Scale – Why It Matters Now
02:14 How Liran Got Into Security
05:12 The Shift Toward Developer-Led Security
08:33 How Snyk Changed the Developer Security Workflow
11:07 The Story Behind NPQ and Safer Dependency Installation
14:02 The Rise of NPM Malware and Maintainer Compromise
16:48 Why Blind Upgrade Everything Pipelines Are Dangerous
19:15 Is Node the Problem or Is It NPM
21:10 The Hidden Risk of MCPs and AI Agent Vulnerabilities
24:18 Toxic Flows, Shadowed Tools, and Prompt Injection
27:22 AI Browsers, Extensions, and Real Prompt Injection Attacks
30:04 Why Prompt Injection Has No True Fix
33:01 AI-Generated Code Is Statistically Insecure
35:12 How Snyk Plus MCP Creates a Secure Coding Loop
37:40 The Most Common MCP Vulnerabilities
40:55 How AI Agents Turn Mild Bugs Into Critical RCE
43:11 The Glassworm Invisible Unicode Attack Vector
44:51 EventStream, XZ Utils, and Supply Chain Horror Stories
48:03 Liran’s Personal Security Incidents
51:10 UX vs Security and Real World Tension
53:04 Liran’s Book Recommendations
55:37 Final Thoughts and Protecting Yourself as AI Evolves

Sound Bites
"Security at scale is a complex challenge."
"AI-generated code is not always secure."
"Security and UX must work together."

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Podcast URL: https://neciudan.dev/senors-at-scale
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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan
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Additional Resources
Snyk – developer-first security tools
Serverless Security (O’Reilly) – co-authored by Liran
Liran’s GitHub: https://github.com/lirantal
NPQ package checker: https://github.com/lirantal/npq
MCP Scan (Snyk) – securing MCP servers

#security #softwaresecurity #supplychainsecurity #npm

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How are you protecting your stack from supply chain attacks? Share below 👇

In this episode of Señors @ Scale, Dan sits down with Luca Mezzalira, Principal Serverless Specialist at AWS and author of Building Micro-Frontends, for a deep and highly practical look at scaling frontend architectures for hundreds of developers.

Luca shares the real story behind how micro-frontends were born — from his early experiments at DAZN trying to scale a live sports platform across 40 devices and 500+ engineers, to pioneering techniques that cut app startup times from 40 seconds to 12.

We break down how distributed frontends actually work:
How to design stable application shells with zero global state,
How to compose independently deployed views without iframes, and how guardrails like bundle-size budgets and canary deployments keep massive systems fast and safe.

Luca also explains the hidden challenges most teams miss — governance, team topology, and socio-technical design.
He shows how to evolve from a monolith to micro-frontends step by step, using edge routing, feature flags, and domain-driven design to scale safely without rewrites.

The conversation goes beyond theory — into the mechanics of migration, platform teams, CI/CD pipelines, and why friction in your system is actually a signal, not a failure.

If you’re leading a frontend platform, planning a migration, or just trying to make sense of where micro-frontends actually fit, this episode is a masterclass in autonomy, architecture, and evolution at scale.

Chapters
00:00 The Origin of Micro-Frontends at DAZN05:41 Building a Distributed Frontend Without iFrames08:50 Designing the Application Shell and Stateless Architecture12:23 Zero Global State and Memory Management15:53 Guardrails for Bundle Size and Developer Discipline17:39 Governance and Designing for Scale20:18 When (and When Not) to Adopt Micro-Frontends22:46 Canary Releases and Edge Routing for Safe Migration25:49 Vertical vs Horizontal Splits in Micro-Frontends31:30 Lessons from Building the First Edition of the Book35:38 Frameworks, Federation, and Modern Tools39:22 Core Principles of Successful Frontend Architecture42:06 Building Platform Teams and Core Governance44:19 When Micro-Frontends Don’t Make Sense47:50 Micro-Frontends for Small Teams and Startups49:32 Monorepo vs Polyrepo – What Actually Matters53:10 Preventing Duplication and Encouraging Communication57:39 Why a Design System Is Non-Negotiable59:17 Common Anti-Patterns in Micro-Frontend Architecture

1:03:33 Book Recommendations and Final Thoughts

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💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan
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Additional Resources

📘 Building Micro-Frontends – Luca Mezzalira (O’Reilly) buildingmicrofrontends.com

🌐 buildingmfe.com

💬 Luca’s Blog: https://lucamezzalira.com

#microfrontends #aws #frontendarchitecture #javascript #webdevelopment #softwareengineering #softwarearchitecture #react #scaling #teamtopologies #serverless #señorsatscale

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How is your team approaching frontend scaling and independence? Share below 👇

🎙 About the Podcast:

Join host Neciu Dan as he sits down with Stefano Magni, a senior front-end engineer and tech lead at Preply, to explore the intricacies of building a robust design system and the journey of working in public.

Stefano shares his insights on the importance of skills, reputation, and networking in shaping a successful career. Discover how his experiences from building Flash mini-games to architecting React-based systems have influenced his approach to engineering excellence.

