She has made her extra cash by selling these items on sites like eBay, Poshmark, Mercari and Facebook Groups. Chong started her side hustle 13 years ago and has become a consultant to others who want to start selling luxury items. She has even designed her ...

I Make $8,000 a Month From My Side Gig — Here’s What I Do

I bought a laptop off mercari as a gift for my daughter's 12th birthday & she can't even use it. It was supposed to include one but for some reason they didn't. She is really wanting to try her laptop out & was super bummed out not being able to use it.

Hey does anyone have an Acer Chromebook model # ZHN laptop charger they no longer use?

The demand for second-hand clothing and clothing resale applications has soared as more and more individuals have become aware of the

Turning Wardrobe Clutter Into Cash: The Top 16 Apps for Clothes Reselling

Nikkei said on Tuesday that it will add two constituent stocks to the Nikkei 225 Climate Change 1.5°C Target Index, effective Oct. 31, following a periodic review. Mercari, Lasertec will be added to the index,

Mercari, Lasertec to join Nikkei Climate 1.5°C Target Index

According to a survey by commerce company Mercari, 2.9 billion items were thrown away or tossed in the recycling bin in the United States in 2022. In monetary terms, this equals $76.3 billion of discarded items that would have otherwise been fit for sale or use.

Side hustles & your used stuff: How to cash out old tech, toys, clothing, more

The Blameless Terraform Provider delivers a comprehensive array of features and benefits: Detailed audit logs to track configuration changes and their authors. Seamless automation of Blameless configuration changes, perfectly aligning with existing CI/CD workflows. Enhanced learning resources for optimizing incident and retrospective workflows.

Blameless Unveils New Terraform Provider to Elevate Workflow Management at Scale

Sift, a new Google Chrome extension developed by Brown students, aims to show shoppers cheaper alternatives to online shopping options.

Meet Sift, a thrifty Chrome extension developed by Brown students

Shopping secondhand for clothing and accessories has become a go-to for many consumers who see it as a way to save money and create less waste. And while some enjoy the treasure-hunt vibe of spending a Saturday afternoon sifting through items at their local Goodwill store, others might be scared off by the time investment required to do that.

10 things to know about shopping Poshmark and other resale websites

Shopping secondhand for clothing and accessories has become a go-to for many consumers who see it as a way to save money and create less waste. And while some enjoy the treasure-hunt vibe of spending a Saturday afternoon sifting through items at their local Goodwill store,

Beautiful cart bag from the 90sVery good used condition6-way divider4 pocketsUmbrella holderNo raincoverThere is another one like this on another site in poor condition with vinyl heavily faded and logos (does have raincover) for 85. I"ve priced this to ...

