(Port of Seattle Photo) Nearly three weeks after identifying unauthorized activity on its network, the Port of Seattle continues to recover from a

'You need to invest in cybersecurity': Port of Seattle director offers advice amid ongoing outage – GeekWire

While the Port of Baltimore has lost most of its maritime business until the collapsed Key Bridge can be removed from the channel, shipping experts expect cargo shipments to return due to the port&#x27;s proximity to large markets.

Baltimore’s port expected to rebound from Key Bridge disaster once channel reopens

CAMAS — Two months after unexpectedly losing its docking agreement with American Queen Voyages, the Port of Camas-Washougal has partnered with another company to bring back cruise ships.

Cruise ships returning to Port of Camas-Washougal, months after cruise line went bankrupt - The Columbian

The Port of Baltimore&#x27;s shutdown has dealt a devastating blow to the economy, causing a staggering 8,000 jobs to be lost.

Baltimore bridge collapse has dockworkers in fear for their future - 6abc Philadelphia

The state is launching a program to help businesses retain employees as the Port of Baltimore recovers from the Key Bridge collapse.

State launches Port of Baltimore Worker Retention Program

There&#x27;s not much work left to do for thousands of port workers in Baltimore, Maryland, as the main shipping channel has now been blocked for more than two weeks due to the deadly collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge.

Baltimore port workers ‘nervous’ as more than 2,000 remain out of work - WTOP News

A British ex-pat and her husband had one of their worst cruise experiences in 20 years after the ship they were sailing on was held at Barcelona port and more than 60 passengers with incorrect visas were marched off the boat.

British ex-pats have ‘worst cruise experience’ in 20 years after police board ship at Barcelona port | The Independent

Baltimore bridge collapse has dockworkers in fear for their future - ABC News

GIVEN UP ON RECOVERING THE THREE VICTIMS THAT ARE STILL MISSING, AND THAT THEY ARE ON TRACK TO OPEN THAT LARGER CHANNEL TO THE PORT BY THE END OF THE MONTH. WE’LL KEEP YOU UPDATED, BUT FOR NOW, IN SPARROWS POINT, I’M TOMMIE CLARKE WBZ TV 11 NEWS. TOMMIE. THANK YOU.

Tradepoint Atlantic ramps up to handle cargo after bridge collapse

Breaking news and exclusive analysis on business, including the latest news on tech, media and earnings.

Director Jonathan Daniels Looks to Baltimore Port's Future After Francis 
Scott Key Bridge Collapse - WSJ

Port

port

Crypto Investment Assistant: How I Built a Chatbot That Simplifies Portfolio Management With Coze

