Don't tell me about pull requests.  They don't work either Introduction A code review takes the form of an interruption, the type of interruption called a “meeting.” This is the first point I want to raise in my continual push to restore the recognition of Flow as the most important condition of software development. Interruptions disrupt concentration and lost concentration is lost productivity and diminished quality. And this is just the start. Code reviews are rarely comprehensive; they are another example of checking a box and rarely catch bad practices or subtle errors. They are wastes of time and ineffectual, but they don’t have to be. We have better tools now but we don’t yet use them for reviewing code. And, no, I am not talking about pull requests. They are however too important to be left as just another procedure. All developers have blind spots and when we develop new code we tend to focus on the expected path of execution and do error handling as an anxiety-driven compulsion to be gotten out of the way (cleanup, return) instead of considering all that might credibly go wrong. Test-Driven Development has led the idea that developers write their own tests, a profoundly unwise assumption, making code reviews the only opportunity for other eyes to review the logic and potentially reveal its holes. Traditional Code Review You get called to a code review. Five minutes before the meeting you send a job to the printer queue, the changed files. Waiting at the printer are the other meeting attendees, doing the same thing, wasting paper for a single-use printing just in time for the meeting. As the meeting attendees arrive they flip through the pages, maybe not even sure which parts are changed. . They certainly don’t have time to analyze the code or the context of the changes so once the review begins the comments are mostly about superficialities like formatting or style. They are seeing the code for the first time Why are you checking for there? If that call fails it’s going to and you’ll never reach the check NULL throw NULL Flip, flip, flip. Why are you putting the and operators at the beginning of the line? The rest of the team puts them at the end of the line. && || I think we should be consistent Flip, flip, flip. This is excessive indentation. Why don’t you just stick in a return and Just Get Out? Uh, excuse me, are we ever going to talk about my changes or just about minutiae? Where are you going? Back to my desk. This is a waste of time. (slam) He’s not a I’m scheduling a with Microsoft Outlook. team player. meeting This kind of review doesn’t really investigate the changes, just looks at them. The paper ends up in the trash. If this kind of review is of a substantial amount of new code as opposed to incremental changes to existing code then a few actual useful remarks may come out of it. It’s all in front of the readers, but even then the analysis is going to be mostly superficial. Because even a completely standalone module is called from somewhere and it needs to be analyzed in context, which is not going to happen in an interruption. Er, meeting. Pull Request Review A pull request (terrible nomenclature; is the request ever denied?) shows a code diff and is usually done after a review. I don’t have a lot of experience with these but code changes without the surrounding code provide no context, without which the review is even more of a box-checking exercise. I don’t like being sent a PR link and asked for a review. It’s simply inadequate but has become, along with so many other shoddy and ill-considered recent practices, the “industry standard.” Looks fine to me A Better Way Forget the interruption, er, meeting. Don’t hold a meeting. Let me tell you how I do code reviews. I’m assuming all readers use Git and if not the same ideas area applicable to Subversion or whatever revision control you use. There is a tool called that integrates with your repositories and shows the branches in current and common use, and allows display of the contents of any commit . GitKraken in context from screenshot GitKraken GitKraken is free for noncommercial use and it is a truly excellent tool that provides a lot of what is missing in Git. It can be used to operate your local respository but that is not within the scope of this document. In the screenshot above the is a list of branches left pane the is a list of commits, each line representing time on the vertical axis, top being most recent, with each commit an image of the developer avatar central pane the shows, when a commit is selected, the contents of the change with the changes color-highlighted and some of the other file contents right pane The Process I recommend reviewing . Within reason of course; you don’t need to review projects you never work with, use your judgment (if agile has left you any). every single commit The advantages are You do the reviews at a , instead of attending an interruption and wasting a pile of paper time convenient to you Changes are (insertion, change, deletion) clearly color coded You can load the branch and examine the code in situ You can check all to the component to see how the change will affect the call points references You can to the codebase, even those outside your work area, e.g. changes to browser JavaScript when your own work is in the server keep up with all changes Conclusion This is a responsible, thorough, and contextual way to accomplish a code review without the wanton wastefulness of the traditional paper-flip interruption or the near-useless pull request review. It makes reviewing code as much a part of your workflow as writing it. Resources The Magnificence of Flow TDD is Fundamentally Wrong GitKraken

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Code Reviews Don’t Work: A Better Way to Create Software

obj = ItemObject()
.addItem( )
.addItem( )
.removeItem( ) const new 'a' 'b' 'c' Is there anyone who doesn't like ? It makes programming so much easier. I recently experimented on converting a callback based API into a fluent api. fluent interfaces Let's take the following class as an example. It has 3 methods and each expects a callback. If we wanted to run all of them in order, we would have to call them in a nested way as shown at the bottom of the snippet. Callback = ; Task {
  func1(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  }

  func2(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  }

  func3(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  }
} obj = Task();
obj.func1( {
  obj.func2( {
    obj.func3();
  })
}); export type ( )=> err?: , data?: any any void export class => () console 'function 1' return 1000 => () console 'function 2' return 1000 => () console 'function 3' return 1000 const new => () => () This will run as you would expect. Each function will run in order and 1 second apart. However, wouldn't it be nicer if we could chain methods? Ok long story short, here is how I accomplished it: Callback = ; Stage {
  func: Callback;
  callback: Callback;
} FluidTask { stack: Stage[] = []; isRunning = ; stager(func: Callback, callback?: Callback){ .stack.push({ func, callback }); (! .isRunning){ .stageRunner();
    }
  } stageRunner(){ stage = .stack.shift(); (!stage){ .isRunning = ; ;
    } .isRunning = ;
    stage.func( {
      stage.callback && stage.callback(err, data); .stageRunner();
    });
  } _func1(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  } _func2(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  } _func3(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  }

  func1(callback?: Callback){ .stager( ._func1(cb), callback); ;
  }

  func2(callback?: Callback){ .stager( ._func2(cb), callback); ;
  }

  func3(callback?: Callback){ .stager( ._func3(cb), callback); ;
  }
} FluidTask()
.func1()
.func2( .log( ))
.func3()
; export type ( )=> err?: , data?: any any void interface export class private private false private this if this this private const this if this false return this true ( )=> err, data this private => () console 'function 1' return 1000 private => () console 'function 2' return 1000 private => () console 'function 3' return 1000 this ( )=> cb this return this this ( )=> cb this return this this ( )=> cb this return this new => () console 'function 2 has finished' and voila! Let me explain what's going on! There are two main methods and . stager stageRunner stack: Stage[] = []; isRunning = ; stager(func: Callback, callback?: Callback){ .stack.push({ func, callback }); (! .isRunning){ .stageRunner();
    }
  } private private false private this if this this method expects two arguments. The first one is the function to be executed and the second one is the callback to be called when the function is done. It pushes these two values the stack and if it's not running we will call the method . stager stageRunner stageRunner(){ stage = .stack.shift(); (!stage){ .isRunning = ; ;
    } .isRunning = ;
    stage.func( {
      stage.callback && stage.callback(err, data); .stageRunner();
    });
  } private const this if this false return this true ( )=> err, data this This method will be called recursively. It will take the first item out and easy enough, if it's undefined, it will mark as not running and return. If it has an item, that means we have the function. We call the function with a callback that wraps the original callback that we stored. func This is the reason why we needed to save the original callback so that we can know when the execution finishes. And then the obvious, call . stageRunner Let's look at one of the methods now! _func1(callback?: Callback){
    setTimeout( { .log( ); callback && callback();
    }, );
  }

  func1(callback?: Callback){ .stager( ._func1(cb), callback); ;
  } private => () console 'function 1' return 1000 this ( )=> cb this return this In , the function calls the method and passes in a callback function: This is the function to be executed. func1 stager (cb)=> this._func2(cb) When its turn, essentially the following will happen: this._func2((err, data) => callback(err, data)); and finally so that we can return the object reference to chain  other methods. return this; FluidTask()
.func1()
.func2( .log( ))
.func3()
.func1( .log( ))
; new => () console 'function 2 has finished' => () console 'this is fun'

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Fluent Interface With Callbacks

You know what’s really sexy? Protection. It’s also important in our modern world, but when people write about cybersecurity, they always make it so...dry and tasteless. Well, today I’m gonna make sure cybersecurity sticks to you as long as it needs to. Forget the napkins and your favourite sock – you’re gonna need some industrial-strength paper towels after reading through my list of the sexiest cybersecurity tips that I, together with my dear colleagues at , have gathered. Cybernews Size does matter: the bigger, the better It’s long. It’s hard. It’s superstrong. And it can last for hundreds of years. No, I’m not talking about a fun Friday through Sunday night. I’m talking about something even sexier: a secure password. More specifically, I’m talking about a password that’s a bit different from those crazy formulas people have been recommending over the last decade or so. This is not a good password: iL1k3b0oBz,123! It’s not good because you definitely won’t remember it. In general, it’s also not stronger: a password like this is easy for a computer to crack, but hard for a human to remember. Instead, do the opposite. Take a phrase you can remember and put it all together – and remember, if it’s longer, it’s truly better: longerbiggercandymanbeetlejuice If it’s more memorable, that means you won’t have to write it down, email it to yourself, or any of those risky things people often do with confusing passwords. You can go further with protection Sure, you can go explore all the nooks and crannies of the world without having any kind of protection, but do you really want to run the risk of having your hard drive getting all red and itchy? Probably not. That just ain’t sexy, buddy. Even worse, you can infect others with it. Basic protection is so...basic, but you’d be surprised at how many people wander the internet without even having an antivirus program installed. That’s like [explicit] someone’s [explicit] while they [explicit] in your [explicit] with your own [explicit]! And that’s just crazy, right? Antivirus programs, much like condoms, won’t give you 100% protection from absolutely everything, but they will help stop the biggest and most common dangers. It’s not just for when you’re browsing your Saturday night favs on the internet – it’s also great for scanning your local network or your desktop, including when someone puts their USB stick in your open port, if you know what I mean. Even better, you can protect your whole computer and all your devices by making the entire machine encrypted. So, when your partner-for-the-night asks you: is that an encrypted hard drive or are you just happy to see me, you won’t have to choose. You can simply answer “Yes!” These two words can get you into all kinds of places If you want to get into my nether regions, you just need these two things: Multifactor. . Authentication And by nether regions I mean my most sensitive accounts – if you catch my drift. And by catch my drift, I mean not just my banking and payment details, but also my sensitive images, videos, messages and personal data on my favourite websites. Multifactor authentication, like the popular two-factor authentication, is based on something you know (like your password), and something you have (like your device). If someone ever gets my password, they’ll be in for a sucky surprise: it’s simply not enough to get in. They’ll need to have both my username/password and my phone – without me knowing about it – in order to access my accounts. And, honestly, when’s the last time you went without your phone for more than a few minutes without missing it? If you want to play hard to get – and actually be hard to get – you should set up multifactor authentication, like right now. If it’s fishy, avoid it The best advice I have heard when I had the talk was: if it smells fishy, son, avoid it at all costs. Get your mind out of the gutter folks – I’m simply talking about the strange emails and messages you get online. You see, the biggest weakness in cybersecurity is people. And, guess what, you are also a people. You need to understand that while it can take a hacker roughly 600+ years (via a dictionary attack) or (with a brute-force attack) to crack your password, it will be easier for them to simply get it from you. Maybe it’s written on your desk at work, or maybe you took one of those fun quizzes on Facebook that asked you for the coolest password ever. 58 septillion years For hackers, you’re the main target, because it’s easier to crack you than to do it the hard way. That’s why you should really avoid those fun quizzes on Facebook that ask for your mother’s maiden name (a common “forgot your password” question). And don’t click on a link in a strange, misspelt email, especially when you hover over the link and it goes to “kinkythingsforpirat3s.info” instead of the real website. Bottom line It’s not all that hard to do cybersecurity right. What I’ve given you above simply scratches the surface, but it really is enough to get you covered fundamentally. If you want more advanced techniques, there’s a veritable orgy of information all over the internet. Just like your favourite activity, the more you practice cybersecurity, the better you’ll get, helping you reach further, last longer, and stay stronger and more secure everytime you go online.