Burton cart bag vintage golf discounts outlet buy Leather Golf Bags Mercari

Mercari

mercari

So you’ve been offered a good deal on Mercari, but you’re not quite sure if it’s a reputable website. Or, you’ve heard about different Mercari scams online, and you’re not sure if you should avoid the site altogether or not. First, it’s important to establish that the company itself is legitimate and not a scam. Mercari is an online marketplace where users can buy and sell used items. The company was founded in Japan in 2013 and quickly gained popularity internationally. Users can list their items for sale easily through the Mercari app, which is available for free on both the App Store and Google Play. Is Mercari Safe to Use? Mercari is generally considered a safe platform and provides a secure environment for users to trade safely. However, like any other online marketplace, there may be risks involved, such as dealing with unreliable or dishonest sellers. If you’re a Mercari user, it's important to exercise caution, as the more popular the site gets, the more likely fraudsters will gravitate toward it. Overall, yes, Mercari is safe to use. Six Common Mercari Scams to Avoid on the Platform Yes, Mercari is safe, but it’s not fraud-free. Here are five of the most notorious scams to look out for on the platform: 1) The Fake Listing Scam The number one rule when it comes to shopping online is to not trust every deal you see. Some deals are too good to be true. If you find a handbag you would normally pay $1,100 for in the store and on Mercari, it’s only $100 bucks, you should automatically assume it’s a scam. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people looking for a good deal and are willing to cast all doubt aside to find it. It’s that type of mindset that leads people to fall for scams like this: https://youtu.be/X4bMgLaRORk?si=Edt_rF5jrHsPZbUB&embedable=true Thankfully, you can avoid this scam by: Only deal with sellers who have positive reviews and ratings. Sellers who have a reputation to protect are less likely to pull the wool over your eyes. Try to ask the seller as many questions as you can. Questions are like scam repellant for those trying to make a quick “deal.” Ask the seller for extra photos of the item. If it’s a real item, they shouldn’t mind snapping a few extra pics as proof. 2) The Switcheroo Scam This scam is as old as time when it comes to selling online, but people still do it today, thinking they’re going to get away with it. If you’re a seller on Mercari, this is one you’ll want to look out for. The Switcheroo is when someone buys one of your items and then randomly returns it. When you get the item back, you quickly realize that it’s not the item you shipped out. Instead, you’re left with a cheap knockoff of the item or a broken/ruined version of it.  Or even worse, the scammer sends a completely different item that weighs about the same as the original. If you’ve been a seller online for a while, there’s a good chance that you’ve had to deal with this scam already, and Mercari is no different. The bad news is, if you’re a seller on Mercari, there’s not much you can do about it, as Mercari is known for refunding the buyer once the return looks like it was delivered. It’s still worth trying to for help; just be prepared to write off the item later if there’s nothing the company can do for you. contact Mercari’s customer service 3) The Offsite Payment Mercari Scam This scam is one of the easiest ones to avoid on your part, but only if you know about it. This scam looks innocent at first, but its effects can be devastating. It works like this: You’re interested in an item on Mercari. You contact the seller to make sure they’re the real deal. The seller messages back telling you there’s a problem with their Mercari account, and they need you to pay with Zelle or another outside payment system. You send them money through the third-party payment service. You never get your product, you never hear from the seller again, and you don’t get a refund. The best way to avoid this scam is to make all your transactions on the platform. Don’t believe any of the seller’s lies. You should always be able to send payment through Mercari itself. 4) The Misrepresentation Scam Here’s another classic scam you may run into on Mercari: selling fake or damaged items that appear to be perfectly fine. There are multiple ways that scammers try to pull this off: Altering images through Photoshop. Listing a used item as “new.” Lying about major damage to the item or claiming it works when it clearly doesn’t. There are a few ways to avoid this one. First, check for the “verified seller” icon to make sure it’s not a fake profile. If the profile has a few followers and some good reviews under their belt, that’s even better. If you’re still skeptical, you can also check to see if they have any : Seller Badges Basically, look for anything about the seller that can prove that they have a reputation. If the seller has a reputation, they’re going to want to keep it, and selling fake or damaged items is just not worth it for them. 5) The Changing Address Scam Yes, some sellers do try to pull this off, and many of them succeed. It works like this: You order an item. The “seller” fills a box full of ripped-up paper or garbage. The “seller” uses a third-party shipping company to ship the box full of garbage to your home. The garbage box gets accepted by the carrier. The “seller” calls the shipping company and changes the address to a random house somewhere in your city. The package gets delivered to some random person’s home. From here, it’s a waiting game. The “seller” knows that you only have three days before the return window passes. Three days have passed, and you realize you don’t have your item yet. You contact Mercari, but at this point, it’s too late. To avoid this tricky scam, just remember to keep an eye on your tracking. Your app may say that it was delivered, but it may have been delivered to some random house. If this happens, make sure to inform Mercari right away, and they’ll take care of everything. 6) The Fake Customer Service Representative Scam Here’s an insidious Mercari scam that could do a lot more damage than cheat you out of a few bucks. The fake customer service representative scheme works just like any other type of phishing scam: You get a random message on Mercari or an email informing you about an “issue with your account.” You’re told that you need to resolve the issue immediately, or you risk losing your account altogether. You click on the provided link and fill out the form, including all of the personal information that’s requested. Once you send out the form, the fraudster has everything they need to ruin your life. To avoid this scam, all you need to do is remember that a real Mercari representative would never send you an unsolicited message outside of the platform itself. And if you’re worried that your account may be in danger, you can also contact the company yourself to confirm. How to Report a Mercari Scammer If you or someone you know becomes a victim of a scam on Mercari, don’t just brush it off or pretend like it didn’t happen. It’s better to make the platform a safer place by reporting the scammer to Mercari. You can report any type of fraud you find on the platform by calling 1-888-578-5870. You can also visit the at any time to report your concerns. Mercari Help Center Mercari takes fraud very seriously, and most of the scammers they catch are suspended on the platform for life. Final Thoughts It’s important to reiterate that Mercari is a legitimate website where you can buy and sell goods, just like eBay or Etsy. But just like with any website online, you can’t trust that you’re dealing with a reputable seller or buyer just because they present themselves as one. Feel free to use the platform as much as you’d like; just keep an eye out for the Mercari scams on this list as you do. For more online scams to watch out for, check out these articles: The 8 Most Dangerous Cash App Scams (with Screenshots) Payment Fraud Stats From the World's Most Popular Apps: Zelle, Venmo, Cash App, Paypal, and More 5 Notorious Paypal Invoice Scams & How to Avoid Them

The Most Typical Mercari Scams You Should Look Out For

সবচেয়ে সাধারণ মার্কারি স্ক্যামগুলির জন্য আপনার সন্ধান করা উচিত

Die typischsten Mercari-Betrügereien, auf die Sie achten sollten

Las estafas de Mercari más típicas a las que debe prestar atención

Les escroqueries Mercari les plus typiques à surveiller

सबसे विशिष्ट मर्करी घोटाले जिन पर आपको नज़र रखनी चाहिए

気を付けるべき典型的なメルカリ詐欺

주의해야 할 가장 일반적인 Mercari 사기

Os golpes Mercari mais típicos que você deve observar

Наиболее типичные случаи мошенничества с Mercari, на которые следует обратить внимание

