The FDE Coach blog · new articles every day
Practical guides for engineers who ship AI.
Step-by-step builds with free AI tools, what just shipped in AI and why it matters, and Forward Deployed Engineer playbooks on interviews, pay and client work.
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Forward Deployed
The FDE Weekly Rhythm: Embed, Ship, and Expand in a Customer Environment
A concrete playbook for Forward Deployed Engineers in New York: how to structure your week from on-site embedding to shipping high-signal expansions. Real workflows, comp context, and no fluff.
9 min read
AI News
Adversarial Prompts in Legal Docs: An LLM Supply Chain Attack Case Study
A man injected hidden text into court filings to hijack a suspected AI summary. We unpack the prompt injection mechanics, why this is a critical supply chain risk for engineers deploying RAG pipelines, and how to test your own systems against it.
9 min read
AI News
When a Model Feels Worse: Quantifying Regressions in Instruction Following
Why does a new model release feel clunky and pedantic? We break down a reproducible method to quantify tone and instruction-following regressions, moving from vibes to hard data.
9 min read
AI News
Beyond Linear Chat: Building Editable Context DAGs for Multi-Turn LLM Reasoning
Linear chat chains break complex reasoning. Learn how editable context DAGs let you branch, merge, and prune LLM conversations, turning chaotic threads into structured engineering workflows.
11 min read
AI News
Prompting as Delegation: Why AI-Assisted Coding Mirrors Engineering Management
AI-assisted coding isn't a faster way to type—it's a leadership exercise. Learn why shifting from syntax to specification mirrors engineering management and how to delegate effectively to LLMs.
10 min read
AI News
Claude Code Sessions: Cost Engineering and Context Reuse Patterns That Ship Faster
Stop burning tokens on repetitive context. Master Claude Code session hygiene with compaction, CLAUDE.md, and Git worktrees to slash latency, cut costs, and keep your flow state intact.
9 min read
Build Guides
Build a GitHub PR Review Bot with Groq + Local Ollama Fallback
Ship a free-tier GitHub App that posts inline diff comments using Groq's fast LLMs, with a local Ollama fallback for sensitive repos. Full Cloudflare Worker code included.
10 min read
Build Guides
Automate Daily Slack Channel Summaries with n8n and Groq’s Free Tier
Build a zero-cost n8n workflow that fetches yesterday's Slack messages, runs them through Groq's free Mixtral model, and posts a clean digest back to a channel every morning.
10 min read
Guides
Databricks FDE Interview Questions: A Signal-First Prep Guide
Master Databricks FDE interview questions with a signal-first approach. Covers coding, architecture, scenario-based, and behavioral rounds with real patterns from recent loops.
10 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer vs SRE: Role, Impact, and Career Paths Compared
Forward Deployed Engineer vs SRE: a technical breakdown of responsibilities, required skills, salary expectations, and how each role drives business value differently.
8 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer Salary Levels: An FYI Compensation Breakdown
A data-driven breakdown of forward deployed engineer salary levels by company, tier, and experience. See real FYI compensation ranges from Palantir to startups.
12 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer Questions: A Signal-First Interview Prep Guide
Master the forward deployed engineer interview with high-signal questions, technical breakdowns, and strategic frameworks. Covers Palantir, Google, and Anthropic FDE loops.
11 min read
Guides
HackerRank Forward Deployed Engineer Salary in India (2025 Guide)
Unpack HackerRank FDE salaries in India: Bengaluru ranges, equity vs cash breakdown, leveling (L1-L4), and how to negotiate. Data from Glassdoor, levels.fyi, and real offers.
9 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer Average Salary in India: 2025 City-Wise Breakdown
Real city-wise FDE salary data for India in 2025: Bengaluru ₹35-60 LPA, remote pay, Google vs startup bands, and how to negotiate top-of-band offers.
13 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer Salary Remote: Negotiating Location-Independent Pay in 2025
A practical guide to forward deployed engineer salary benchmarks for remote roles, including equity, travel premiums, and scripts for negotiating location-independent pay.
9 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer: How to Become One Without a CS Degree
A no-fluff guide to becoming a Forward Deployed Engineer. Learn the exact skills, non-traditional paths, and portfolio strategies to break into this $200K+ role.
8 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer Blog: What to Read to Understand the Role
Cut through the hype. This guide maps the critical reading list—from technical deep dives and diary breakdowns to trust-building tactics—that defines a Forward Deployed Engineer.
8 min read
Guides
Forward Deployed Engineer Tools: The 2025 Ecosystem for Rapid Deployment
A field manual to the FDE tools ecosystem: from scripting SDKs and infra-as-code to customer debug proxies. Stack rankings, anti-patterns, and the kit that ships value in week one.
9 min read
Forward Deployed
How Palantir-Style FDEs Embed with Customers to Unlock Technical Wins
A concrete playbook on how Forward Deployed Engineers embed inside customer environments, debug production systems, and ship code that closes million-dollar deals—no fluff.
9 min read
Forward Deployed
How FDEs Turn a Messy Customer Problem into a Shipped Prototype in a Week
A step-by-step playbook for Forward Deployed Engineers: scoping chaos, building a zero-to-one prototype, and shipping it in 5 days while managing stakeholders and technical debt.
10 min read
Forward Deployed
The FDE Portfolio: Shipped Artifacts and Decision Logs That Get You Hired
Forget generic CRUD apps. An FDE portfolio that wins offers demonstrates high-agency problem-solving, cross-system integration, and explicit technical trade-offs. Here's exactly what to build and how to document it.
8 min read
Forward Deployed
What a Forward Deployed Engineer Actually Does in a Week: A Diary Breakdown
A real week-in-the-life of a Forward Deployed Engineer. From debugging a customer's Kafka cluster on-site to writing a C-suite memo on the flight home, here are the unvarnished workflows, tools, and decisions that define the FDE role.
9 min read
Forward Deployed
How to Break Into FDE Roles from a Backend or Frontend Background
Transition from backend or frontend engineering to Forward Deployed Engineer: the skill gaps, portfolio plays, interview prep, and real comp numbers that get you hired.
8 min read
Forward Deployed
Building Trust with Non-Technical Stakeholders as a Forward Deployed Engineer
Trust isn't built in the SOW—it's built in the 15-minute call before the meeting. A tactical FDE playbook for translating chaos into confidence for operators, buyers, and execs.
9 min read
1,162 articles and counting