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I never expected to feel genuinely happy looking back to what, at the time, was the worst period of my life. In less than a year’s time, . I had earned and lost over $60,000 through trading cryptocurrency So, in this article, I’d like to briefly share my story and reflect on the lessons I learned and hopefully you'll be able to learn a thing or two. Getting Lucky If you’ve been in crypto long enough you’ve probably heard the term “invest only what you can afford to lose”. Sadly, the younger version of me discovered Bitcoin during the early stages of its latest bull market and didn’t follow that advice. I didn’t have a lot of savings or a master plan. In fact, all I had was approximately $2000 and a Twitter account. If you were hanging around in 2017, you may remember how Social Media had a major influence on the price of new cryptocurrencies. And once every so often, I saw a crystal clear opportunity to invest. Remember how ? this one played out I am inundated by people asking me for recommendations on cryptocurrencies. If you would use your heads you would figure out that the Coins like Monero (XMR), Verge (XVG), or Zcash (ZEC) cannot lose. John McAfee privacy coins (anonymous transactions) will have the greatest future. -John McAfee I don’t quite remember when I started to formulate strategies but I do remember that I turned my $2,000 into $60,000 with only two trades, within a 3–4 month timeframe. I put all my money into Verge (XVG) and Tron (TRX) when they were valued at a fraction of a cent. Then, at an approximate and purchased Ether (ETH). When the whole market started crashing, Ethereum did the opposite. ~30x I sold them As a person who, during that time, was earning the equivalent of $24,000 in annual income, this amount of money seemed extraordinary. And, as every amateur trader of that time, I got delusional and greedy. Losing it all When market started crashing there were plumbers, gardeners, basically everyone with a webcam and YouTube account giving investment advice and . it was extremely challenging to find a real expert to listen to At some point I decided to sell all my holdings into Bitcoin since it was my understanding that it would help me preserve most of my holdings. During the same time, I was also researching margin trading and hastily decided to give it a go. I was also investing in ICOs, buying cryptocurrencies that are going to "moon" and "hodling". As you could tell, I was all over the place. At that moment, margin trading and coins that were "about to go up", seemed like a great way to earn back my losses and everyone seemed to be ecstatic about it. I won’t go into much detail but trading with high leverage became an obsession and was in many ways similar to gambling. On top of that, most of the coins I bought soon after disappeared. Long story short, through all this, I slowly but surely lost ~99% of my holdings. Getting back to reality The shock remained for several days. I stopped socializing and neglected my relationships. But that was not even the hardest part. The real challenge came when I had to let go of my "millionaire" lifestyle expectations. Nonetheless, something great happened during that period as well. I finally slept better and found time to actually research and understand blockchain technology. I started spending more time exploring the concept of Bitcoin and slowly understood its revolutionary potential. I had come for the money (profits) and stayed for the money (the potential of Bitcoin as a global currency). Fast-forward two years and I am currently working at a Blockchain company, constantly researching the exciting developments of Bitcoin and its underlying technology. And even though I no longer consider myself a trader, I am able to look at my experience in a very constructive way. What I learned Here are some of the most important lessons I learned throughout the last two years, summed up in bullet points: Emotional intelligence is the key to success We are all emotional beings. However, some of us have developed a better response to our stressors in life. And to develop this skill is not that hard. All you need is awareness and logical response. When trading cryptocurrency, this becomes even more prevalent. We are constantly fluctuating between a state of fear and greed, both of which are drivers to our decision making process. So, being able to distance yourself from these emotions is the key to successful trades. You can’t control the market The cryptocurrency market is very volatile and unpredictable. Researchers of the British Psychological Society that the anxiety, choices, and competition related to trading, often lead to illusions of control. argue The same researchers also found that these illusions are tied to a trader’s performance. Realistically, the only thing you can do to maintain some form of control over your funds is to implement a . stop-loss Most traders are lucky Reading charts and understanding the market sentiment is only a small part of investing. In many cases, even the best traders will lose a ton of money. Sure, there are many successful investors on Youtube and Social Media flashing their cars and telling us about their 6-figure trades. But those investors make only a very small fraction of the total. It’s nearly certain that, with millions of investors around the world, some have just been luckier than others. Therefore, if you are getting trading information from individuals across the web, always ask yourself whether his success is the result of skill or luck. Knowledge equals money Inexperienced traders will often dismiss the small costs involved with trading crytpocurrencies, such as transaction fees, exchange commissions, paid channels, etc. When I first started buying Bitcoin, I was using platforms with a nice design and an easy-to-use interface, like , , etc. Coinbase Paybis Along the way, however, I learned that other exchanges like , , etc, offers lower transaction fees. Binance Kraken It might not seem as a big gain but as a trader, you want to utilize each and every opportunity to save money and . maximize your profits Before running, learn how to walk The whole crypto industry is based on speed and efficiency. However, most investors jump into the trading game without any background information. While not directly related to the potential profits of each trade, one should have a good understanding of , how its underlying technology works and why it makes a great investment. what Bitcoin is Since Bitcoin is the driver of the market, knowing everything you can about it can help you better understand the overal market sentiment. Closing I’m sure there are people out there that have lost a lot more than I do. But, in a way, losing a bunch of money can be a very eye-opening process. said it best: Naval "Your trauma creates you." -Naval And even if you’ve not been in my shoes, I am sure that the points above will help you better understand what cryptocurrency trading is really all about. Best of luck.

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How I Lost $60,000 Trading Crypto... and the Lessons You Can Learn From My Mistakes 

HELLO INTERNET. Calling all fellow iOS devs to start drinking backend with Swift. Our time is NOW 😈 Creating an API with Swift is here, and it’s juicy. Here’s what’s up. Stay connected with me on the internet @thetealpickle , leave a response or send me a tweet on twitter. Dont forget to share the ❤️ Namaste. Jessica 🥔

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Artificial Intelligence is going to push development Artificial intelligence made significant headway in 2018. Last year resulted in many complex examples of Artificial Intelligence (AI) use, such as Gmail email reply play reading, programmed calls to book meetings, cyber assistants, driverless vehicles and even humanoid robots. AI is changing various parts of many industries including healthcare, retail, and fintech with voice assistance in 2019. The outlook of software development — poised between ML, big data and complicated AI engines, is brings innovative and gripping outcomes across the board. Revenue from Artificial Intelligence is poised to raise 2x in one year. The most important benefit in the case of self-regulation is how quickly it has incorporated responsibilities that once took so much of your time. A Cross-Platform Solution is a king The concept of cross-platform solutions “develop once, apply anywhere” is alike magical ideal and for administrators and a promising presence for developers. The simplicity of code repurposing is one of the most significant benefits that cross-platform app development provides. It’s cutting the work and time in half as opposed to that of native development. Also, it provides a comparatively more economical charge of development as opposed to native app development because the code applies to various platforms. Cross-platform apps offer the fastest route to market and broad market extension. And, as the app is accessible on various platforms as one and simultaneously, it preserves marketing activities. Here , we’ve written about cross-platform solutions for business Blockchain Blockchain is certainly one of the most discussed techs in the IT business. Electronic money like bitcoin and Ethereum actually appeared with the introduction of this technology. We've recently seen the increasing demand and forecasts for this technology. The protected and streamlined registration of activities in a decentralized record with the maintenance of blockchain make it especially valuable for companies in all industries. Deloitte’s 2018 received statements from over 1,000 C-level managers that work in different businesses. 84% of managers believe blockchain will reach the prevailing outcome. study Interesting fact: While CEOs were questioned on whether they thought blockchain was simply “a database for money” with limited app aside from financial services, only 18% of US interviewees coincided with that statement vs 61% of interviewees in France and the United Kingdom. The internet of things (IoT) The internet of things (IoT) has definitely started to emerge across the world. From smartwatches to self-managed microwaves, internet-connected gadgets are no longer committed to only laptops and smartphones. As techs like 4G start to turn out, more tools can benefit from better wireless bandwidth and energy-efficient, inspirit, innovative and exciting opportunities for the tomorrow of IoT. The future of IoT has the capacity to be endless. Progress to the modern internet will be quickened through improved network coordination, combined with artificial intelligence (AI) and the ability to expand, automate, organize and guard different use cases at the wormhole. Microservices will be habitual Earlier and its impacts on business in the healthcare, financial, and retail industries. The endorsement of microservices is rising and has turned into an essential approach for software developers. we explained the term of microservices An IDC report
 shows that architecture to improve the capacity to fix, upgrade, support, and develop external code by 2022. 90% of apps will use microservices ResearchAndMarkets.com conducted a huge study called  Microservices Architecture Market Research Report-Global Forecast 2023 where they reveal that the global microservices market size will grow from USD 865 Million in 2019 to USD 1,880.0 Million by 2023. Outsourcing Software Development The outsourcing market is expanding remarkably. Breakthrough outsourcing solutions — driven by cloud and automation — are changing traditional outsourcing. More than 44% of CIOs claim that they are more likely to use outsourcing vendors than they would have considered 4 years ago. This is proof of the increasing market for outsourcing worldwide. The reasons for outsourcing are unchanging: organizations turn away from the hiring of internal developers to cut costs and access the most talented developers across the globe. Software engineering demands are heightened in all industries. Companies are hunting for developers in nearly all areas, such as fintech, retail software development, healthcare software development, e-learning software development, etc. Software development will continue to increase every year. By knowing the most advanced trends and keeping your business method consistent, your company has a higher possibility of success.