In this episode, they discuss:

The pivotal moment that led Stefano to work in public

How Preply's design system impacts user experience

The balance between perfectionism and pragmatism in engineering

The role of data-driven decisions in Preply's culture

Best practices for managing large codebases without tests

Stefano also shares his journey from a Flash developer to a leader in the design system space, emphasizing the value of sharing knowledge and building a strong professional network.

Chapters:

00:00 Introduction to Stefano Magni and Preply

05:12 The Importance of Public Work

12:45 Building a Design System at Preply

18:30 Balancing Perfectionism and Pragmatism

25:00 Data-Driven Culture at Preply

32:15 Managing Large Codebases Without Tests

40:00 The Journey from Flash to React

47:30 Networking and Reputation in Tech

55:00 Closing Thoughts and Future Plans

📚Links & Resources:

📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/senorsatscale/📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neciudev🎙 Podcast URL: https://neciudan.dev/senors-at-scale📬 Newsletter: https://neciudan.dev/subscribe💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/se%C3%B1ors-scale/

#designsystem #frontend #engineeringexcellence #preply #networking #publicwork #softwaredevelopment #señorsatscale

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🎙 About the Podcast:
Señors @ Scale is a no-fluff engineering podcast hosted by Neciu Dan — diving into the real-world chaos of scaling systems, teams, and yourself. From production bugs to platform bets, we sit down with senior engineers to discuss the scars, strategies, and lessons that truly matter.

In this episode, host Neciu Dan sits down with Bruno Paulino, Tech Lead at N26, to unpack how reliability, experimentation, and platform culture shape one of Europe’s most trusted digital banks.

Bruno’s path is anything but ordinary — from serving as a police officer in Brazil to leading FinTech engineering teams at scale. He shares how N26 builds server-driven UIs, runs AI-powered customer support, and balances speed vs reliability when every deploy touches millions of users.

They break down:

• How server-driven UI lets N26 ship features in minutes

• Why CI/CD pipelines are the backbone of reliability

• What it means to trade speed for resilience in FinTech

• How Statsig changed experimentation culture company-wide

• Lessons from production outages and post-mortems

• Why strong developer experience drives safer systems

It’s a deep dive into the real architecture, trade-offs, and human decisions behind reliable banking systems at scale.

🎧 Whether you’re scaling a FinTech product, managing CI/CD pipelines, or just trying to keep production sane, this one’s for you.

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🎙 Podcast URL: https://neciudan.dev/senors-at-scale
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💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/se%C3%B1ors-scale/

In this episode of Señors @ Scale, Dan chats with Natalia Venditto, Principal Product Manager at Microsoft, and Igor Minar, Senior Director of Engineering at Cloudflare and co-creator of Angular, about WebFragments — a radical new approach to micro-frontends that rethinks how we build for the web.

Natalia and Igor share how WebFragments was born from years of pain with module federation and brittle micro-frontend systems. They explain why shared dependencies and team coupling still plague large-scale applications, and how WebFragments breaks that pattern by isolating each fragment’s JavaScript and DOM context while still delivering a seamless user experience.

We dive deep into the architecture:
how iframes are being reinvented for performance and isolation,
how Shadow DOM and a technique called Reframing encapsulate code like Docker does for containers,
and how Fragment Piercing enables server-rendered fragments to appear instantly — even before the client shell has loaded.

The conversation also covers the challenges of building vendor-agnostic, framework-independent systems, the middleware patterns that eliminate CORS issues, and Cloudflare’s real-world migration of its production dashboard to WebFragments.
Plus, Natalia and Igor share what’s next — from nested fragments and out-of-order streaming to growing an open-source community around this new model of frontend architecture.

Whether you’re building micro-frontends, leading platform teams, or just curious about what’s next for web architecture, this episode is a masterclass in isolation, performance, and pragmatic innovation at scale.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction to WebFragments and Guests
06:48 Differentiating WebFragments from Module Federation
13:46 The Promise of Independence in Micro-Frontends
16:49 Reframing: A New Approach to Isolation
19:54 The Concept of Piercing in WebFragments
33:26 Fragment Communication and State Management
36:09 Middleware and Request Routing
39:22 WebFragments in Action at Cloudflare
44:02 Getting Started and Migration Path
50:13 Future Developments and Features
54:37 Community and Contributions
01:02:02 Outro

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💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/se%C3%B1ors-scale/

Additional Resources
https://github.com/webfragments
https://blog.cloudflare.com/
https://learn.microsoft.com/

#microfrontends #webfragments #javascript #angular #cloudflare #microsoft #frontend #softwarearchitecture #performance #webdevelopment #softwareengineering #señorsatscale

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How is your team approaching micro-frontends and architectural independence? Share below 👇