Next week, the US will hold a presidential election. At that time, we will vote not for a presidential candidate but for an impression of the candidate we see on TV and at campaign events, read about in newspapers and blogs, and hear about from our friends and family. Like Plato’s shadows on the cave wall, our impressions will reflect only whatever somebody chooses to show us. Modern politics overwhelms us with images crafted and cultivated to fit what we want to see rather than the truth. We latch onto the fragment of reality that we perceive. We never see the full picture. Outside of a few insiders, nobody has enough information to make an informed decision about anybody they vote for. I certainly don’t. Who’s good? Who’s bad? You may think the answers are obvious. Often, it’s not so easy to tell. The devil you don’t know or the other devil you don’t know For example, Congressman Tom Emmer, one of crypto’s most powerful advocates in Congress. He’s the guy who yelled at SEC Chairman Gary Gensler for missing the FTX fraud, among other grievances. Did you know FTX was one of the biggest donors to Tom Emmer’s campaign and gave almost $3 million to the GOP’s Congressional Leadership Fund while Emmer was in charge of it? Did you also know that Emmer was one of several Congresspeople who wrote a letter to Gensler asking him to stop investigating FTX (among other crypto entities)? If you support crypto and politicians, have you ever asked Emmer how he feels about protecting a scam? Taking money from a fraudster? Did he give the money back? Or, do you not care because Emmer says nice things about crypto and criticizes people you dislike? Because he shares your views? If you don’t support crypto and politicians, do you support Gensler’s nonsensical application of obsolete financial rules to stifle a new technology with arbitrary lawsuits and bizarre standards? Or, do you not care about people trying to build or use crypto, so you ignore it? Presidents don’t matter for your financial markets Why does market performance always seem disconnected from politics? The crypto market crashed more than 50% several times under Biden. It crashed more than 70% several times under Trump. Obama was even worse — multiple crashes of 80% or more. On the flip side, it went up 100% after Biden took office, 2,500% after Trump took office, and 5,500% after Obama took office. Seems fishy until you compare that with legacy assets. People make a big deal about the economy under one party or the other, but the economy — like crypto — seems to do whatever it wants regardless of who’s in office. Look at the stock market performance under Republicans and Democrats, adjusted for GDP. Red is Republican, blue is Democrat. Can you see any trend? Neither can I. You can extend this to the wider economy. Let’s do GDP. I counted the number of negative half-years in white: What about inflation? Same. What about employment? Same. What about budget deficits? For statistical consistency, we’ll calculate it as a percentage of GDP. Same. What about oil prices? Same. From a purely investing perspective, you get no advantage or disadvantage under Democrats and Republicans. On the whole, the US economy and its major assets perform as well or as poorly under one as the other. You can take these charts and move the boxes one or two years forward to account for the lag between a change of party and the results of their actions. You’ll get the same result. Know what matters Am I saying presidential elections don’t matter? No. They matter a lot. Every election carries high stakes for your business, employment opportunities, living standards, moral or religious beliefs, mental health, and many aspects of your life. But presidents can’t save your marriage, get you to lose that extra 10 pounds, or fix your financial problems. For people who work in crypto, you won’t find a better friend than Trump. That’s important for people trying to run businesses, build crypto apps, and create new tokens. What about the rest of us? Doesn’t matter. Sure, government policies can tinker around the edges, but crypto is a global asset. Prices come from buyers, sellers, and circumstances beyond any president’s control. The past two years saw a wave of innovation from non-US talent and US companies working abroad. Thousands of new projects have been launched. Hundreds more are waiting for market conditions to improve. Oddly enough, crypto is bigger under Biden now than Trump and Obama. Bitcoin’s hit three new all-time highs! For all those reasons, vote your conscience, not your crypto portfolio. If neither presidential candidate resonates with you, write somebody in. You can scribble “Bitcoin” on your ballot. Most likely, you live in a state where your presidential vote doesn't matter — any of the 43 states painted red or blue in the image below. Partisanship has already made your decision irrelevant. Why not vote for somebody or something you want? You have nothing to lose. I dive more deeply into this topic in a recent post, The US Presidential Election Matters for You, Not Your Crypto Portfolio. https://cryptoiseasy.beehiiv.com/p/the-us-presidential-election-matters-for-you-not-your-crypto-portfolio?embedable=true Mark Helfman publishes the Crypto is Easy newsletter. He is also the author of three books and a top Bitcoin writer on Medium and Hacker Noon. Learn more about him in his bio and connect with him on Tealfeed. Next week, the US will hold a presidential election. At that time, we will vote not for a presidential candidate but for an impression of the candidate we see on TV and at campaign events, read about in newspapers and blogs, and hear