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There are numerous posts about developing a chatbot using Dialogflow. But creating chatbot isn’t enough. Connecting Dialogflow to the web interface is even more interesting and challenging. With Angular being a popular and emerging platform, here is our guide to integrate Dialogflow chatbot with Angular JS. In our quest to simplify chatbot integration with different platforms, we have previously written guides to integrate chatbots with websites and apps. Pre-requisites To get started, you would need a chatbot or working knowledge of Dialogflow and Angular JS. To integrate the chatbots with Angular, you will need a account. All the aforementioned tools have free to try out. Dialogflow Kommunicate Steps to integrate Dialogflow chatbot with Angular JS I am going to explain how I connected Dialogflow and Angular with the help of Kommunicate. Note: To keep it very simple and straight this tutorial explains with really basic and plain code development. Also to mention this project can be found on my Github . To get an in detail tutorial on how to integrate the bot into a website you can check here . Step 1: Create your Dialogflow chatbot To get started, you can easily create a chatbot in Dialogflow or edit one of their provided sample chatbot templates. To go further, you can create your own Intents & Entities. Step 2: Integrate Dialogflow chatbot with Kommunicate Login to your Kommunicate dashboard and navigate to the . If you do not have an account, you can create one . Locate the Dialogflow section and click on Settings. Bot section here Now, navigate to your Dialogflow console and download the service account key file. Here are the steps to locate the file: Select your Agent from the dropdown in the left panel.Click on setting button. It will open a setting page for the agent.Inside general tab search for and click on your service account.After getting redirected to your , create a key in JSON format for your project from the section and it will get automatically downloaded.Now upload the . GOOGLE PROJECTS SERVICE ACCOUNT actions key file If you are using V1 APIs, just copy your client and developer token from Dialogflow console and paste in the fields provided. Click on Save and Proceed. Setup your bot’s name and profile picture and choose whether to allow the for your newly created bot. Click and voila, your bot is now integrated. bot to human handoff Finish bot integration setup You can check/edit your integrated bot using the below path: Dashboard →Bot Integration → Manage Bots: You can check all your integrated bots here. Dashboard → Bot Integration. Once finished, your Dialogflow section will have a green icon with the number of bots are you have successfully integrated. Step3: Install the Angular CLI globally. To install the CLI using npm, open a terminal/command prompt and enter the following command: npm install -g @angular/cli Now, create a new workspace and initial app project. Run the CLI command ng new and provide the name my-app, as shown here: ng my-app new The initial app project contains a simple Welcome app, which is ready to run. Angular includes a server so that you can easily build and serve your app locally. Now, navigate to the workspace folder (my-app). Launch the server by using the CLI command ng serve, with the –open option. cd my-app
ng serve --open Step 4: Installing chatbot in the Angular component Install chatbot on the angular component. The CLI will create the first Angular component. It is the root component and is named app-root. Run any code editor and open workspace folder (my-app). Note: Components are the fundamental building blocks of Angular applications. They display data on the screen, listen for user input, and take action based on that input. @Component({ : , : , : [ ]
}) {
  title = ;
} selector 'app-root' templateUrl './app.component.html' styleUrls './app.component.css' export class AppComponent 'My First Angular App!' To install the chatbot, open Kommunicate and navigate to Dashboard →Settings. Click on under the Configuration section. Copy the JavaScript code to be added either in your website or your application. Install Paste the javascript code into the app.component.ts file. The code of the component should look like this @Component({ : , : , : [ ]
}) {
  title = ;
  ngOnInit() {
    ( { kommunicateSettings = { : <CONVERSATION_TITLE>};
      var s = document.createElement("script"); s.type = "text/javascript"; s.async = true;
      s.src = "https://api.kommunicate.io/v2/kommunicate.app";
      var h = document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0]; h.appendChild(s);
      (window as any).kommunicate = m; m._globals = kommunicateSettings;
    })(document, (window as any).kommunicate || {});
  }
} selector 'app-root' templateUrl './app.component.html' styleUrls './app.component.scss' export class AppComponent 'my first app' ( ) function d, m var "appId" ,"conversationTitle": < > YOUR_APP_ID The ng serve command launches the server, watches your files and rebuilds the app as you make changes to those files. The –open (or just -o) option automatically opens your browser to . http://localhost:4200/ If you run the browser, you should see a chat widget screen pop up and that means your chatbot is ready. This is how you integrate Dialogflow chatbot with Angular using Kommunicate in few simple steps. This article was originally published here

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How to Integrate Dialogflow Chatbot with AngularJS [Step-By-Step Guide]

Now-a- Days chatbots are playing an essential role in the day to day activities of humans {personals and organizations}. According to the survey done, 27% of the people are using the AI-powered chatbots such as Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, Cortana, Apple Siri etc. for simple task or commands. A chatbot can work for the company based on training provided to it and increase the efficiency of the work. Several supporting technologies help the chatbot to work as a real assistant. E.g. NLP, AI and IoT supported tools and applications are working as a backbone for the chatbot. Keywords: (Natural Language Processing), NLP (Internet of Things), IoT (Artificial Intelligence). AI What Are Chatbots? A chatbot is an independent entity that provides administrative services to the users and technical and social assistance to the clients. It can work in various modes like secretarial work, customer service support, marketing on social media, as well as can do the web editing task for a particular site or app. For making business plans, setting reminders, planning events, attending calls; these chatbots are used. Before moving forward, let’s know what types of chatbots are there in the market and which one best for you or your business. Types of Chatbots: The chatbots are of two types: Rule-Based Chatbots AI-powered Chatbots Rule-Based Chatbots As the name suggests, they work on some predefined set of rules or statements defined for a particular kind of problem. In this kind of bots, conversations map out to envision . They even can’t answer the question outside their scope, i.e. outside the predefined set of rules. They do not learn from the history of conversations. They work for the situations only for what they are drawn up. These kinds of chatbots are faster as compare to AI-Powered chatbots. what a client may ask and how the chatbot ought to react These bots are used as an FAQ resource, used when there are a few conversations to feed — basically used by small companies and organizations. AI-Powered Chatbots Unlike rule-based chatbots, they use machine learning and artificial intelligence to understand the user queries and then finally map that with the most appropriate response. In this kind of bots, conversations map out to envision They even answer the question outside their scope using context. whatever a client asks, and the chatbot ought to react. We’ll study more about the context in the coming chapter named Intent Identification. We prepare a model at the time of their training so that they can answer those queries that are not in their dataset. These kinds of chatbots are slower as compared to Rule-Based chatbots because they need training automation for mapping queries to the response. These bots can be used as a personal virtual assistant like Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant. UPS and Skyscanner are also rule-based bots that are good enough to handle necessary inquiries about shipping and flight rates. Most of the other bots in the market today are rule-based bots because building a truly AI-bot requires building a self-training bot that utilizes natural language processing How to Build a Chatbot? Let’s see by how many ways we can construct a chatbot. We can classify chatbots further based on how were they built. We can create chatbots with , , and . To construct chatbot with and , we use chatbot development platforms like dialogflow, chatfuel, botsify, motion.ai and, so on. To create a chatbot with we’ll go either for programming languages like python, javascript etc. or some platforms that provide this feature too. no code low code only code no code low code only code, Why Dialogflow? In this tutorial, we’ll study how to build a chatbot using dialogflow. But why, dialogflow? Why not any other chatbot building platform or by using programming languages? We use dialogflow because we can create all three types of chatbots using it. i.e. chatbots with no-code, low code, and only code. Dialogflow is a chatbot building platform that provides a user-friendly environment to build both rule-based or ai-powered chatbots with no-coding, low coding or only coding. We can build natural and rich conversational experiences using it. Dialogflow helps in building voice and content-based conversational interfaces. It furnishes offices to associate with clients on your website, versatile application, the Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, Facebook Messenger, and other popular platforms and devices. More importantly, It’s free to signup, and it can even provide live testing over the smart display, smartphones, smart speakers. Just think of you’re running a small organization and you aren’t able to pay a receptionist every month what you can do is, you can integrate a chatbot to your website or any of the above applications to handle those queries. Or, you can use chatbot if you are a parent and want your child to learn vocally by playing games. Don’t trust me? Say or type “Ok Google, Talk to chemical cards amusement” (for English) and “Ok Google,” केमिकल कार्ड मनोरंजन से कनेक्ट करो ” (for Hindi) at your phone’s google assistant. Proceed, I’ll pause. is a game to learn the atomic number and their names along with their symbols of modern periodic table {chemistry}. This game is now available in two locales one is English, and the other one is Hindi. Chemical cards amusement One more exciting and fantastic thing about Dialogflow is that it is now available in more than 15 root languages including English, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Portuguese, Spanish, German, Italian, French and many more. Is there any prerequisite? The prerequisites to follow this tutorial is, the learner must known about google sheets or ms-excel. Knowledge of programming languages like python, node.js is a plus.