Dikkat Etmeniz Gereken En Tipik Mercari Dolandırıcılıkları

Những trò lừa đảo Mercari điển hình nhất mà bạn nên đề phòng

您应该警惕的最典型的 Mercari 诈骗

I was reading through my newsreader this morning and wondered what I could do if I could mainline that content right into my brain. What could you do if your noggin had access to all of the Internet's content in just a thought? Would you do it? The thought started with a series of articles on Nueralink and raised even more questions than just becoming NEO. Here are some of the questions that popped into my head. I'm just asking '"for a friend." What would the warranty be on the chip? Do I get a limited warranty on parts and labor for the life of the implant?
Do I need a subscription, and what happens if I stop paying?
Would the free plan include advertising? If I am not on a paid tier, will I get an antacid ad when I try to fall asleep?
Is the installation DIY, or must I book an appointment with a certified technician?
Is there an open-source option?
Can I fall asleep in a meeting and just let it answer for me?
What happens if my neural implant gets hacked?
If I'm unsatisfied with my neural implant, can I return it for a full refund or store credit?
What's the battery life on this thing? Will I need to plug myself in at night?
Can I resell my implant on Ebay? Mercari?
Does it ship with Amazon Prime?
Does it integrate with Zapier?
Can it run Linux?
Would I get spammed in my brain?
Can salespeople contact me through it?
Does it have an alarm clock?
Is there a payment plan, or could I get it on layaway?
Will it help me remember everyone’s name at my high school reunion?
Could it help me forget half of the people from my high school? I’m just curious about the consumer aspects of this. Honestly, I think we would turn into Jello if we could call up any fact, language, directions or ability to know everything. Why leave the house? Some of the articles that got me started. https://www.statnews.com/2024/07/08/neuralink-elon-musk-scientific-ethics-brain-computer-interface/?embedable=true https://augmentedhorizon.beehiiv.com/p/chip-every-brain-internet-rewiring-kids-minds?embedable=true https://www.hindustantimes.com/business/elon-musk-says-second-neuralink-brain-implant-to-give-people-superpowers-in-a-week-101720666555269.html?embedable=true I was reading through my newsreader this morning and wondered what I could do if I could mainline that content right into my brain. What could you do if your noggin had access to all of the Internet's content in just a thought? Would you do it? The thought started with a series of articles on Nueralink and raised even more questions than just becoming NEO. Here are some of the questions that popped into my head. I'm just asking '"for a friend." What would the warranty be on the chip? Do I get a limited warranty on parts and labor for the life of the implant? Do I need a subscription, and what happens if I stop paying? Would the free plan include advertising? If I am not on a paid tier, will I get an antacid ad when I try to fall asleep? Is the installation DIY, or must I book an appointment with a certified technician? Is there an open-source option? Can I fall asleep in a meeting and just let it answer for me? What happens if my neural implant gets hacked? If I'm unsatisfied with my neural implant, can I return it for a full refund or store credit? What's the battery life on this thing? Will I need to plug myself in at night? Can I resell my implant on Ebay? Mercari? Does it ship with Amazon Prime? Does it integrate with Zapier? Can it run Linux? Would I get spammed in my brain? Can salespeople contact me through it? Does it have an alarm clock? Is there a payment plan, or could I get it on layaway? Will it help me remember everyone’s name at my high school reunion? Could it help me forget half of the people from my high school? What would the warranty be on the chip? Do I get a limited warranty on parts and labor for the life of the implant? Do I need a subscription, and what happens if I stop paying? Would the free plan include advertising? If I am not on a paid tier, will I get an antacid ad when I try to fall asleep? Is the installation DIY, or must I book an appointment with a certified technician? Is there an open-source option? Can I fall asleep in a meeting and just let it answer for me? What happens if my neural implant gets hacked? If I'm unsatisfied with my neural implant, can I return it for a full refund or store credit? What's the battery life on this thing? Will I need to plug myself in at night? Can I resell my implant on Ebay? Mercari? Does it ship with Amazon Prime? Does it integrate with Zapier? Can it run Linux? Would I get spammed in my brain? Can salespeople contact me through it? Does it have an alarm clock? Is there a payment plan, or could I get it on layaway? Will it help me remember everyone’s name at my high school reunion? Could it help me forget half of the people from my high school? I’m just curious about the consumer aspects of this. Honestly, I think we would turn into Jello if we could call up any fact, language, directions or ability to know everything. Why leave the house? Some of the articles that got me started. https://www.statnews.com/2024/07/08/neuralink-elon-musk-scientific-ethics-brain-computer-interface/?embedable=true https://www.statnews.com/2024/07/08/neuralink-elon-musk-scientific-ethics-brain-computer-interface/?embedable=true https://augmentedhorizon.beehiiv.com/p/chip-every-brain-internet-rewiring-kids-minds?embedable=true https://augmentedhorizon.beehiiv.com/p/chip-every-brain-internet-rewiring-kids-minds?embedable=true https://www.hindustantimes.com/business/elon-musk-says-second-neuralink-brain-implant-to-give-people-superpowers-in-a-week-101720666555269.html?embedable=true https://www.hindustantimes.com/business/elon-musk-says-second-neuralink-brain-implant-to-give-people-superpowers-in-a-week-101720666555269.html?embedable=true

If You Could Get a Neural Implant to Access ChatGPT, or Any LLM, Would You Let It?

In November 2022, the cryptocurrency world was rocked to its core when FTX, one of its brightest stars, collapsed in a scandal that echoed through the entire digital currency ecosystem. This event, marked by allegations of fraud, mismanagement, and regulatory failures, has led to significant skepticism about the future of cryptocurrencies. However, the question that now looms large over the industry is whether it can recover from this seismic shock. A Prelude to Uncertainty The fall of FTX was not just a single event but a cataclysm that highlighted the vulnerabilities within the crypto industry. Founded by Sam Bankman-Fried in 2019, FTX quickly rose to prominence, symbolizing the rapid growth and potential of digital currencies. Its collapse in late 2022 unveiled a labyrinth of financial mismanagement and regulatory oversight failures. Billions of dollars of investor and customer funds vanished, leading to a crisis of confidence in platforms. This scandal has raised questions about the safety of the crypto industry's infrastructure and its susceptibility to fraud. cryptocurrency The Industry's Response and Path to Recovery Following the upheaval caused by , the cryptocurrency industry has been propelled into a phase of critical self-assessment and reform. Crypto platforms are now more committed to being open about their operations, ensuring that users have a clear understanding of how their investments are managed and safeguarded. This move toward openness is pivotal in restoring the trust that was shaken by the FTX fallout, making the crypto space more inviting and reassuring for both current and prospective investors. the FTX scandal Simultaneously, there's a growing recognition within the industry of the need to align more closely with regulatory standards. This doesn't just mean adhering to the existing rules but also actively engaging with regulatory bodies to help shape a framework that supports safe and ethical crypto practices. Through better security measures, transparent handling of funds, and robust defenses against illegal activities, the industry is working to prove that it can offer a reliable and safe investment avenue. The Undiminished Resilience of Cryptocurrency Despite the turbulence caused by the high-profile scandal, the fascination with cryptocurrencies has not waned for a significant segment of the market. These digital assets are still revered for their revolutionary potential to overturn traditional financial paradigms. The resilience of cryptocurrency's appeal is notably evidenced by its continued integration and acceptance across diverse sectors. In Japan's tech industry, the adoption of extends beyond mere financial transactions. Companies are leveraging it for enhancing security and transparency in a wide array of business processes. On top of this, Mercari (one of Japan’s largest e-commerce platforms) has begun to accept cryptocurrency as payment since the beginning of this year. blockchain technology We’ve also seen cryptocurrencies move into multiple gambling spaces across the world. In New Zealand, for example, the online casino industry has seen a persistent incorporation of cryptocurrencies as a payment method. A Cautious Optimism The road to recovery for the cryptocurrency market is not straightforward. It will require a concerted effort from all stakeholders, including regulators, to build a more transparent, secure, and resilient infrastructure. The crypto industry must embrace this moment as an opportunity to address its flaws and fortify itself against similar crises in the future. post-FTX scandal While the FTX scandal has undoubtedly dealt a significant blow to the , it has also served as a catalyst for reflection and reform. The path forward will likely be marked by greater regulation, increased transparency, and more cautious investment strategies. cryptocurrency market