In this episode of Señors @ Scale, Erik Grijzen, Principal Software Engineer at New Relic, joins Dan to share his journey from web designer to principal architect and what it really takes to scale UI development across dozens of teams. Erik walks us through how New Relic built one of the first large-scale micro-frontend architectures before the term even existed, designing tooling that lets teams ship independently—from CLI bootstrapping to runtime composition. He explains how to manage hundreds of deploys a day without breaking the platform, and how observability keeps complex systems reliable when they inevitably fail.We dive deep into observability at scale—how metrics, logs, traces, and business data blend to show what’s happening inside distributed systems, and why visibility isn’t just for developers anymore but a business priority tied to uptime, revenue, and customer trust.Erik also shares what technical leadership looks like at New Relic: influencing without authority, scaling architecture through culture, and using processes like RFCs and change documents to make better decisions. He emphasizes writing before building, POCs before roadmaps, and the mindset shift from coding features to guiding direction.The episode closes with a thoughtful discussion on burnout, balance, and habits for longevity in engineering—from sports and shutdown rituals to books like A Philosophy of Software Design and 4,000 Weeks.Whether you’re an architect, staff engineer, or team lead scaling a complex frontend platform, this episode is packed with real lessons on architecture, observability, and leadership at scale.Chapters00:00 Introduction to Erik Grijzen and His Journey08:48 Building a Unified Platform at New Relic13:34 Challenges and Solutions in Micro-Frontend Development18:47 How Observability Works Behind the Scenes32:02 Organizing Teams Around Domains36:38 Testing in Micro Frontends43:38 Technical Leadership and Management49:38 Effective Processes for Teams54:05 Decompressing and Work-Life Balance---Follow & Subscribe:📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/senorsatscale/📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neciudev🎙 Podcast URL: https://neciudan.dev/senors-at-scale📬 Newsletter: https://neciudan.dev/subscribe💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/se%C3%B1ors-scale/---Additional Resources[https://newrelic.com/blog](https://newrelic.com/blog)[https://micro-frontends.org/](https://micro-frontends.org/)[https://web.stanford.edu/~ouster/cgi-bin/book.php](https://web.stanford.edu/~ouster/cgi-bin/book.php)[https://oliverburkeman.com/books/4000-weeks/](https://oliverburkeman.com/books/4000-weeks/)#microfrontends #observability #softwarearchitecture #newrelic #frontend #softwareengineering #leadership #teammanagement #engineeringculture #señorsatscaleDon’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more engineering stories from the front lines. How is your team scaling architecture and observability? Share below 👇

In this episode of Señors @ Scale, Kateryna Porchienova, Senior Engineering Manager at Buffer, joins Dan to talk about her journey into programming, the craft of UI animation, and why accessibility should be a standard — not an afterthought.Kateryna shares how her very first app, built in high school, ended up helping children with disabilities learn from home — sparking a lifelong commitment to inclusion in tech. She walks us through best practices for accessibility, from learning to use a screen reader to understanding semantic HTML and ARIA roles.We also dive into the tooling side — from React Aria and Radix to Storybook and Lighthouse — and discuss how AI can both help and hurt accessibility efforts. Kateryna explains the most common mistakes developers make (like overusing ARIA labels), why animation and motion preferences matter for users’ health, and how to advocate for accessibility within engineering teams and company culture.The episode closes with her favorite book recommendations on product development and communication, underscoring how great engineering is as much about people as it is about code.🎯 Whether you’re a frontend developer, design system engineer, or tech lead, this episode is packed with real stories, practical takeaways, and thoughtful lessons from years of building inclusive products at scale.Chapters00:00 Introduction to Katarina Porchienova02:40 The Importance of Animation in UI Design05:23 Katarina's Journey into Programming09:02 Exploring Accessibility in Development11:43 Best Practices for Accessibility14:18 Tools and Libraries for Accessibility Testing17:09 The Role of AI in Accessibility20:44 Common Mistakes in Accessibility Implementation24:14 Advocating for Accessibility in Companies30:37 Recommended Books and Closing Thoughts---Follow & Subscribe:📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/senorsatscale/📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neciudev🎙 Podcast URL: https://neciudan.dev/senors-at-scale📬 Newsletter: https://neciudan.dev/subscribe💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neciudan💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/se%C3%B1ors-scale/---Here are some additional resources to dive deeper into the topic and learn more:- If you are just starting with accessibility, this free course on Udacity is awesome: 🔗 [Web Accessibility Course / Udacity](https://www.udacity.com/course/web-accessibility--ud891)- A11ycasts series on YouTube is great for bite-sized content on accessibility and screen-reader tutorials🔗 [A11ycasts with Rob Dodson](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtTyRajRuyY&list=PLNYkxOF6rcICWx0C9LVWWVqvHlYJyqw7g)- [Adrian Roselli blog](https://adrianroselli.com/posts) is an awesome resource for deep dives on specific topics and details- [Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1](https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG/)- [ARIA Authoring Practices Guide (APG)](https://www.w3.org/WAI/ARIA/apg/) is super useful for developing different widgets- [HTML Accessibility API Mappings](https://www.w3.org/TR/html-aam/) to see how native HTML elements map to accessibility tree- [Aria Live Regions documentation](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Accessibility/ARIA/ARIA_Live_Regions) to learn more about announcements and live regions- [A11Y support](https://a11ysupport.io/) shows support for various ARIA attributes across different screen readers#accessibility #webdevelopment #frontend #uiux #animation #buffer #reactaria #softwareengineering #a11y #engineeringculture #señorsatscaleDon’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more engineering stories from the front lines.How is your team building accessibility into your workflow? Share below 👇