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Introduction to Chatbot Development

Companies like Airbnb, Apple, Uber, and GitHub have changed the ways they design digital products by incorporating their design language and organizing it into a system that can be used across all employees — and even outside of the company. It quickly became popular in the whole industry: Just google the company’s name and the word “design” next to it, and you’d be surprised by how many companies have something similar. , , , — these are the examples of good design systems. Airbnb Design Apple Design Uber Base Web GitHub Primer We won't be talking today about the reasoning behind having a company-wide design system or the organizational challenges that come with it (though it’ll be definitely covered later, so stay tuned). Instead, we’ll focus on the technical choices and implementation details. Traits of a Good Design System A good design system is a collection of reusable components — guided by clear standards — that can be assembled together to build any number of applications. Let’s try to split this definition into actionable traits we want to prioritize and focus on from a technical perspective. Reusable components Generally speaking, the design system is a set of shared components that’ll be used by everyone. Imagine you have several independent teams in the company, and some of them use vanilla JS. Another team uses React, and even another group is experimenting with Svelte. As a creator of a design system, you have to build components for these frameworks and think about flexibility in the feature, so you won’t lock other developers in a specific ecosystem. Extensive documentation To ensure the smooth adoption of your design system, you’ll have to provide thought-through, easy-to-use documentation with examples and best practices. How do you do this? First, a website with all components and their descriptions would help. Second, it’d be amazing if you could provide guidance about possible arguments and use cases for your components directly in the developer’s IDE. Performance-oriented So you’re about to ask your fellow developers to add this design system as a dependency and probably replace something that’s already working, make sure to keep the number of dependencies as low as possible, preferably zero, so you won't bloat the package size of all projects. Try to rely on a browser API or CSS and be closer to browser-native behavior because less custom JS code means faster components. Maintain the highest quality You also need to ensure your design system won’t break on a new release. Apart from doing code review and manual testing, I’d encourage everyone to look at automated tests. For presentational components, consider . For stateful ones, write integration and end-to-end tests. screenshot testing StencilJS and Web Components to the Rescue If you’re wondering how you’re going to cover everything from the list above without spending a month setting up the architecture, I have something to suggest. is a toolchain for creating reusable, scalable design systems built on top of Web Components. It provides a complete set of tools to start working on your design system right now and makes it easy to work with Web Components. StencilJS The components created with Stencil are fully compatible with browser standards and can be run in any framework, including just a plain HTML file. You can use to add a custom website that’ll showcase your work. It also features (apart from e2e and Jest integration). output targets screenshot testing Let’s dive into it, and see how easy it is to build a simple-yet-stateful component. Introducing the fetch button The core component of any design system is a button. But since just a button would be too simple, we’ll make it powerful enough to also fetch data from any endpoint you specify in its attributes and return data via browser events. To start, run the Stencil generator: . It’ll ask you to pick a starter. Choose Component. That’ll generate a folder with a simple test component so you can start playing with it ( ). npm init stencil npm install && npm start In the folder, you’ll find the folder. Rename it to — as well as the and files inside of it. The CSS file is responsible for the styling of our button, so let’s add some styles: src/components my-component fetch-button css tsx button { : # e;
    background-image: linear-gradient( deg, #fafbfc %, #eff3f6 %);
    
    padding: px px;
    font-size: px;
    font-weight: ;
    line-height: px;
    cursor: pointer;
    border-radius: em;
} color 24292 -180 0 90 6 12 14 600 20 0.25 Now go to the file. This is the actual component we need to build. tsx { Component, Prop, h, Listen, State, Event, EventEmitter } ;

@Component({ : , : , : }) { @Prop() url: string; @State() status: string;

  @Event() success: EventEmitter;
  @Event() error: EventEmitter;

  @Listen( , { : })
  handleClick() { .status = ;

    fetch( .url)
    .then( response.json())
    .then( { .success.emit(data) .status = })
    .catch( { .error.emit(error) .status = })
  }

  render() { ( <button>
          <slot />
        </button> <div>Status: {this.status}</div> );
  }
} import from '@stencil/core' tag 'fetch-button' styleUrl 'fetch-button.css' shadow true export class MyComponent /**
   * URL to fetch
   */ /**
   * The query status
   */ 'click' capture true this 'pending' this => response ( ) => data this this 'success' ( ) => error this this 'error' return < > div </ > div Before the component class, we need to add a decorator specifying the tag name, a path to the style file. Then inside of the class, we need to define a called . It’ll work as an HTML attribute and allow us to pass data to the component. prop url The next line creates a state variable: Every time we change it, the render function will rerun. The directive registers two events for us: and . @Event onSuccess onError helps us to listen to click events and execute the corresponding function. In our case, we’ll call the native fetch function and update the state and trigger events depending on the outcome. @Listen Finally, the function defines the DOM that‘ll’ be created. The tag will be replaced by children. render <slot /> <fetch-button> That’s it. Now let’s see how we can use it. Fetch Button Demo Fetch my data from vanilla JS <!DOCTYPE html> < = = > html dir "ltr" lang "en" < > head < = > meta charset "utf-8" < = = > meta name "viewport" content "width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, minimum-scale=1.0, maximum-scale=5.0" < > title </ > title < = = > script type "module" src "/build/designsystem.esm.js" </ > script < = > script nomodule src "/build/designsystem.js" </ > script < = > script src "https://unpkg.com/react@16/umd/react.development.js" crossorigin </ > script < = > script src "https://unpkg.com/react-dom@16/umd/react-dom.development.js" crossorigin </ > script < = > script src "https://unpkg.com/@babel/standalone/babel.min.js" </ > script </ > head < > body < = > fetch-button url "https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/todos/1" </ > fetch-button < > script fetchButton = .querySelector( );
    fetchButton.addEventListener( , .log) const document 'fetch-button' 'success' console </ > script < = > div id "root" </ > div < = > script type "text/babel" ReactDOM.render(
        <fetch-button
          ref={el => el.addEventListener( , console.log)}
          className= url= onSuccess={console.log}
        >
          Fetch data from React
        </fetch-button>,
        document.getElementById( )
      ); 'success' "react" "https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/todos/1" 'root' </ > script </ > body </ > html Apart from the native HTML example, I’ve added integration with React. As you can see, it’s as easy as writing plain elements. div Known Complexities Now, it’s time to talk about the downsides of using Web Components. The most important one is the lack of good framework support. For example, in React, you can’t attach event listeners to your component. As a workaround, you can attach a native event using the property — which is what I did in the example above. The website shows the compatibility Web Components has with popular frameworks. ref Custom Elements Everywhere Conclusion Before starting working on the design system, evaluate the values you want to focus on. Maybe you don’t need to have it at all and just properly organized shared components would be enough for you. If you’ve decided to incorporate the system, Web Components perfectly solves challenges that stand before design systems and is a great technology to build your components upon. StencilJS makes it easy to manage and deliver components for different targets. But with all that in mind, beware and explore the still-standing issues regarding framework support.

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Truly Reusable Design Systems in Practice: Web Components

Continuing our Swift backend takeover 😬 by configuring our API with a popular, powerful database MySQL 🖥 ⚡️ Getting our database configured, let's get it! 💪🏾 Stay connected with me on the internet @thetealpickle , leave a response or send me a tweet on twitter. Dont forget to share the ❤️ Namaste. Jessica 🥔

Getting your Swift API Interacting With a MySQL Database 💾 

In this post, I would share about my experience with and without A/B testing on and how adopting A/B testing has improved my landing page conversion rates by 60%. Howuku landing page We can all agree that the landing page of a SaaS is one of the most important aspects if not more important than the application itself. A landing page is essentially the storefront of your SaaS and if you did it correctly, it would pay off dividends by acting as a self-promoting machine to your audience. Therefore, it is really important to keep your landing page content appealing to your audience and selling them the idea to your SaaS. If you’ve been running a for your landing page you would know that . That means it is really crucial to pick your words carefully in order to give your audience a reason to scroll down to find out more. Otherwise, it might have just become your last words to visitors. heatmap report most visitors do not scroll past the headline of a website (Spoiler alert: this is really bad for conversion) I believe everyone who runs a website has been through the phase of constant refining website copies hoping to find the one best resonate with your audience pain point and giving them a reason to stay a little bit longer to eventually convert into a paying customer. So without using a proper A/B testing tool, you will need to do everything manually. From updating the experiment from time to time to keeping track of the conversion rates while recording the result somewhere else (probably in an Excel sheet), and analyzing the collected results. But what is this A/B test? At its core, A/B test is an experiment that involves two or more of a given test subject with each presented to a distributed portion of your total audience. : This is the original copy of your landing page. Control : Since you cannot assume that the control version is optimal, you need to create new versions that contain a distinct variation to find out if these variations could outperform the original. Variation A/B testing would determine which of your test variation are performing the best depending on each of their conversion rates. and interfere with the identification of the effectiveness of tested variations. Ideally, you should run test on one simple component at a time (e.g. headline, main CTA button, one marketing copy), as this would eliminate the problem of too many factors Manual A/B testing Before I was introduced to A/B testing, I would go around gathering inspiration for marketing content and copies and start testing them out on my website and see if they actually worked. By testing I mean, I would keep tracks of each tested variation conversion rate with an excel file. These tests were usually a simple change on the headline of my landing page. The process usually goes like this… : Starting with my original headline after been running for a month or so was seeing a modest conversion rate at 5%. To further optimize my conversion rate, I shall create a new challenger Control . : Spin up the headline with a value-oriented statement and running it for 2 weeks I am getting a conversion rate of 12% which is pretty good compared with the original copy. Ideally, we would retire the underperformed and keep trying to refine our test to achieve higher conversion rates. Now we are going to add a new challenger . Variant 1 Variant 1 Variant 2 : quickly comes up with a new headline to test and let it run for another 2 weeks duration. Was it perform any better? NO, it was actually performed the worst out of all 3 with a merely 3% conversion rate! Variant 2 My initial thought was that it is not a big deal as we can always go back to the best performing copy, right? Plot twist: My website conversion rates did NOT improve and I always resorted back to Variant 1! I quickly came to the realization that it was more than just a headline change that was happening at the given time frame, there were also other variables I did not account for, such as quality of traffic, the sample size of conversion, and other unexpected events. Problems with Manual Testing During a different period of my tests, I might have been experimenting on other growth methods like: Experimenting on Google Ads campaign by changing my targeted audience or Ads copies Startup community promotion such as Indiehacker, Betalist or Product Hunt. Receiving some traction from some SaaS groups, Reddit, or etc. Other alternative growth methods such as experimenting on Bing’s free Ads credit I realize those tests were each running on a different time period hence the final conversion rate has varied accordingly to unexpected events at that particular time. The hypothesis is that tests should run in parallel to see accurate results coming from the very same targeted group of audiences and this way we can eliminate all the variables of different events, source, and quality of visitors. The Pain Points of A/B Testing I was planning to build one for myself because, as a cheapskate, I thought: . “I am a developer, why not build one myself. How hard could it be?” Also, it would be a great complement to my current stacks in Howuku to offer a complete CRO solution. So I talked to a few CRO experts to see if they have any pain points and whether I can provide value over and above the existing A/B testing tools in the market. I’ve come to learn that the price of A/B testing tools is relatively costly. One CRO manager has told me that: . “Cost is a limiting factor. I use Optimizely but I’ve heard it’s quite expensive” I looked around the internet and found to be the golden standard of enterprise-grade A/B testing tools. Optimizely My curiosity brought me to the Optimizely website trying to find out their prices but . they were not very transparent about their prices So, I dug deeper and went on to see other people’s reviews on it, and to my horror, I found it would cost a whopping $50,000 per year as the minimum entry price! “Wait a minute, I can do that!”, I said to myself. So I spent a month working on it and come out with a working MVP to carry out my hypothesis on my Howuku landing page. Running an A/B Test I’ve set up my first test to find out how effective it would be to just change one line headline to my conversion rate (sign up). I am running an A/B/C test and the following is my setup: : A better way to understand user behaviors and better UX Control : Create a high performing user experience for website Variant 1 : The easiest way to understand your website visitors Variant 2 All incoming visitors to my landing page have a 33% pseudo-randomized chance to see each of the headlines stated above. After a month of experimenting with A/B testing, is winning the competition convincingly and am really amazed to see such results. Variant 1 If I were to make some assumptions as to why the result would turn out this way, it would be that Variant 1 is a more value-oriented statement. Visitors were able to see the end goal or benefit of using my service which is to create a website with a really good user experience that can convert more users into customers. On the flip side, the value proposition is not clear with and it does not explain why should visitors care? Variant 2 The is somewhere in between of the two, but the statement itself feels very long and is not as straightforward as Hence it got a mixed result which is neither bad nor is it an optimal performance. Control Variant 1. Conclusion The A/B testing result has been a great success for my landing page It is almost magical for me to see how the result plays out and performs in a statistically-significant fashion. so far. Anyway, I shall let the experiment run for perhaps another month to see if I can get anything new from it. I would definitely suggest anyone who has a landing page to try out A/B testing and see if you can manage to make some improvement out of your current conversion rates. Try add a new variant of your website and experiment to see if a slight variation will perform even better. At Howuku, we have recently launched a to help you quickly spin up a new variation of your website. free A/B testing tool that comes with a visual editor is a business analytics platform that track user interaction via on-site feedback, heatmap, recordings, and landing page A/B testing. Howuku Analytics Register a new account with on any of our plans today! 14 days free trial ( : Disclaimer The author is the Founder at Howuku Analytics) Originally published here