Will We Ever See Crypto Bounce Back After the FTX Scandal?

It’s no exaggeration that new scams are popping up online almost daily. In my quest to help people avoid these money traps, I try to keep my ear to the ground as much as possible. One of the searches I kept coming across online was “Is Momentum Solar a pyramid scheme?” I had no idea what Momentum Solar was, so I had to look into it. On the surface, I found a business selling a newer technology to the masses. Below the surface, I found a swarm of angry customers armed with business-ending allegations. Why Do I Keep Hearing About Free Solar Panels? If you’re an avid YouTube watcher, radio listener, or newspaper reader, you’ve probably seen one of the many commercials for “free” solar panels. Usually, these offers are part of a government-subsidized solar program that pitches the idea of getting free solar panels installed on your home's roof, which you’ll later be able to write off or get some kind of credit for. First of all, these commercials are misleading, as these programs are rare, and only households that are considered low-income can apply for them. This doesn’t necessarily make these programs scams; it makes them bait. A way to get you into the door so they can sell you something else. If you don’t live in a low-income household, chances are, the company will pitch either a “solar lease agreement” or a “power purchase agreement (PPA).” With a solar lease agreement, you’ll get the panels installed with no upfront costs and then sign a contract binding you to a monthly fee for the use of the equipment. A PPA gets rid of the monthly fee and charges you just for the amount of electricity generated from the panels. What is Momentum Solar? In order for something to be a pyramid scheme, traditionally, the company that’s being used as a front doesn’t make or sell anything. This is not the case when it comes to Momentum Solar. Momentum Solar is a turnkey solar solution company that handles the engineering, procurement, and construction of solar panels for residential and commercial clients. The company seems to be rapidly expanding and currently operates in seven states in the US: New Jersey Connecticut New York Pennsylvania Texas Florida (Southern) California It’s also important to note that Momentum Solar is considered a legitimate company and one of the country's largest solar panel installers. The company claims that it’s able to cut your utility bill down to a fraction of what it was, and they have the proof to back it up: So if Momentum Solar is a legitimate company that can lower their customers’ utility bills tremendously, then why do so many people think it’s a scam? For the most part, it comes down to one word: contracts. How Momentum Solar Handles its Contracts One of the biggest reasons Momentum Solar has had such a bad reputation as of late is the “Cooling Off” rule and how the company handles it. The “Cooling Off” rule is a federal law (16 CFR 429) that gives customers three days to cancel any agreement or contract with a business. This rule was put in place by the Federal Trade Commission to protect consumers from feeling pressured or rushed into a transaction. Momentum Solar abides by this rule, but former customers have complained that the company has found ways around this by basically ignoring all phone calls and emails until the initial three days are up. It’s even worse in Momentum Solar’s case, as their company policy is supposed to allow customers the chance to cancel any time before the equipment gets installed. For example, one former customer on Reddit posted that the company was ducking all of their calls, texts, and emails about the cancellation. They even called their Town Hall to voice their concerns and block Momentum from getting the correct permits. This person was also working for the company as a door-to-door salesman. They quit the company when they concluded that Momentum’s sales tactics were deceptive and designed to trap people in a power purchase agreement for two decades. This Redditor believes that the company was using psychological tactics to pump their sales numbers up as well. Momentum Solar is plagued with complaints online about how they handle contracts, with some people claiming that the company tried to get thousands of dollars out of them after canceling: Some complaints are centered on how pushy the salespeople are for the company, refusing to leave their homes until they sign on the dotted line. There have even been some shady claims about installing a small disconnect box on people’s property just to lock them into their contracts: Other Complaints About Momentum Solar It’s not just the company’s handling of contracts that people have a problem with. There are plenty of other complaints as well. For instance, the company’s customer service is often under fire for how long it takes for equipment to be fixed, with some people claiming that it took months for anyone to come out. Another common complaint is misleading advertisements, with some customers claiming that their electricity bills didn’t go down enough. This complaint depends on the customer, as many people are satisfied with their results, but still, there are many claims that say otherwise. To be fair to Momentum Solar, a representative for the company has managed to respond kindly to many of the complaints online. This type of acknowledgment points to some responsibility on the company’s end. How to File a Complaint with Momentum Solar Before you do anything, first try to contact Momentum Solar directly. It’s always possible that there’s some kind of misunderstanding or mistake on the company’s part. If you can’t work things out with them, you may have to go to your State Licensing Board. This is one of the best ways to get someone else to investigate any potentially illegal issues you may have with the company. If things need to progress further, you could file a complaint with your state’s Attorney General’s office or consider filing a claim against the company in court. It’s best to speak with an attorney before attempting any of these more drastic measures. One thing you can do at any time is post your complaint on Momentum Solar’s BBB page. Most companies will take their reputation with the Better Business Bureau seriously, and voicing your concerns there may get them to pay more attention to your issues. So, is Momentum Solar a Pyramid Scheme? Again, it’s important to say that Momentum Solar is a real business, not a criminal enterprise designed to steal your money. Is Momentum Solar a pyramid scheme? In short, no. However, just because it’s a real company doesn’t mean it’s not a scam. If the product doesn’t work as advertised, then it could easily gain a reputation as a scam. For now, all we can do is keep a close eye on Momentum Solar and ensure they fulfill their promises. If you want to watch out for other scams out there, check out these: Brushing Scams on Amazon: What They Are and How to Handle Them The Most Typical Mercari Scams You Should Look Out For Payment Fraud Stats From the World's Most Popular Apps: Zelle, Venmo, Cash App, Paypal, and More