about from our friends and family. Like Plato’s shadows on the cave wall, our impressions will reflect only whatever somebody chooses to show us. Modern politics overwhelms us with images crafted and cultivated to fit what we want to see rather than the truth. We latch onto the fragment of reality that we perceive. We never see the full picture. Outside of a few insiders, nobody has enough information to make an informed decision about anybody they vote for. I certainly don’t. Who’s good? Who’s bad? You may think the answers are obvious. Often, it’s not so easy to tell. The devil you don’t know or the other devil you don’t know For example, Congressman Tom Emmer, one of crypto’s most powerful advocates in Congress. He’s the guy who yelled at SEC Chairman Gary Gensler for missing the FTX fraud, among other grievances. Did you know FTX was one of the biggest donors to Tom Emmer’s campaign and gave almost $3 million to the GOP’s Congressional Leadership Fund while Emmer was in charge of it? Did you also know that Emmer was one of several Congresspeople who wrote a letter to Gensler asking him to stop investigating FTX (among other crypto entities)? If you support crypto and politicians, have you ever asked Emmer how he feels about protecting a scam? Taking money from a fraudster? Did he give the money back? Or, do you not care because Emmer says nice things about crypto and criticizes people you dislike? Because he shares your views? If you don’t support crypto and politicians, do you support Gensler’s nonsensical application of obsolete financial rules to stifle a new technology with arbitrary lawsuits and bizarre standards? Or, do you not care about people trying to build or use crypto, so you ignore it? Presidents don’t matter for your financial markets Why does market performance always seem disconnected from politics? The crypto market crashed more than 50% several times under Biden. It crashed more than 70% several times under Trump. Obama was even worse — multiple crashes of 80% or more. On the flip side, it went up 100% after Biden took office, 2,500% after Trump took office, and 5,500% after Obama took office. Seems fishy until you compare that with legacy assets. People make a big deal about the economy under one party or the other, but the economy — like crypto — seems to do whatever it wants regardless of who’s in office. Look at the stock market performance under Republicans and Democrats, adjusted for GDP. Red is Republican, blue is Democrat. Can you see any trend? Neither can I. You can extend this to the wider economy. Let’s do GDP. I counted the number of negative half-years in white: What about inflation? Same. What about employment? Same. What about budget deficits? For statistical consistency, we’ll calculate it as a percentage of GDP. Same. What about oil prices? Same. From a purely investing perspective, you get no advantage or disadvantage under Democrats and Republicans. On the whole, the US economy and its major assets perform as well or as poorly under one as the other. You can take these charts and move the boxes one or two years forward to account for the lag between a change of party and the results of their actions. You’ll get the same result. Know what matters Am I saying presidential elections don’t matter? No. They matter a lot. Every election carries high stakes for your business, employment opportunities, living standards, moral or religious beliefs, mental health, and many aspects of your life. But presidents can’t save your marriage, get you to lose that extra 10 pounds, or fix your financial problems. For people who work in crypto, you won’t find a better friend than Trump. That’s important for people trying to run businesses, build crypto apps, and create new tokens. What about the rest of us? Doesn’t matter. Sure, government policies can tinker around the edges, but crypto is a global asset. Prices come from buyers, sellers, and circumstances beyond any president’s control. The past two years saw a wave of innovation from non-US talent and US companies working abroad. Thousands of new projects have been launched. Hundreds more are waiting for market conditions to improve. Oddly enough, crypto is bigger under Biden now than Trump and Obama. Bitcoin’s hit three new all-time highs! For all those reasons, vote your conscience, not your crypto portfolio. If neither presidential candidate resonates with you, write somebody in. You can scribble “Bitcoin” on your ballot. Most likely, you live in a state where your presidential vote doesn't matter — any of the 43 states painted red or blue in the image below. Partisanship has already made your decision irrelevant. Why not vote for somebody or something you want? You have nothing to lose. I dive more deeply into this topic in a recent post, The US Presidential Election Matters for You, Not Your Crypto Portfolio . The US Presidential Election Matters for You, Not Your Crypto Portfolio The US Presidential Election Matters for You, Not Your Crypto Portfolio The US Presidential Election Matters for You, Not Your Crypto Portfolio https://cryptoiseasy.beehiiv.com/p/the-us-presidential-election-matters-for-you-not-your-crypto-portfolio?embedable=true https://cryptoiseasy.beehiiv.com/p/the-us-presidential-election-matters-for-you-not-your-crypto-portfolio?embedable=true Mark Helfman publishes the Crypto is Easy newsletter. He is also the author of three books and a top Bitcoin writer on Medium and Hacker Noon . Learn more about him in his bio and connect with him on Tealfeed . Crypto is Easy Crypto is Easy Crypto is Easy Medium Medium Medium Hacker Noon Hacker Noon Hacker Noon bio bio Tealfeed Tealfeed