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What I Learnt About A/B Testing by A/B Testing my Landing Page

It’s time to pay attention. Ray Dalio, Conspiracy Theorists, Gold Bugs, Bitcoin Maximalists and even the all have one thing in common. They believe that the existing Global Financial System is in for a paramount change in the near future. Chinese Government , the Founder of Bridge Water Associates, has been trying his best to alert the broader market about this coming major change. He has been on the , media stations and even went as far as releasing an for free just to warn others about the imminent paradigm shift. Ray Dalio biggest global stages entire book Recently, he was at the , where he was quoted saying: 2019 Institute of International Finance Annual Meeting I think we are in the last stages of the cycle where we ask: What is currency? What is a reserve currency? How does our fiat monetary system work? A major change is coming, are you prepared to navigate the Big Debt Crisis? One of the most major changes in recent history was the end of the and the which saw the United States Dollar turn into a in 1971. Overnight, the United States Dollar went from being backed by the world’s largest Gold reserve to being paper, backed by trust in a central authority. Bretton Woods System Gold Standard Fiat Currency The United States government has since shown an unquenchable appetite for debt as can be seen by the following chart. United States Government Debt The United States is not the only guilty one, as nearly all global economies have been on a debt binge during the past 50 years which can be seen by the following chart. Global Credit-Market Debt Owed Typically once excess levels of debt are reached, economies will experience a . This can come as a Beautiful Deleveraging or a Bubble Burst depending on what are deployed. deleveraging monetary policy tools During his , Dalio explained that Monetary Policy Tool #1 — the lowering of interest rates — is no longer effective because interest rates are already near zero. These near zero interest rates can be seen in the chart below. talk at the IIF 10 Year Government Bond Yields He further expanded saying that Monetary Policy Tool #2 — the printing of money (and ) — is also unlikely to have a meaningful effect due to our current economic climate. While using this tool used to have tremendous positive effects, it’s now akin to “pushing on a string”. quantitative easing The United States Dollar has seen its value (purchasing power) drop substantially since turning into a fiat currency, which can be seen in the chart below. Purchasing Power of the US Dollar Ray Dalio believes that we need a for the coming . He states: Monetary Policy Tool #3 and a new Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) paradigm “in paradigm shifts, most people get caught overextended doing something overly popular and get really hurt. On the other hand, if you’re astute enough to understand these shifts, you can navigate them well or at least protect yourself against them.” He believes the coming paradigm is likely to be categorized by near zero interest rates, the aggressive printing of dollars and . debt monetization This should cause any intelligent investor to take a good look at their existing portfolio allocations and if left unchanged, feel very uneasy with the prospect of these things coming true. In this new world, Dalio mentions that “storing one’s money in fiat currency and bonds will no longer be safe. Bonds are a claim on money and governments are likely to continue printing money to pay their debts with devalued money. That’s the easiest and least controversial way to reduce the debt burdens and without raising taxes”. He further explains that Digital Currencies will be of much more value and that “holding cash in a vault” is seemingly archaic. While most people will think Bitcoin, even Ray Dalio has been quoted saying: “Bitcoin could be like the blackberry phone, you could have Ethereum come along and everything change” These comments and the coming paradigm shift perfectly aligns with the creation of an entirely new financial system. Welcome to Ethereum and the new Open Financial System. This open financial system has a new at its base layer. This new money, known as (ETH), will continue to gain value over the US Dollar due to . native money Ether superior monetary policy ETH is Money — www.tradingview.com This financial system is open to all global citizens regardless of nationality, age, race or gender. It provides many of the same luxuries you would see in the traditional financial system with things like access to , , , , , , , , and even . Credit Stocks Commodities Bonds Gold Real Estate Stable Coins Exchanges Insurance Identity Systems An internet connection is all you need to access these services. Source: www.TheBlock.com One of the greatest benefits of this new open financial system ( ) is complete transparency. The existing financial system allows banks, financial institutions, and regulators to control the flow of information, causing cataclysmic events like the . Open Finance 2008 financial crisis These entities choose what information gets disclosed to the public. It’s not like you can walk into your bank and say, “I’m here to perform an audit.” Things are different with , which makes all the data publicly available on-chain for everyone to see. Transparency and real time data are two major advantages Open Finance has gained by rebuilding things from scratch. If you are interested in tracking Open Finance activity, head over to , and . Open Finance DeFi Pulse DeFi Prime ETHHub We are at the very early stages of this new global financial system and it’s likely it will see growing pains as it matures. Rest assured that a and a are doing their best to ensure the world has a new, more fair and accessible way to conduct their financial activities. legion of dedicated developers thriving community If you are interested in learning more or have any questions, feel free to reach me on twitter . @iDecentralized

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Global Debt, Ethereum, and a New Open Financial System [Analyzed]

Proof of keys day is an annual event that Trace Mayer started on January 3rd 2019 on the 10th anniversary of Bitcoin. It was started in an effort to remind everyone that if you don’t control the keys to your Bitcoin, it’s not yours. really January 3rd is the Proof of Keys day This year we look to continue in this tradition by , as well as to keep exchanges or 3rd party services in check, by ensuring that they have the money that they say they do. withdrawing our funds from exchanges and 3rd parties on the 3rd of January to claim ownership of our property We trust exchanges much like we do banks, believing that they are safeguarding our money and that we can withdraw it at any time if we need to. Crypto holders, investors and traders make use of exchanges to store and secure their funds, just like you might use a bank to store your fiat. We trust that the exchange will safeguard your money, and that at any given time, they’ll give it back to you on request. Proof of Keys day aims to encourage crypto users to move their funds from exchanges to their own private wallet that they control. Side note: I would recommend using a fresh address for a touch of added privacy — unless your exchange required you to KYC, in which case you should use a fresh address anyway for practice. Why is Proof of Keys Day important? The most important thing that any participant gets from this day is the fact that they have taken control of their own money. It reminds us that Satoshi created Bitcoin for this very purpose, to be able to transfer value between two parties without having to ask permission or rely on anyone else. (even symbolically) Proof of Keys day also coincides on the anniversary of Bitcoins genesis block. The Genesis Block contains the first Bitcoin transaction that was ever sent. Satoshi Nakamoto sent 10 bitcoins to Hal Finney, a developer, and early Bitcoin adopter. Proof of Keys keeps exchanges accountable Right now, financial institutions practice something that is called fractional reserve banking. When you make a deposit into your bank account, you expect that you can withdraw it at any time and they’ll have your money, already allocated to you and to nobody else, right? Wrong. When money is deposited into a bank, it is generally now considered theirs — and they can do pretty much anything with it besides outright steal it. (perhaps) This means that the bank can lend your money out, and only keep a fraction of your deposit, thereby creating imaginary money out of thin air. The percentage that the bank is made to keep depends on your jurisdiction, In Argentina the banks are required to keep 44% and in Europe, the ECB is only required to hold 1% . This is how banks make their money, they use your money to loan to others, and the same kind of — behaviour could, and has been found in some exchanges in the past. hustle, scam, call it what you will — Bank runs are large scale coordinated withdrawals by citizens and/or businesses from a specific or all banks — usually because there is the general suspicion that the bank or entity is not entirely solvent. Bank runs first came about in the 16th century and have also been used as a mechanism for the blackmail of individuals and governments. Proof of Keys day, a modern-type bank run, encourages people to withdraw all their assets from crypto exchanges and force exchanges, much like a bank run, to prove their solvency and trustworthiness in a system where trust is not a requirement to transact. You can read more about trustless transactions in an by . article Preethi Kasireddy If all the customers, or even just the greater majority of customers of exchanges all withdraw their funds, exchanges who intentionally only hold a fraction of their customers’ assets or those who may have been hacked would be exposed for their insolvency. There were 7 crypto hacks in 2019, totalling at least $150m in losses. (major) More famous than any hack would be Mt. Gox which saw around 850,000 Bitcoins stolen in 2014. Exposing insolvency and flexing our keys is our way of holding 3rd parties accountable and ensuring that they the trust that we give them. earn How do I participate in Proof of Keys day? This part is kinda fun and pretty easy. If you’re withdrawing bitcoins you can use Green Wallet from , and if you’re into Ethereum and its tokens, you can use Trust Wallet from . Blockstream Viktor Radchenko Side note: You can send your tether to Trust Wallet. Just be sure that you have a little bit of Ethereum in the wallet if you send any tokens to it, or you won’t be able to move your tokens until you do). Set up your wallet if you don’t have one, log into your account on your exchange(s) and withdraw all of your funds to your wallet(s). Thanks for reading this and doing your part in ensuring that those we trust are truly trustworthy. Info on Green can be found Info on can be found Blockstream here Trust Wallet here I am in no way assosciated with Blockstream, Trust Wallet or any other company or person mentioned in this post.