Is Momentum Solar a Pyramid Scheme?

মোমেন্টাম সোলার কি একটি পিরামিড স্কিম?

Ist Momentum Solar ein Pyramidensystem?

¿Es Momentum Solar un esquema piramidal?

Momentum Solar est-il un système pyramidal ?

क्या मोमेंटम सोलर एक पिरामिड योजना है?

モメンタム・ソーラーはねずみ講か?

Momentum Solar는 피라미드형 계획입니까?

O Momentum Solar é um esquema de pirâmide?

Является ли Momentum Solar финансовой пирамидой?

Momentum Solar Bir Piramit Şeması mı?

Momentum Solar có phải là một sơ đồ kim tự tháp không?

Momentum Solar 是金字塔计划吗？

102 Stories To Learn About Storytelling

Let's learn about via these 51 free stories. They are ordered by most time reading created on HackerNoon. Visit the to find the most read stories about any technology. Terraform /Learn Repo 1. 6 Free Terraform Tools to Facilitate a Multi-Cloud Infrastructure Have a multi-cloud infrastructure? These free Terraform tools will help you to reduce costs and make your multi-cloud efficient. 2. Developer Trends from Thoughtworks’ Technology Radar 27 Thoughtworks’ Technology Radar is a regular time to take a look at what trends are changing our industry. 3. Serverless API with Terraform: GO and AWS [Part 2] In part 2, we'll go over deploying serverless API to AWS Cloud with Terraform. 4. How a Unicorn Startup in Japan Leveraged the Power of Microservices Startup experience in Mercari. Road to microservices from monolith. 5. Getting Started With Creating, Managing an AWS ECS Cluster With Terraform In this tutorial, you'll define AWS resources using Terraform and how resource definitions translate to actual resources created on AWS 6. Basics of AWS Tags & Terraform with S3 - Part 1 In this video course, you'll learn the basics of AWS tags and Terraform with an S3 bucket. 7. How to Test Terraform the Right Way In this blog post, you'll learn about why you should be testing IaC and the best platforms to get started with. 8. Static Code Analysis  for Infrastructure as Code Using Azure DevOps Pipelines This article explains how to set up static code analysis for infrastructure as code using Azure DevOps pipelines. 9. Should Deploying Production Infrastructure be Hard? Below I'll explain why I built terra_boi to deploy Clientelify, why I think it was downloaded 1,000 times in the first 10 days (despite not promoting it anywhere), and why deploying an application to production shouldn't suck. 10. How To Manage Infrastructure With Terraform What is Terraform? 11. Getting Started Provisioning an AWS EKS Kubernetes Cluster with Terraform Learn how to provision an AWS EKS Kubernetes cluster with Terraform. See a full step-by-step tutorial. 12. How Infrastructure as Code Is Forcing a Revolution in Cost Management You might have read our beta launch blog post, which describes how Infrastructure as Code (IaC) is driving the third datacenter revolution (the first two being virtualization and the move to public clouds). In this post, I want to go deeper into looking at how IaC is driving a new need and approach to cost visibility and management. 13. Automating User Management in the Company Have you ever faced the challenge of automating users in your company? 14. Introducing Driftctl: Your IaC Security Belt We recently released the first versions of driftctl, a new open-source project for infrastructure developers, DevOps, SRE, and cloud practitioners, with the goal of helping manage all kinds of drifts. 15. Deploying a Terraform Remote State Backend with AWS S3 and DynamoDB In this article, we are going to be deep diving into remote state management in terraform. 16. Another Reason to Use Docker Recently I was working on a project which includes Terraform and AWS stuff. While working on that I was using my local machine for terraform code testing and luckily everything was going fine. But when we actually want to test it for the production environment we got some issues there. Then, as usual, we started to dig into the issue and finally, we got the issue which was quite a silly one 😜. The production server Terraform version and my local development server Terraform version was not the same. 17. Building Maintenance Mode for your API Gateway Using Terraform In my previous blog post, I went through how to create a maintenance mode page for your application, and how to implement it using Terraform and github pages. But the website is just one part of an Application, and often there’s also a public (or private) API that also needs to have a maintenance mode. Let’s see how we can do that using Terraform on API Gateway. 18. How to Deploy a Django Application on AWS with Terraform The final goal of this guide is to create a scalable and reproducible setup of the Django Web Application on AWS using Terraform. 19. How To Sync Terraform Config And .tfstate File For Existing AWS Resources Terraform is a great (and dominant) infrastructure automation tool. It is multi-cloud, can build all sorts of resources, and in some cases supports API calls to build resources before the native tooling from cloud providers does. 20. Managing Active Directory Objects with Azure AD Provider for Terraform Learn how to manage Active Directory Objects with Azure AD Provider for Terraform. See examples of how to authenticate and grant the correct permissions. 21. Why you should take care of Infrastructure Drift When talking about infrastructure drift, you often get knowing glances and heated answers. Recording gaps in your infra between what you expected to be and the reality of what is, is a well known and widespread issue bothering hundreds of DevOps teams around the globe. 22. Managing a GitHub Organization With Infrastructure as Code This post will share our experience in adopting infrastructure as code (IaC) to manage GitHub organization resources. 23. Using Jupyter/TensorBoard In Any Cloud With One Command Using Terraform Provider Iterative for bespoke Machine Learning & Data Science on AWS, Azure, GCP and K8s 24. The Top 5 DevOps Tools and Services to Consider as a Startup A collection of DevOps tools can significantly enhance your Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and increase engineering productivity. 25. Change the Name of your AWS S3 Bucket in Terraform Without Breaking Things Learn how to rename an AWS S3 bucket in Terraform. See renaming process of Amazon s3 bucket in a few simple steps. 