Trump or Harris? Won’t Matter for Your Crypto Portfolio

I’ve always been inspired by the openness within the developer community—the way they freely share solutions and source code for anyone to explore. Beyond the vast array of available learning materials and self-study courses, there are entire repositories filled with code you can dive into, adapt, learn, and borrow solutions from for your projects. In contrast, the graphic design world tends to be more closed off. Designers often showcase only final results, with little insight into their creative process. For me, the openness in development helps move the whole field forward. We all benefit from those contributions when everyone can access knowledge and tools. A Multidisciplinary Approach to Design While graphic design has always been my core focus, I’ve been drawn to other fields that intersect with it—motion design, illustration, typography, photography, and digital design. This doesn't mean I have mastered each profession (there are always far more experienced professionals in each specific field), but I believe in a multidisciplinary approach. Understanding the foundations of a field before diving into it helps shape your design perspective and ensures that the practical aspects of the medium inform your work. For instance, in graphic design, it’s important to understand the specifics of printing before preparing a layout. That knowledge guides the design process. Similarly, when I began designing a website for my design studio, I became interested in front-end and back-end website development. At that time, I had some knowledge of HTML, CSS, and a little JavaScript, so the first version of the site I built manually without any CMS. But soon, I realized I needed a more flexible content management system. Exploring CMS Options A developer friend of mine recommended Kirby, a flexible and user-friendly file-based PHP CMS that’s ideal for small sites. Using it helped me understand the core concept of setting up content management systems and integrating it with the frontend, which had previously felt so complex. Later I even built a student exhibition website using Kirby, where 150 students uploaded their work themselves, but that’s a story for another day. This opened the door for me to explore new tools, and I started experimenting with Gatsby (a React-based framework for static sites) and Sanity (a headless CMS). I set myself a challenge: to update my portfolio website using these tools to learn more about them. In that process, I was greatly helped by the large amount of knowledge, documentation, and video tutorials available: it's a fascinating process. Once I finished and published my studio’s website, I had an idea. Why not create a tool for other designers? Specifically, an open-source portfolio template that any designer or visual creator could use to build their own website. Visual-First Approach & Customisation There are plenty of portfolio templates built with Next.js which can be easily deployed on Vercel. But those templates are usually made for developers with a focus on development specifics. Designers, on the other hand, need a different approach—one that highlights their visual work. That’s why, for this template, I used a grid layout with large project previews and project pages that emphasize imagery and content. Customization is also key for designers. When building the template, I included features like setting custom background and text colors, reordering projects displayed on the main page, and creating project pages using modular content blocks—images, video embeds, and text. The idea is to be able to easily compile a story about a particular project out of predefined content pieces, creating an ideal visual storytelling. I used Tailwind CSS for the frontend, which makes styling and adapting content for different devices extremely easy. Thanks to Sanity’s powerful content management and the integration with Next.js, users can update content without needing to rebuild with each content update through Webhook-triggered Incremental Static Revalidation. This makes it easy to populate the portfolio with projects from scratch, keep it updated, and add projects on the go when a new project is completed and ready to be published. Easy Deployment and Accessibility Using Vercel, a user can deploy a copy of their own website with just one click, even with no development experience. The only thing needed is to register a set of free accounts: GitHub, Vercel, and Sanity. And for those who are more