Tether

Trace

Proof of Keys Day: Not your keys, Not your Bitcoin [Jan/3➞₿🔑∎]

#1 The Distributed Workforce Proliferates 💻 It is no secret work has become increasingly distributed. Not just from ride sharing and Craigslist gigs, but startups and small businesses seeking on-demand talent for cheap. Today, employers are connecting with part-time experts from around the world thanks to services like and . I’m expecting this trend to accelerate in 2020, perhaps to the point large corporates get onboard for an upper hand. The future of work will encompass a shared workforce — one where a talented designer or even excel wizard receives premium pay for their 3-month project (and maybe pro-rated health and 401K benefits). Fiverr Upwork #2 Bitcoin Tops $50K 🚀 Bitcoin traders are anticipating “ ” — an event where BTC mining rewards will be cut in half sometime near May 2020. In the past we’ve seen rollercoaster pricing due to chain splits and general 2017 FOMO. So why would a major mining event be different? Institutional investors will face a ‘now or never’ bitcoin investment dilemma in 2020 and may have SEC assurance this time around. Bitcoin won’t be the the de facto future of digital payments but the supply squeeze will propel non-believers into reluctant investors. To the moon! the halvening #3 Electric Vehicles Hit Tipping Point ⚡️ If there is one company who has proven doubters wrong in 2019, it is Tesla. Elon and friends , quickly built a China Gigafactory, and led a booming stock rally to close out Q4. The electric vehicle evolution is staring auto incumbents in the face, and they’ll push hard in 2020 to make up for years of ignorance. Plenty of factors finally favor an electric profit too. The costs of lithium-ion batteries is drastically declining and more EV fast-charging stations are on the way. 2020 could be the year of an EV that is affordable, reliable, and long-range. Fitting that this would come 20 years after the environmentally-friendly Toyota Prius was launched? crushed production expectations Follow Matt Bloom on Twitter .

Fomo

Tesla

Three Bullish Tech Predictions for 2020

Overview of How HTTP Routing Works in Azure Functions For a high-level overview of three popular HTTP routing patterns, refer to blog post by Lori MacVittie from F5 networks. Moving forward, when I refer to HTTP routing in the context of Azure Functions for the balance of this blog post, I am referring to path-based routing. this HTTP routing in Azure Functions is responsible for mapping request URIs to endpoints and routing HTTP requests to those endpoints. Additionally, Azure Functions can extract values from the URI contained in the request and use those values for request processing. The latter is a useful way to pass multiple parameters to an HTTP trigger. Route Prefix As the name implies, you can customize or remove the default “api” route prefix for HTTP triggers in Azure Functions. See documentation from Microsoft for reference. To change it, you modify the file and the following configuration setting: this host.json add { : { : { : }
  }
} "extensions" "http" "routePrefix" "foo" In the above example, we are setting the route prefix to “foo”. Please note: this setting is “global” in that if you are hosting more than one function in a function app, this setting will apply to all functions. Given the global nature of the setting, I have not found much value in modifying the default. Route Parameters As outlined above, an HTTP route can serve two purposes in Azure Functions: mapping request URIs to endpoints or request processing. Routes are defined in the file and configured when the function app starts. According to the documentation, route parameter names must be non-empty and cannot contain these characters: {, }, /. function.json Mapping request URIs to endpoints This pattern is by far the easiest to implement. Let’s walk through an example where you want to host two versions of an HTTP trigger function in the same function app. In this example, we have an HTTP trigger function named “FirstName”. To add a version to the route, simply modify the function.json file and the following configuration setting: add : , "route" "v1/FirstName" Now you can create a similar HTTP trigger function named “FirstName2”, modify the function.json file and the following configuration setting: add : , "route" "v2/FirstName" You can use this feature to ensure that you do not break compatibility with functions that you publish or to route traffic to a given endpoint. Request Processing with HTTP Route Parameters Let’s walk through an example of using a route parameter to customize request processing. Consider the default HTTP trigger template, which takes data passed to the “name” parameter as input and outputs the data passed to the function. Imagine that you want to extend this function to take both a first name and last name, you would the following to your function.json file: add : "route" "FirstNameLastName/{firstname}/{lastname}" And you would modify your function code to reflect the following: logging.info( )

    firstname = req.route_params.get( )
    lastname = req.route_params.get( ) func.HttpResponse( ) -> func.HttpResponse: def main (req: func.HttpRequest) 'Python HTTP trigger function processed a request.' 'firstname' 'lastname' return f"Hello ! \n" {firstname} {lastname} Notice that you use the “route_params” property instead of the “params” property. The full documentation for the HTTPRequest class for Python is . here When you run your function locally, you will notice that the URL has been modified from the default: FirstNameLastName: [GET]    http: localhost: FirstNameLastName {lastname} // 7071 /api/ /{firstname}/ Route Constraints Adding a constraint to your route parameter allows you to restrict how the routes in function.json are matched. The general syntax is “{parameter:constraint}”. For example, if we want to restrict our function to only accept alpha characters for the two routes we previously defined, we would configure it in function.json like the below: FirstNameLastName : , "route" "FirstNameLastName/{firstname:alpha}/{lastname:alpha}" Given the pay per transaction nature of Azure Functions, this is an excellent way to ensure that only valid transactions are processed by your function app. For a full list of route constraints, refer to this article . here Please note: processing of route constraints is not performed by the function app but instead by the . The Azure Function Host will return a 404 if you supply it a bad URI. I will cover this topic in a future blog post about debugging route parameters. Azure Function Host Mandatory vs. Optional Route Parameters You can mark HTTP route parameters as optional, which gives you some flexibility in your code. The ‘?’ character marks a parameter as optional and can occur only at the end of the parameter. For example, if we want to mark our last name route parameter as optional in our previous example, we would configure it in our function.json like the below: : , "route" "FirstNameLastName/{firstname:alpha}/{lastname:alpha?}" Please note that if you do not pass lastname to the above URI, the value of the lastname variable in your function code would be . For example: None curl http://localhost:7071/api/FirstNameLastName/foo/bar
  Hello, foo bar!

curl http://localhost:7071/api/FirstNameLastName/foo
  Hello, foo None! Please ensure to add proper error handling in your function app if you mark your HTTP route parameters as optional. That’s it for now, in my next blog post I will cover how to debug HTTP routing parameters in detail. If you have any feedback, please send me a note at gattjoseph at <hotmail>

Configuring HTTP Route Parameters in Azure Functions 2.x using Python

Welcome to the first post of Upwork Series. In this series, we are going to work on gig requirements posted on UpWork. Web Scraping & Data Extraction Our task is to create web crawler which will scrape data daily from the report pages of a transportation company. Click here to see description of project Step 1: Understanding the task First, it is important to understand the task clearly. They want from us to where each attribute listed above is its own separate column. scrape data then save it in CSV file We are going to crawl the following information: Date ("The information below reflects the content of the FMCSA management information systems as of {Date}") Operating Status Legal Name DBA Name Physical Address Mailing Address USDOT Number Power Units Drivers We can provide an initial set of 100 DOT numbers to make sure the information above can be scraped easily, from there we can provide all DOT numbers we would like to scrape on a daily basis. Report pages can be accessed by dots or with other name IDs. Each page has its own id (dot). So, these dots locate in Excel file. We have to read this file and extract dots from there then pass it into URL to access the report page. Step 2: Creating our environment and installing dependencies Now, we know what client wants from us, so let's create our virtual environment then inspect elements that we are going to crawl. To create virtualenv run the following command in your terminal: virtualenv env then install BeautifulSoup which is a Python package for parsing HTML and XML documents and xlrd which is a library for reading data and formatting information from Excel files: pip install beautifulsoup4 xlrd Step 3: Crawling Data Alright Devs! Let's start with opening the example url from project description so can see the fields. Click to see Example URL The page should look like this: Our first target is to find - Date ("The information below reflects the content of the FMCSA management information systems as of {Date}") The information below reflects the content of the FMCSA management information systems as of 01/01/2020. The truth is we can't crawl this element by specific class name or id. Unfortunately, this report pages messed up. But we can see that this element is in bold format. There are also many elements locate with the bold format. However, we can crawl all of them as text and use to extract the data we need. RegEx A regular expression (RegEx) is a special sequence of characters that helps you match or find other strings or sets of strings, using a specialized syntax held in a pattern. The date locates between and . So , to find the date regex will look between these strings. The information below reflects the content of the FMCSA management information systems as of .(dot) re urllib.request urllib.request urlopen, Request bs4 BeautifulSoup req = Request(url, headers={ : })
    html = urlopen(req).read()
    bs = BeautifulSoup(html, ) bold_texts = bs.find_all( ) b bold_texts: : date = re.search( , b.get_text(strip= , separator= )).group( ).strip() len(date) > :
                date = date.split( , )[ ]
            print(date) AttributeError: import # regex import from import from import : def crawl_data (url) 'User-Agent' 'Mozilla/5.0' 'html.parser' # Find all bold texts 'b' for in try # look between these strings 'The information below reflects the content of the FMCSA management information systems as of(.*).' True '  ' 1 # If regex finds multiple dots, extract string before first dot if 11 "." 1 0 except pass Well if you run the program you will see it's printing the date. Let me quickly show you how regex works, because I feel some of you trying to understand. Consider the following code: re