26. Exporting Your GKE Cluster to Terraform Cloud: A Guide with Challenges and Solutions In this article, I'll share our journey at ANNA Money from using our Kubernetes installation in GCP to the managed Kubernetes service by Google and GKE. 27. Hashicorp's Terraform: A Introduction Join us in the journey of learning Terraform. This blog series aims to provides a guidance for essentials to be known while working with Terraform. 28. A Handy Guide to Migrating Terraform State to GitLab CI/CD Migrating Terraform state to GitLab CI/CD is a GitOps best practice that allows multiple engineers to work together to develop infrastructure. 29. How Namespace and Terraform Can Manage Kubernetes Environments In the last several years, Kubernetes has become the “go to” standard for managing and orchestrating containerized workloads. Thanks to it’s vendor agnostic nature, you can easily run Kubernetes almost anywhere, and in fact, all the major cloud vendors offer a managed Kubernetes service (AWS EKS, Google GKE, and Azure AKS). 30. Building a “Maintenance Mode” with Terraform and Github Pages As you may have seen, we just launched our public beta of env0 last month. As part of the run-up to the launch, our dev team had to go through and make sure everything about our infrastructure was ready for ongoing public use: one element being creating a maintenance mode for both our Application and our public API. 31. How To Migrate An Existing Infrastructure into Terraform Terraform is a powerful tool to have in your toolset. 32. How To Setup Continuous Integration Pipeline By Using Terraform And GitLab CI Terraform is a fantastic tool for managing your cloud infrastructure, especially if your assets are hosted on multiple cloud providers. 33. Learn How to Build a CI/CD Pipeline Using GitLab for your Website We'll run through how to build and configure a CI/CD pipeline to deploy your business's website using AWS, Terraform & Gitlab. 34. How to Optimize for Iteration: Choosing Your Early Startup's Tech Stack As we’ve discussed in a previous blog post, product development is hypothesis testing. This is especially true in the early stages of a company when you need to confirm or reject your hypothesis as quickly as possible. This process is then repeated until you (hopefully) reach product-market fit. To get there, your team needs to be able to work and build at a pace that allows for this constant and rapid iteration. 35. What Really Propelled The Cloud Revolution: A Developer's Perspective An overview of the main trends that have pushed the Cloud industry — and the world — forward, in the past decade and a half. 36. Sanity-Checks with Playwright in Fargate container on schedule There is often the need to check whether your production system is working as expected. Playwright is a great way to test if everything is going to plan. 37. From “Feature branches” to “Feature environments” with Terraform “The advantage of feature branching is that each developer can work on their own feature and be isolated from changes going on elsewhere.” (FeatureBranch) 38. Serverless API with Terraform, GO and AWS, Part 1 Knowing how to build REST API with latest tech is cool. You know what's even cooler? It's being able to deploy it to the cloud! I'll walk you through the process of building simple, server-less application using GO, AWS (Lambda, API Gateway, Dynamodb) and Terraform. 39. Improve Your IaC With a Specialized Management Platform Most often, there is no point in implementing an in-house solution as the cost and effort of building and maintaining it may exceed its potential benefits. 40. Kubernetes Terraforming on Linode: Linode + Terraform + Kubernetes = Cloud Nirvana Let's discuss the process of "Terraforming" a Kubernetes cluster on Linode using Terraform to help organizations efficiently manage and scale  infrastructure. 41. 10+ Best Resources to learn DevOps in Depth [Online Courses] DevOps is one of the most in-demand skills from employer and there are many job opportunities lying for full stack developers, distinguished engineers and DevOps professionals. If you are an experienced Java programmer or a full-stack web developer, and want to become a DevOps engineer then you have come to the right place. 42. Ad Hoc Environments for Django Applications With ECS, Terraform and GitHub Actions This article will show how software development teams can build on-demand environments for dog-food testing, quality review, internal and external demos and oth 43. Create Your New Reality With Wirehole And Other Awesome Automation Tools **UPDATE October 13, 2020 - The mjtechguy/terransible-wirehole Github repo now supports deploying to Digital Ocean and Hetzner Cloud as well! 44. GraphQL Is Not a Silver Bullet GraphQL is not a configuration language, also not a transformation language, a replacement for SQL, and definitely not Terraform. 45. Building an AWS EKS Fargate Cluster with Terraform How to build an AWS EKS Fargate cluster using terraform. 46. Terraform Configuration Syntax Overview All you need to know to get started about Terraform Syntax. 47. Is Terraform Still Useful? Terraform is an agentless infrastructure tool used mainly by DevOps for infrastructure management. Find out why you should use Terraform for infrastructure. 48. 6 DevOps Trends in 2022 That DevOps Engineers Should Adopt The role of DevOps engineers, their responsibilities, growth opportunities, a set of important soft & hard skills, and most importantly, DevOps trends in 2022. 49. Deploying an Open Source Secure Video Conference Server [A How To Guide] In this article, you'll create a new DigitalOcean account using a free credit link. Then, you will clone a GitHub repository, and use Terraform code to initialize, plan and apply resources to your account, using a preconfigured image from DigitalOcean and your custom domain name. Finally, you will access your account remotely via SSH and execute two scripts to configure both your video conference server and Let's Encrypt SSL to enable HTTPS. 50. Newsflash - "People with AWS Console Access Tend to Change Things" This blog post is a written transcript of the FOSDEM Talk: “Infrastructure drifts aren’t like Pokemon, you can’t catch ’em all”, by Stephane Jourdan – CTO and founder 51. Introduction to AWS Log Insights as CloudWatch Metrics A step-by-step description of how to create an AWS Lambda to convert Cloudwatch LogInsights into metrics Thank you for checking out the 51 most read stories about Terraform on HackerNoon. to find the most read stories about any technology. Visit the /Learn Repo

