Dave Plummer: Programming, Autism, and Old-School Microsoft Stories | Lex Fridman Podcast #479
Lex Fridman Podcast
Aug 29, 2025
Dave Plummer, a legendary Microsoft software engineer who built the Windows Task Manager and ZIP support, shares how an autistic perspective shaped his technical problem-solving. This deep dive moves from retro Commodore 64 programming to the high-stakes environment of Windows NT development, illustrating the power of extreme focus in software craftsmanship.
Key insight: Plummer discovered a Windows kernel bug by embedding his own phone number into the code's assertion logic; it remains in leaked NT source code to this day.