# We need to extarct the string
data = name = re.search( , data)
print(name)

# Output: import "coderasha" from "Hello my name is coderasha." 'Hello my name is (.*).' < ; = ), = > _sre.SRE_Match object span (0, 27 match 'Hello my name is coderasha.' As you see match is found but its printed like object. group(1) capture the text matched by the regex inside them into a numbered group that can be reused with a numbered backreference re

# We need to extarct the string
data = name = re.search( , data).group( )
print(name)

# Output: coderasha import "coderasha" from "Hello my name is coderasha." 'Hello my name is (.*).' 1 So, I am applying the same logic to find the date inside strings that crawled. The next step is, to find a table and continue to crawl other fields. Luckily, the table locates between center tags. However, we have to find data again using RegEx because table elements have no any special attribute. information = bs.find( ).get_text(strip= , separator= ) operating = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    legal_name = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    physical_address = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    mailing_address = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    usdot_address = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    power_units = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    drivers = re.search( , information).group( ).strip() # Get all texts inside table 'center' True '  ' # Find fields using RegEx 'Operating Status:(.*)Out' 1 'Legal Name:(.*)DBA' 1 'Physical Address:(.*)Phone' 1 'Mailing Address:(.*)USDOT' 1 'USDOT Number:(.*)State Carrier ID Number' 1 'Power Units:(.*)Drivers' 1 'Drivers:(.*)MCS-150 Form Date' 1 Step 4: Write data in CSV Once data crawled, it is time to create new csv file and write data into it. I prefer to create another function which will handle this action. csv open(usdot_address + , mode= , newline= , encoding= ) csv_file:
            fieldnames = [ , , , , , , ]
            writer = csv.DictWriter(csv_file, fieldnames=fieldnames)
            writer.writeheader()
            writer.writerow({ :date, : operating, : legal_name, :physical_address, : mailing_address, :power_units, :drivers }) import : def write_csv (date, operating, legal_name, physical_address, mailing_address, usdot_address, power_units, drivers) with '.csv' 'w' '' "utf-8" as 'Date' 'Operating Status' 'Legal_Name' 'Physical Address' 'Mailing Address' 'Power Units' 'Drivers' 'Date' 'Operating Status' 'Legal_Name' 'Physical Address' 'Mailing Address' 'Power Units' 'Drivers' CSV name must be unique, so I named it with or with other name ID of report page from crawled data usdot_address Step 5: Read excel file to crawl data for each dot The final step is to read excel file and pass these dots end of the URL to access the pages. We can use to read excel file xlrd xlrd

dots = [] loc = ( ) 
    wb = xlrd.open_workbook(loc) 
    sheet = wb.sheet_by_index( ) 
    sheet.cell_value( , ) i range( , ): dot = str(sheet.cell_value(i, )).replace( , )
        dots.append(dot) import : def read_excel_file () "dots.xls" 0 0 0 # First five dot in excel for in 1 5 # Convert floats to string and clean from .0 0 '.0' '' xlrd reads numbers as float so the best solution is to convert them to strings and use method to remove .0 end of the string and pass these dots into url: replace() dot dots:
    crawl_data( + dot) time.sleep( ) for in 'https://safer.fmcsa.dot.gov/query.asp?searchtype=ANY&query_type=queryCarrierSnapshot&query_param=USDOT&query_string=' # Sleep 5 seconds to avoid any errors 5 Here is the Full Code: re csv urllib.request urllib.request urlopen, Request bs4 BeautifulSoup xlrd time

dots = [] loc = ( ) 
    wb = xlrd.open_workbook(loc) 
    sheet = wb.sheet_by_index( ) 
    sheet.cell_value( , ) i range( , ): 
        dot = str(sheet.cell_value(i, )).replace( , )
        dots.append(dot) req = Request(url, headers={ : })
    html = urlopen(req).read()
    bs = BeautifulSoup(html, )
    bold_texts = bs.find_all( ) b bold_texts: :
            date = re.search( , b.get_text(strip= , separator= )).group( ).strip() len(date) > :
                date = date.split( , )[ ]
            print(date) AttributeError: information = bs.find( ).get_text(strip= , separator= )

    operating = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    legal_name = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    physical_address = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    mailing_address = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    usdot_address = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    power_units = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()
    drivers = re.search( , information).group( ).strip()

    write_csv(date, operating, legal_name, physical_address, mailing_address, usdot_address, power_units, drivers) open(usdot_address + , mode= , newline= , encoding= ) csv_file:
            fieldnames = [ , , , , , , ]
            writer = csv.DictWriter(csv_file, fieldnames=fieldnames)
            writer.writeheader()
            writer.writerow({ :date, : operating, : legal_name, :physical_address, : mailing_address, :power_units, :drivers })                


read_excel_file()
print(dots) dot dots:
    crawl_data( + dot)
    time.sleep( ) import import import from import from import import import : def read_excel_file () "dots.xls" 0 0 0 for in 1 5 0 '.0' '' : def crawl_data (url) 'User-Agent' 'Mozilla/5.0' 'html.parser' 'b' for in try 'The information below reflects the content of the FMCSA management information systems as of(.*).' True '  ' 1 if 11 "." 1 0 except pass 'center' True '  ' 'Operating Status:(.*)Out' 1 'Legal Name:(.*)DBA' 1 'Physical Address:(.*)Phone' 1 'Mailing Address:(.*)USDOT' 1 'USDOT Number:(.*)State Carrier ID Number' 1 'Power Units:(.*)Drivers' 1 'Drivers:(.*)MCS-150 Form Date' 1 : def write_csv (date, operating, legal_name, physical_address, mailing_address, usdot_address, power_units, drivers) with '.csv' 'w' '' "utf-8" as 'Date' 'Operating Status' 'Legal_Name' 'Physical Address' 'Mailing Address' 'Power Units' 'Drivers' 'Date' 'Operating Status' 'Legal_Name' 'Physical Address' 'Mailing Address' 'Power Units' 'Drivers' for in 'https://safer.fmcsa.dot.gov/query.asp?searchtype=ANY&query_type=queryCarrierSnapshot&query_param=USDOT&query_string=' 5 Mission Accomplished! I hope you liked the first post of new Upwork series. The job offer still open so if want you can send proposal to client using this code. I post similar stories at . Check it out. Reverse Python Video Tutorial available in . YouTube Channel - Reverse Python Stay Connected!

Polkadot

Mozilla

Reverse Python Labs

Web Scraping And Data Extraction with Python: Upwork Series #1

It’s a new year and, with that, the speculations about the performance of the crypto market are flying free. From a big drop to drastic rallies, analysts seem to be all over the place when comes to predicting the performance of the top cryptocurrencies. Instead of getting into the prediction game, we would like to start the year by presenting some interesting data points that might shed some light into the current state of the crypto markets and their behavior in the near future. Bitcoin During the last few weeks, Bitcoin has remained steady around the low $7000s. A detailed examination of the data reveals some explanations for that behavior. 1) There are almost 1.7 million Bitcoins between $7000 and $7450 reveals that this volume of active Bitcoins at those price ranges has made $7450 a difficult barrier to break through. IntoTheBlock’s In-Out Money analysis 2) If Bitcoin breaks through $7450, then it will face strong resistance all the way to $8420. shows that there are 2,960,000.00 addresses in the Bitcoin network with positions between $7450 and $8420 which should represents a very strong level of resistance for Bitcoin. The same analysis 3) The Bitcoin network has remained mostly steady with small signs of growth We shouldn’t expect the Bitcoin network to suddenly show drastic signs of growth. The last month has shown that the growth in addresses has remained relatively stable as illustrated by . IntoTheBlock’s Address analysis 4) Exchange Inflow and Outflows have remained consistent and highly correlated with price movements IntoTheBlock’s exchange netflow analysis shows that Bitcoin have experienced both positive and negative balances related to the flow of funds in and out of exchanges respectively. The top inflow peak happened around December 20th and was the precursor of a price rally in the next few days. 5) Recent order book activity points to stronger sell-side momentum Order book analysis tends to be very transient but a recent look at Bitcoin’s shows an increasing momentum on the sell side. This is clearly shown by that shows an increasing level of activity on the sell side for the last 12 hours for Coinbase and Binance. IntoTheBlock’s Trade per Side analysis Ethereum 6) Ethereum faces tremendous resistance to break through $166 illustrates that the Ethereum blockchain has over 3 million addresses with average positions between $139 and $162 which should represent a very strong level of resistance for the cryptocurrency. IntoTheBlock’s In-Out Money analysis 7) New money is flowing into Ethereum Is not all bad news for Ethereum, shows that new funds have been steadily flowing into the cryptocurrency which could be a sign of support for future price rallies. IntoTheBlock’s Traders analysis Bitcoin Cash 8) A small rally might push BCH past $140 reveals that there are only 140,000.00 addresses that hold BCH across a wide spread from $211 to $244. From that perspective, it might not take a lot to push BCH higher. IntoTheBlock’s In-Out Money analysis Tether 9) The number of large Tether transactions has remained steady shows that the number of large transactions in Tether have remained consistent between 700 and 1000 moving around $300 USD daily. IntoTheBlock’s large transaction analysis This is a strong indicator of the settlement activity in large cryptocurrencies. 10) The Tether network continues to grow rapidly Despite the stability in the major cryptos, the Tether network has shown consistent levels of growth as shown by . IntoTheBlock’s Address analysis These are some of the key data points that illustrate the state of the crypto markets in the early days of 2020. There are many macro signals pointing to an exciting year in the crypto space but the data points to a steady beginning of the year.