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About this Article Hello, folks. My name is Sho Ogihara. I am Tech Lead of . We're famous for being the , and also famous for . I have 7+ years of experience in this company, but will leave soon to become a freelance. Today I’d like to write about my experience of Mercari US with my gratitude. Mercari US Microservices Platform first startup unicorn in Japan Superbowl Ad in US We started the business in 2013, and when I joined at the end of 2014, our backend was a traditional PHP and MySQL (LAMP) stack. But now we do the microservices architecture by kubernetes, istio, gRPC, golang, Prometheus, and so on. If you're interested in our current tech stack, please visit our engineering blog. There are many fantastic posts. How could we modernize our backend system? I’ll tell you the story but . This post may include many mistakes. Even so, I hope this experience will be helpful for other engineers. please remember this is NOT the official one and more like my perspective and experience Mockup (<=2014) I heard our app was originally created by Ruby on Rails for the mockup. However, it was rewritten fully in PHP. This sounds crazy because RoR was one of the most popular frameworks at that time, around 2014. Actually this makes sense to me because our CEO had good connections with many senior PHP engineers. He recruited members through social media like Facebook and Twitter at first. For startups, it’s very important to ship the product, and it’s best to work on it with your friends. The current trend is not the only reason to select certain technology. Old fashioned LAMP (2014~2015) Our app was released using the PHP framework named , which is inspired by CakePHP but is thinner and easier to learn. It's designed to enable newbies to develop the new API endpoint from the very first day when they join. dietcake In this phase, it was unique that the API endpoints were designed specifically for iOS and Android screens. For example, please assume an endpoint GET /items/:id. In the general REST design, this endpoint would return an object like this: {
    "id": "m1000",
    "name": "iPhone 13 pro max",
    "price": "1000",
    "status": "sold",
    "buyer_id": 12345,
} However, our API response was designed like this on purpose: {
    "item": {
        "id": "m1000",
        "name": "iPhone 13 pro max",
        "price": "1000",
        "status": "sold"
    },
    "buyer": {
        "id": 12345,
        "name": "buyer-12345",
        "icon": "https://icon-url"
    },
    "youMayAlsoLike": [
        {
            "name": "iPhone 12",
            "price": 900,
            "status": "onSale"
        }
    ]
} As you can see, all the related objects are included in a single response. So, for example, the clients don’t have to call another API to get the details of information. This design might be different from the well-known best practice of REST. Actually, we can see a similar idea to GraphQL today. buyer I would not say REST is wrong and the GraphQL approach is better. My point is, that this design was the evidence that the mental model of backend developers was close to the mobile app screen. Regardless of the position, we discussed the app spec well. It might be longer than discussing the design of the backend system. At that time we were driven by the design of the app itself. And I think it’s very important, especially for startups. Anyways the tech stack was chosen from the startup perspective, carefully and consciously. Many engineers tend to be satisfied with just being capable of using the technology. But engineering skill is to achieve the goal, not the goal itself. I think the first engineering leaders were aware of it. Many tries, got more complex (2015~2017) Though our app was originally started in Japan, we desired to challenge the global market early. The US version was released very quickly, it was only 1 year after the JP version. The reason why we could release so quickly is we didn’t add too many localizations except for the shipping, payment, and i18n messaging. I think it was on purpose because we were confident with the product. Facebook and Twitter don't change the app by region, right? Our idea was something like it. Also, the speed was the most important as we experienced. We should release the app and see the reaction of the market as soon as possible, rather than spending too long on the investigation. So the backend API code was shared in JP and US. However, the market was not easy as we expected. We do the e-commerce app, so it was critical that the shipping is very different from Japan. In addition, it’s not easy to start a new team as always. Especially when it’s in other countries, and if the members start a new life there. Actually, I was one of them. Now Mercari is quite a global company and . But it was not so from the beginning. has many supports Eventually, the company decided to spend all the product members' resources for the US version for a while. Because many members suddenly started to contribute to the US version, as a result, many "if region == US" were created in the code. We knew this practice was not good, but there were no other options because the spec was literally to solve the problems in the US. No matter what coding technique we use, it's impossible to avoid it completely. Actually "if region == US" was not the only thing. To adapt to the new market, we tried many features. It’s absolutely good to run the sprint many times rapidly, trial and error. But by the time we noticed, half of the endpoints were not being used in the production environment. I feel like our development agility was degraded in this era. Start Microservices (2017~2018) We needed something for the breakthrough. One day after Thanksgiving, our CPO announced to start project ‘double’, which came from the goal that we’ll make the retention rate double. The highlight of this project was building a completely different app from scratch. Even the app theme color was changed to purple from red, and the logo was also changed. It was literally from zero, and decided to rewrite everything on iOS and Android. Unlike clients, the backend couldn’t be fully scratched because it’s too challenging to discard the existing users and items. Instead, we decided to put a new gateway before the previous backend. In this gateway, we used new technologies like Kubernetes, gRPC, golang, and more. And we decided to implement the new features as microservices in the new gateway world. The architecture overview looked like this. However, for me, it was NOT the most important that we started the new tech stack. It was most important that