technically inclined, the code is open-source, so they can tweak it to suit their needs. Vercel and Sanity have more than enough traffic and content storage for a small portfolio site, and with the provided CDN, loading time is minimized, which is important for a site with a large amount of visual content. The only thing left is to connect a custom domain, which will make the portfolio site truly personal for the designer. This template is perfect for junior and experienced designers, even small design studios. One of the biggest challenges for designers in creating a portfolio is the blank page syndrome—getting stuck while being overwhelmed with designing and structuring their future portfolio website. I’ve taken care of the design and layout part, so all designers need to do is select their best projects and publish them. I named the template Collected, as it’s a place to collect and showcase the best work. I’ve created a small dedicated website to showcase the template, complete with a visual overview, a demo version, step-by-step instructions, and a video screencast where I show how to set up a portfolio website. My goal is to make the process as intuitive and visual as possible, showing designers how they can easily create a professional portfolio site without development experience. collected.to What’s next Looking ahead, I plan to keep expanding the template’s functionality. I want to add options for choosing fonts from Google Fonts, changing the grid’s column layout on the main page, and adding even more flexibility in the project page builder. I’m excited to see how the design community will use and adapt this project. Some of my fellow designers have already shared their work using this template, and I am thrilled to see what they have created. I think that by encouraging a culture of openness, we can push design forward, creating better tools and more collaborative opportunities, similar to what I've seen in the developer community. I hope this project will inspire more designers to explore the technical aspects of their craft, as understanding the tools we use is as important as creating designs in today's digital world. The complete source code for this project can be found on GitHub. I’ve always been inspired by the openness within the developer community—the way they freely share solutions and source code for anyone to explore. Beyond the vast array of available learning materials and self-study courses, there are entire repositories filled with code you can dive into, adapt, learn, and borrow solutions from for your projects. In contrast, the graphic design world tends to be more closed off. Designers often showcase only final results, with little insight into their creative process. For me, the openness in development helps move the whole field forward. We all benefit from those contributions when everyone can access knowledge and tools. A Multidisciplinary Approach to Design While graphic design has always been my core focus, I’ve been drawn to other fields that intersect with it—motion design, illustration, typography, photography, and digital design. This doesn't mean I have mastered each profession (there are always far more experienced professionals in each specific field), but I believe in a multidisciplinary approach. Understanding the foundations of a field before diving into it helps shape your design perspective and ensures that the practical aspects of the medium inform your work. For instance, in graphic design, it’s important to understand the specifics of printing before preparing a layout. That knowledge guides the design process. Similarly, when I began designing a website for my design studio, I became interested in front-end and back-end website development. At that time, I had some knowledge of HTML, CSS, and a little JavaScript, so the first version of the site I built manually without any CMS. But soon, I realized I needed a more flexible content management system. Exploring CMS Options A developer friend of mine recommended Kirby , a flexible and user-friendly file-based PHP CMS that’s ideal for small sites. Using it helped me understand the core concept of setting up content management systems and integrating it with the frontend, which had previously felt so complex. Later I even built a student exhibition website using Kirby, where 150 students uploaded their work themselves, but that’s a story for another day. This opened the door for me to explore new tools, and I started experimenting with Gatsby (a React-based framework for static