Shanea Leven, Founder and CEO of CodeSee, joins ChedHER to discuss why there is a universal need for code-based understanding, and how CodeSee is aiming to meet those needs on a global scale.

chedHER

CodeSee Founder on the Universal Need for Code-Based Understanding

Joining us now is Shiny. 11 founder and ceo of code. See you definitely want to get some insight in terms of the mission of code C but also got to know what is a code visibility platform exactly. Uh Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me. Um code visibility is really able to visually see how your code works. Uh It visualizes the connections, the files, it's working structure so that you can actually create a mental model of how it works because that's all that we do as developers, we read code line by line and build that visibility in our heads uh which takes a ton of time and we basically give you that visibility instantly so you can understand it faster and better, fascinating why come up with this platform and what's the mission behind it? Yeah, the mission is to just help developers master the understanding of code bases are code bases have exploded over the last 10 years with the advent of open source and the deep connections and software built on top of software. And it's really hard to understand um how the code works. And so basically you pull out bugs or security vulnerabilities, kind of underlying our code based code runs our entire world. Right? So we really, really need to understand all of the inner workings of it. You mentioned there a moment ago, cozy, just announced that it's launched its open source hub as a community for developers. What's the goal with creating this global hub? Yeah, so most open source communities are primarily just issue aggregators um and open source hub provides developers a way to visually on board and understand the massive amount of code in an open source project, really making it easy to contribute to collaborate and make meaningful contributions. You can see the impact that your change has um on the code base uh in open source and visually walk someone through, making it easy for technical and non technical people to understand the changes that you've made and why you've made them. Um and we can visually showcase um the contributions um in a way that developers can really showcase how their time is able to be contributed to causes that matter, like climate change, social activism and and machine learning. You mentioned a few moments ago that code really runs our world and the more that we get into a digital space is only going to continue to kind of grow in its power and how it affects us. So with that, why do you think there is such a need for universal kind of code based understanding? Is it because there are a shortage of kind of minds and and real skills in this space. Absolutely. We have a shortage of software developers and we have for a really long time and I don't think it's going away because our code bases are growing exponentially. Um and it takes a ton of time for each individual developer to understand the code. We spend 60% of our time reading and understanding code when we should be writing more code. Um, and you need to understand it performing, you can write it. Um, we spend a lot of time visually connecting things in our heads and then each individual developer is doing the exact same thing. So there's a ton of inefficiencies with how we talk about code, how we learn about it, how we share it and reason about it. And we really need for more people of different, diverse backgrounds, different understandings, different experiences to learn code as quickly as humanly possible. Cosi has has raised a total of about $10 million dollars to date. Congratulations on that. That is no small feat by a long shot. What advice do you have for other founders out there? Female founders in particular to to race looking to raise capital. Yeah, So the truth is that raising money is a bit counterintuitive. It's incredibly relationship based and you know, sometimes just presenting all of the facts just without the story behind what or why you're doing or the larger vision or where you can end up being a massive company. And so the advice that I have is make as many connections with people in the VC market as you possibly can and have those people introduce you have those people make recommendations about your company to other Vcs. Um, and do research on how VCS make their money, What are they looking for? Have empathy for what they're trying to achieve, build your story around that because it really helps you get on the same page with a VC. That networking and social capital so critical, really quickly here. When we look at the tech industry, it is typically white, typically male dominated. How are you hoping that coach E cosi changes those tides. Absolutely. So the our product by helping people visualize code, we really hope that it helps more people get over the gaps between just graduating or getting out of a boot camp and getting their first software engineering job. There's a huge gap in creating a school project with going into a company's billion line of code code base. And so code is that gap that really helps all people, whether you're a professional developer or whether you're just getting started, tackle this massive amount of code that our companies have. Listen, I, I am not a techie person at all. But I can imagine if I can see it, it makes it a lot easier to understand it and maybe to your point earlier, more efficient. I really appreciate your time shiny. 11 co founder and Ceo of Code C.