we got the chance to rethink our app spec. And the new gateway became the filter to distinguish what is really necessary for us. When we find the problems for the code, there are two approaches to solve, refactoring or rewriting. Refactoring is to fix the code without changing the behavior. It is a good approach if the problem is ‘how to write’. But, at that time, our problem was ‘what to write’. Our code was getting exhausted because of many challenges. We should rethink what was really needed for our app. If we need to change the behavior of the code, it is not refactoring but rewriting. Usually, it’s hard for the backend to do this because the backend API has to take care of the compatibility. Luckily, we got the rare chance to do it. If you’re the backend architect and considering the refactoring, I would like to suggest involving product managers in the project and reconsidering the spec. It is the most powerful to clean up the spec in order to clean up the code. The spec tends to be the worst debt in many cases. Regarding this, the project went smoothly because CPO was on our side. After working hard for 3 months, we finally released the new version. The current purple Mercari was started here. Though it didn’t mean everything was solved, we got the starting point here. Start Microservices Platform (2018~2021) We just got a new place to write microservices. The next step was how to accelerate this architecture. We worked on many solutions for this. Let me introduce some of them. The first was to analyze the most used PHP classes in the previous monolith codebase and then implement them as microservices. The classes such as User, Item, Payment, etc are the basics of our app. It’s hard to implement any features without these classes. Otherwise, we had to continue implementing most of the features in the legacy codebase. Also, we could get knowledge of microservice development by implementing such kinds of core object microservices. Though we had the policy to separate Kubernetes namespaces by microservices, other than this, we didn’t have so many ideas for the code design, monitoring, networking, and so on. These microservices became good experiments to think of our practices. By the way, this is off-topic but it took about one week to finish the static analytics for the legacy PHP codebase, even though I used the machine we usually use for machine learning. The generated SVG file of the dependency graph could never be opened in the web browser. I learned how impossible to understand our codebase through the recognition of human beings. After we got knowledge from some microservices, we made a tool named starter-kit, which is the terraform module and the microservices template. Actually, this is developed by the JP team and, not by us, the idea is described in this . This tool is shared in both JP and US microservices. presentation I think one of the most important ideas of starter kit is to clarify the owners of the microservices. Actually, to me, microservices are not only the way to design software, but also to design human organizations. When we think of the bottleneck of development, it tends to be communication with others. The more stakeholders the developers have, the more frustration they feel. Microservices abstract the communication to the API interface, and abstract the problems to the success rate and latency. The only thing we should do is to speak the same protocol (we use gRPC). When we design such communication of teams, it is the most important prerequisite to clarify who are the owners. Another big challenge after the starter kit was to move the legacy PHP to the Kubernetes environment. I know some people have an allergy to PHP. For them, it seems PHP is immediately evil and it must be erased as soon as possible. But IMO the genuine evil is the complexity of the code. It happens no matter the programming languages we use. Moreover, it happens no matter whether microservice or not. Whatever my point is we’ll have to get along with the previous PHP monolith for a long time. We have to admit that the things written in the monolith are correct to some extent. At least it is NOT legacy in my definition, because there are maintainers. As long as the development is active, it is not a legacy. In that case, the problem was the development tools were very different between microservices and the previous monolith. Because we created the microservices as a brand new place, the practices such as how to develop, how to deploy, and how to monitor, were not the same. The team was going to be separated by microservices development or not. However, the development tools are definitely NOT the essence of development. We must use the practices but must not be used by the practice. The teams must be designed by goals, never by tools or tech stack. Then we started the project to migrate the monolith which was running on VMs, to the Kubernetes. It started with containerizing and took about 1 year to finish all the processes. The details of this project are written . Please check it out. here Wrap up Actually, in addition to the above project, there were many interesting projects, like integrating istio, scoring microservices, and recreating our cluster to VPC native. Unfortunately, I cannot write everything but it’ll be published in our company blog. Through over 7 years of experience in this company, one of the most important lessons for me was that we should regard the software as the human body. Because things cannot be perfect from birth, we should let the software circulate like the body replaces the cell every day. I believe one of the reasons why we could become the best e-commerce company in JP is because we updated our app rapidly. Though we had some difficulties due to this, we could get over it by shifting microservices. I love the words of Charles Darwin: It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change. Also, another important lesson is we should sometimes follow our intuition. By shifting microservices architecture, we got many benefits such as observability, a brand new machine learning approach, and more. But we didn’t really aim for all the benefits from the beginning. These are kind of side effects of our curiosity. If we pursue only the small and certain wins, we are likely to be conservative and lose the benefit in the long term. So if I’m asked why microservices, I will answer “one of the reasons is just for fun” with confidence. At last, as stated in the beginning, I’ll become a freelance from next month. Please feel free to contact if you’re interested in me. gon.gong.gone@gmail

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