sites) and Sanity (a headless CMS). I set myself a challenge: to update my portfolio website using these tools to learn more about them. In that process, I was greatly helped by the large amount of knowledge, documentation, and video tutorials available: it's a fascinating process. Kirby Gatsby Sanity Once I finished and published my studio’s website, I had an idea. Why not create a tool for other designers? Specifically, an open-source portfolio template that any designer or visual creator could use to build their own website. Visual-First Approach & Customisation There are plenty of portfolio templates built with Next.js which can be easily deployed on Vercel. But those templates are usually made for developers with a focus on development specifics. Designers, on the other hand, need a different approach—one that highlights their visual work. That’s why, for this template, I used a grid layout with large project previews and project pages that emphasize imagery and content. Customization is also key for designers. When building the template, I included features like setting custom background and text colors, reordering projects displayed on the main page, and creating project pages using modular content blocks—images, video embeds, and text. The idea is to be able to easily compile a story about a particular project out of predefined content pieces, creating an ideal visual storytelling. I used Tailwind CSS for the frontend, which makes styling and adapting content for different devices extremely easy. Thanks to Sanity’s powerful content management and the integration with Next.js, users can update content without needing to rebuild with each content update through Webhook-triggered Incremental Static Revalidation. This makes it easy to populate the portfolio with projects from scratch, keep it updated, and add projects on the go when a new project is completed and ready to be published. Easy Deployment and Accessibility Using Vercel, a user can deploy a copy of their own website with just one click, even with no development experience. The only thing needed is to register a set of free accounts: GitHub, Vercel, and Sanity. And for those who are more technically inclined, the code is open-source , so they can tweak it to suit their needs. Vercel and Sanity have more than enough traffic and content storage for a small portfolio site, and with the provided CDN, loading time is minimized, which is important for a site with a large amount of visual content. The only thing left is to connect a custom domain, which will make the portfolio site truly personal for the designer. open-source This template is perfect for junior and experienced designers, even small design studios. One of the biggest challenges for designers in creating a portfolio is the blank page syndrome—getting stuck while being overwhelmed with designing and structuring their future portfolio website. I’ve taken care of the design and layout part, so all designers need to do is select their best projects and publish them. I named the template Collected , as it’s a place to collect and showcase the best work. I’ve created a small dedicated website to showcase the template, complete with a visual overview, a demo version, step-by-step instructions, and a video screencast where I show how to set up a portfolio website. My goal is to make the process as intuitive and visual as possible, showing designers how they can easily create a professional portfolio site without development experience. Collected collected.to collected.to collected.to What’s next Looking ahead, I plan to keep expanding the template’s functionality. I want to add options for choosing fonts from Google Fonts, changing the grid’s column layout on the main page, and adding even more flexibility in the project page builder. I’m excited to see how the design community will use and adapt this project. Some of my fellow designers have already shared their work using this template, and I am thrilled to see what they have created. I think that by encouraging a culture of openness, we can push design forward, creating better tools and more collaborative opportunities, similar to what I've seen in the developer community. I hope this project will inspire more designers to explore the technical aspects of their craft, as understanding the tools we use is as important as creating designs in today's digital world. The complete source code for this project can be found on GitHub. The complete source code for this project can be found on GitHub . GitHub