Bitcoin Cash

10 Cryptocurrency Data Points to Takeaway from 2019

Product designers get the worst of it; they are either confused with other specialists, or simply misunderstood. Sergey Lukyanov, co-founder, and Head of Design at Preply , on who product designers really are and what they actually do. Myths are part of the IT industry. While fiction about programmers and designers are getting old, positions in companies multiply. New delusions flourish in areas where work is being done at the intersection of several disciplines. I am the co-founder, and Head of Design at , international edtech marketplace for learning foreign languages, explains what product designers are, and more importantly — what they are not. Preply Myth #1. A Product Designer is just a Designer You can’t generalize too much. The key task of a product designer is to address user and product problems. To achieve this, you must go beyond being a specialist, but also a generalist, a professional with knowledge in several areas. You have to dive into behavioral psychology, UI and UX, analytics and much more. . The role of the product designer is to oversee interface development, usability, and product type, given the budget and tasks Myth #2. A Product Designer is almost a Product Manager Another oversimplification. To avoid it, you need to remember areas of responsibility. Product managers assign team KPIs and manage the project life cycle. Product designers are on the other side; they have responsibility for what happens when people use the product. The daily tasks that product managers focus on are not first on a product designer’s list. The latter deals with issues using , and is also in charge of the information infrastructure. design thinking and designs the human-product interaction Myth #3. A Product Designer only cares about Aesthetics First of all, a product designer should focus on how the product will be used, rather than the way it looks. Of course, you cannot ignore aesthetics, however, the position doesn’t allow you to lose yourself in visual fantasies. Paradoxical as it may sound, a poor design may look good, and a good one may not be so spectacular. How to strike the right balance? This is one of the product designer’s challenges and it is much more complicated than "just making it pretty." Just look at the new iPhone screens. A contentious cut at the top. It does not suit the phone and is hidden in banners. But the main thing is that the “bangs” are no bother — Apple had to edit the rounding elements millimeter by millimeter. Myth #4. A Product Designer is just an Executive Having the strictest ToRs and running sprints like crazy is a dangerous strategy. A product designer cannot be a rigorous technocrat. One needs to walk in the user’s shoes, get the hang of habits and characteristics, without breaking the key product’s principles. Simply put, it’s all about empathy and understanding that you can always retrain people. Myth #5. A Product Designer is an Authoritarian Genius Dictatorship with both coworkers and users is unnatural for a product designer. Articulating issues and assigning the right tasks requires close communication — with your team, product managers and team leaders. You will have to analyze sketches, discuss functionality with engineers, talk to copywriters and go over the UI. Listening and hearing in this position is vital. A “reserved genius" style will not work. Myth #6. A Product Designer acts Randomly Methodologies and work strategies form the basis of the work process in the IT environment. Principles of design thinking guide product designers. What we’re talking about here is the approach to innovative developments, where people and their needs are at the core, and technical means addressing them. It’s an uneasy path: first, you need to define the problem, then analyze possible solutions, build a prototype and evaluate its effectiveness. Each step demands careful reflection and creativity. Therefore, in product design, a person is always more important than the process, though, from afar it may seem that the work is proceeding "on a hunch". Myth #7. Just Hand it over to Production! The product designer’s work does not stop at the point the product enters the market. Actually, it’s quite the opposite — this is where the fun begins. In addition to prep, a product designer also needs to evaluate the real effectiveness of the work done. Welcome to the world of metrics and constant monitoring! No matter how hard you try, there is always something to fix. The main thing is to keep an eye on the feedback and important indicators. Myth #8. Following the Trend is Above All A product designer needs immunity to trend noise. If minimalism is in fashion, this specialist will recall Einstein’s quote: “Everything should be done as simple as possible, but no simpler”. And vice versa, one will need to double-check and make sure the user is not overloaded with options or visual effects. The main product designer’s guide is rationality and the usefulness that a product should bear. The actual value is above design trends. Myth #9. Product Designers never really Existed Programmers are sometimes compared with mathematicians, while designers are compared with creators. It gives authority. What about product designers? The job is not that easy, and anthropologist is its "academic" analogy. Not to be confused with an archaeologist! Other than the origin, anthropologists study human behavior and its change under the influence of socio-economic and natural factors. Product designers are a little more specific, but the perspective is pretty much the same. The analogy, of course, is not perfect. Comparing designers with artists is a convention. The main idea is that such a position is not a whim of the digital era. Myth #10. Product Designers don’t bear Real Responsibilities Imagine an iPod without the famous click wheel, offices without Aeron seats or the auto industry without the Model-T Ford. No need to explain how much all these inventions have changed everything. All of them have a thoughtful product design, even if it is usually reduced to ordinary ingenuity or simplicity. Product designers create a user experience, and there is nothing more important than that.

#Busted: 10 Laughable Myths About Product Designers

Businesses can’t afford to lose millions of dollars because of malicious domain names used in all types of domain-related attacks including domain name squatting, business email compromise (BEC) frauds or, more generally, spoofing and phishing scams. That said, having proper domain & threat intelligence sources like WHOIS is key to protecting one’s organization from such cyber risks. In fact, WHOIS data can proactively support the early identification and follow-up investigation of suspicious domain registrations and their owners. Why is that? is an inherent part of the domain name system, served from distributed databases of registries and registrars via the incumbent WHOIS protocol and the new RDAP. Today, WHOIS records are still essential pieces of information linking a domain to its owner. WHOIS data However, the direct use of the WHOIS protocol and its database has many obstacles (i.e., amount and frequency limitations, absence of historic records, etc.). It also only supports limited types of queries and does not allow, for example, reverse WHOIS searches. For these reasons, various WHOIS data providers with more practical and thorough offerings have emerged; and here is a list of the best WHOIS domain name search and lookup tools that can help protect users and organizations as a whole. Tool #1: & WHOIS Search WHOIS Lookup WHOIS and WHOIS are straightforward research tools from WhoisXML API, the former being part of . Search Lookup Domain Research Suite Both enable users to quickly retrieve key data points for a particular domain, such as its age, creation and expiration dates, registrar, owner, administrative and other contacts, and more. WHOIS Search and WHOIS Lookup are one of the best WHOIS search tools in the market today, as the company’s long-standing relationship with registrars has allowed it to yield mostly complete WHOIS records for its users. Tool #2: Reverse WHOIS Search Reverse WHOIS Search (https://drs.whoisxmlapi.com/reverse-whois-search) is another handy tool from WhoisXML API’s Domain Research Suite. It allows users to discover all domains associated with a particular WHOIS record. For example, you can use a phone number, an email address, or a company name as a query term to retrieve a list of connected domains and WHOIS records. The volume of results that this tool can churn out is outstanding, making it easy to do background checks on domain owners and websites. The database has over 6.7 billion historical WHOIS records collected over the past ten years. Tool #3: Bulk WHOIS Lookup As far as features go, does the job of looking at a large number of domains. It is an enterprise-grade tool that allows users to search for the WHOIS records of up to 500,000 domains or IP addresses at any given time. Bulk WHOIS Lookup It accomplishes this via a single RESTful API query over HTTP or HTTPS. The output comes in a well-parsed format of one’s choice (JSON or XML). Users get 500 free WHOIS checks upon registration, which is ideal for small business operations. Tool #4: Whois.net Owned by NTT America, Whois[.]net has been around since 1999. To use the tool, users have to enter a domain to retrieve its WHOIS record. The research tool also claims to let users search domains by IP address. Results are returned in a matter of seconds and provide users immediate information on whether domains are available for registration or are already in use, followed by their corresponding WHOIS records. Tool #5: Whois Lookup DomainTools is a known provider of lookup and data loss prevention (DLP) solutions for personal and enterprise use. Its is pretty decent as well and its outputs reveal related IP addresses and the number of sites hosted on a particular server. Whois lookup tool Tool #6: Whois Domain Lookup is a service offered by domain registrar WHOIS. It provides relevant information on a domain, including its registration status, expiration date, and name servers, just like the other tools on this list. It is predominantly featured on WHOIS’s homepage so that domain buyers can use it. Whois Domain Lookup Tool #7: ICANN Lookup Last but not least is the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Number . It provides users a simplified overview of a domain’s WHOIS record. (ICANN)’s Whois Lookup tool In its query results, ICANN shows users the queried domain’s internationalized domain name version, name servers, and authoritative name servers. It also shows whether a domain has Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) enabled or not. --- The domain threat landscape has evolved at an unprecedented pace and businesses need to keep up. Fortunately, new advances in cybersecurity have made domain intelligence more accessible to organizations of any size. The abovementioned products are some of the best WHOIS domain name search and lookup tools that can aid IT professionals in protecting their companies from cyber risks.

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Winner of Noonies 2020 for the award Hacker Noon Contributor of the Year - GOOD COMPANY.

HackerNoon Tech Stories Archive January 3rd, 2020

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Global Debt, Ethereum, and a New Open Financial System [Analyzed]

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Anthony Bertolino

Proof of Keys Day: Not your keys, Not your Bitcoin [Jan/3➞₿🔑∎]

@ImTiaan
Tiaan Wolmarans

Three Bullish Tech Predictions for 2020

@MattBloom
Matt Bloom

Configuring HTTP Route Parameters in Azure Functions 2.x using Python

@joegatt
Joe Gatt

Web Scraping And Data Extraction with Python: Upwork Series #1

@coderasha
coderasha

10 Cryptocurrency Data Points to Takeaway from 2019

@jrodthoughts
Jesus Rodriguez

#Busted: 10 Laughable Myths About Product Designers

@sergey-lukyanov
Sergey Lukyanov

7 Best WHOIS Domain Name Search and Lookup Tools to Support Security Research and Investigations

@WhoisXMLAPI
WhoisXML API

HackerNoon Tech Stories Archive January 3rd, 2020

@CheopysChris Fox

@msaricaMehmet

@tG785^G*Laura K. Inamedinova

@HelvisHelvis Smoteks

@thetealpickleJessica

@eugenia-kuzmenkoEvgenia Kuzmenko

@harishbala1oHarish Balaji R

@himanshu99Himanshu Maggu

@ilyamkinIlya Lyamkin

@thetealpickleJessica

@donaldDonald Ng

@aBertolinoAnthony Bertolino

@ImTiaanTiaan Wolmarans

@MattBloomMatt Bloom

@joegattJoe Gatt

@coderashacoderasha

@jrodthoughtsJesus Rodriguez

@sergey-lukyanovSergey Lukyanov

@WhoisXMLAPIWhoisXML API

@Cheopys
Chris Fox

@msarica
Mehmet

@tG785^G*
Laura K. Inamedinova

@Helvis
Helvis Smoteks

@thetealpickle
Jessica

@eugenia-kuzmenko
Evgenia Kuzmenko

@harishbala1o
Harish Balaji R

@himanshu99
Himanshu Maggu

@ilyamkin
Ilya Lyamkin

@thetealpickle
Jessica

@donald
Donald Ng

@aBertolino
Anthony Bertolino

@ImTiaan
Tiaan Wolmarans

@MattBloom
Matt Bloom

@joegatt
Joe Gatt

@coderasha
coderasha

@jrodthoughts
Jesus Rodriguez

@sergey-lukyanov
Sergey Lukyanov

@WhoisXMLAPI
WhoisXML API