Bridging Design and Development: Creating an Open-Source Portfolio Website Template for Designers

Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea - October 12, 2024 - HackerNoon, the independent technology publishing platform, is pleased to announce the nominees for its annual “Startups of The Year” award, featuring the most promising and innovative companies in the Port Moresby startup ecosystem. The list, compiled by the HackerNoon team, showcases 30 startups making significant contributions to the Port Moresby economy and driving innovation in their respective industries. https://youtu.be/XOpG6B4AKPU?embedable=true Nominations are open - learn more here. You can nominate your company as the Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here. The Startups in Port Moresby nominated for Startups of The Year 2024 include: Cywer Learning
Altrium
CraveHRO
Spinlab
Svenklas
SoSha
Code Campus
Merkle Science
Next Round Capital Partners
Localis
ClickLocal Digital Advertising LLP
AgileBrains
Seak
City Schools Sports Association
The IT Gigs
Inspiredvalley (Inspired Eduventures Pvt. Ltd.)
Terra Legal
Ciba Health
FAST Artificial Intelligence Society
HempStreet
Snoox Automation Pvt. Ltd.
ATOM POWER PROJECTS PVT. LTD.
Per Annum
BONbLOC
CODESTP Software Technology Park
Grab247 Company Limited
Stupa Sports Analytics
Quadictive Infotech Pvt. Ltd.
directlink
LEFIN Suitcase “We are thrilled to recognize the top startups in Port Moresby and celebrate their achievements,” said David Smooke, HackerNoon Founder & CEO. “Starting and sustaining a company is difficult. We’re honored to showcase their work and impact.” Why It Pays Off to Be Nominated Startups of The Year 2024 is a 100% community-driven voting event recognizing startups transforming technology and the world for the better. Starting October 1st, 2024, the internet can nominate and vote for the best ventures in their city and industry. People can nominate their favorite startups until October 31st, and vote once per day per award for who they think should be Startup of The Year up to March 31st, 2025. Winners will be announced in April 2025, after a comprehensive evaluation by the HackerNoon team. Apart from validation from the world's greenest tech publication, all nominees get free interviews relevant to their region and industry. They will also receive curated startup-friendly packages and a free version of their very own Evergreen Tech Company News Page on HackerNoon. In sum, being nominated gives you major credibility as one of the top startups globally and an expert in your industry, meaning even without winning, you still gain tons of exposure. Nominations are open - learn more here. You can nominate your company as the Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here. About HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year Startups of The Year 2024 is HackerNoon’s flagship community-driven event celebrating startups, technology, and the spirit of innovation. Currently in its third iteration, the prestigious Internet award recognizes and celebrates tech startups of all shapes and sizes. This year, over 150,000 entities across 4200+ cities, 6 continents, and 100+ industries will participate in a bid to be crowned the best startup of the year! Millions of votes have been cast over the past few years, and many stories have been written about these daring and rising startups. The winners will get a free interview on HackerNoon and an Evergreen Tech Company News page. Visit our FAQ page to learn more. Download our design assets here. Check out the Startups of The Year Merch Shop here. HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year is a branding opportunity unlike any other. Whether your goal is brand awareness or lead generation, HackerNoon has curated startup-friendly packages to solve your marketing challenges. Meet our sponsors: Wellfound: Join the #1 global, startup-focused community. At Wellfound, we're not just a job board—we're the place where top startup talent and the world's most exciting companies connect to build the future. Notion: Notion is trusted and loved by thousands of startups as their connected workspace—from building product roadmaps to tracking fundraising. Try Notion with unlimited AI, FREE for up to 6 months, to build and scale your company with one powerful tool. Get your offer now! Hubspot: If you’re looking for a smart CRM platform that meets the needs of small businesses, look no further than HubSpot. Seamlessly connect your data, teams and customers in one easy-to-use scalable platform that grows with your business. Get started for free. Bright Data: Startups that leverage public web data can make faster, data-driven decisions, giving them a competitive edge. With Bright Data’s scalable web data collection, businesses can grow from a small operation to an enterprise by harnessing insights at every stage. Algolia: Algolia NeuralSearch is the world's only AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform combining powerful keyword and natural language processing in a single API. Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea - October 12, 2024 - HackerNoon, the independent technology publishing platform, is pleased to announce the nominees for its annual “Startups of The Year” award, featuring the most promising and innovative companies in the Port Moresby startup ecosystem. Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea - October 12, 2024 - HackerNoon, the independent technology publishing platform, is pleased to announce the nominees for its annual “Startups of The Year” award, featuring the most promising and innovative companies in the Port Moresby startup ecosystem. Port Moresby , Papua New Guinea - October 12, 2024 Port Moresby - October 12, 2024 - HackerNoon, the independent technology publishing platform, is pleased to announce the nominees for its annual “ Startups of The Year ” award, featuring the most promising and innovative companies in the Startups of The Year startup ecosystem. The list, compiled by the HackerNoon team, showcases 30 startups making significant contributions to the Port Moresby economy and driving innovation in their respective industries. https://youtu.be/XOpG6B4AKPU?embedable=true https://youtu.be/XOpG6B4AKPU?embedable=true Nominations are open - learn more here. You can nominate your company as the Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here. Nominations are open - learn more here . You can nominate your company as the Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here . here Startup of The Year in Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here here The Startups in Port Moresby nominated for Startups of The Year 2024 include: Startups in Startups in Startups in Port Moresby Port Moresby nominated Cywer Learning Altrium CraveHRO Spinlab Svenklas SoSha Code Campus Merkle Science Next Round Capital Partners Localis ClickLocal Digital Advertising LLP AgileBrains Seak City Schools Sports Association The IT Gigs Inspiredvalley (Inspired Eduventures Pvt. Ltd.) Terra Legal Ciba Health FAST Artificial Intelligence Society HempStreet Snoox Automation Pvt. Ltd. ATOM POWER PROJECTS PVT. LTD. Per Annum BONbLOC CODESTP Software Technology Park Grab247 Company Limited Stupa Sports Analytics Quadictive Infotech Pvt. Ltd. directlink LEFIN Suitcase Cywer Learning Altrium CraveHRO Spinlab Svenklas SoSha Code Campus Merkle Science Next Round Capital Partners Localis ClickLocal Digital Advertising LLP AgileBrains Seak City Schools Sports Association The IT Gigs Inspiredvalley (Inspired Eduventures Pvt. Ltd.) Terra Legal Ciba Health FAST Artificial Intelligence Society HempStreet Snoox Automation Pvt. Ltd. ATOM POWER PROJECTS PVT. LTD. Per Annum BONbLOC CODESTP Software Technology Park Grab247 Company Limited Stupa Sports Analytics Quadictive Infotech Pvt. Ltd. directlink LEFIN Suitcase “We are thrilled to recognize the top startups in Port Moresby and celebrate their achievements,” said David Smooke, HackerNoon Founder & CEO. “Starting and sustaining a company is difficult. We’re honored to showcase their work and impact.” “We are thrilled to recognize the top startups in Port Moresby and celebrate their achievements,” said David Smooke, HackerNoon Founder & CEO. “Starting and sustaining a company is difficult. We’re honored to showcase their work and impact.” “We are thrilled to recognize the top startups in and celebrate their achievements,” said David Smooke, HackerNoon Founder & CEO . “Starting and sustaining a company is difficult. We’re honored to showcase their work and impact.” David Smooke, HackerNoon Founder & CEO Why It Pays Off to Be Nominated Startups of The Year 2024 is a 100% community-driven voting event recognizing startups transforming technology and the world for the better. Starting October 1st, 2024, the internet can nominate and vote for the best ventures in their city and industry. People can nominate their favorite startups until October 31st , and vote once per day per award for who they think should be Startup of The Year up to March 31st, 2025. Winners will be announced in April 2025, after a comprehensive evaluation by the HackerNoon team. Startups of The Year 2024 nominate their favorite startups until October 31st nominate their favorite startups Apart from validation from the world's greenest tech publication, all nominees get free interviews relevant to their region and industry. They will also receive curated startup-friendly packages and a free version of their very own Evergreen Tech Company News Page on HackerNoon. get free interviews startup-friendly packages startup-friendly packages Evergreen Tech Company News Evergreen Tech Company News In sum, being nominated gives you major credibility as one of the top startups globally and an expert in your industry, meaning even without winning, you still gain tons of exposure. Nominations are open - learn more here. You can nominate your company as the Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here. Nominations are open - learn more here . You can nominate your company as the Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here . here Startup of The Year in Startup of The Year in Port Moresby here here About HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year Startups of The Year 2024 is HackerNoon’s flagship community-driven event celebrating startups, technology, and the spirit of innovation. Currently in its third iteration, the prestigious Internet award recognizes and celebrates tech startups of all shapes and sizes. This year, over 150,000 entities across 4200+ cities, 6 continents, and 100+ industries will participate in a bid to be crowned the best startup of the year! Millions of votes have been cast over the past few years, and many stories have been written about these daring and rising startups. Startups of The Year 2024 Startups of The Year 2024 many stories many stories The winners will get a free interview on HackerNoon and an Evergreen Tech Company News page. free interview on HackerNoon Evergreen Tech Company News Evergreen Tech Company News Visit our FAQ page to learn more. FAQ FAQ Download our design assets here . here here Check out the Startups of The Year Merch Shop here . here here HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year is a branding opportunity unlike any other. Whether your goal is brand awareness or lead generation, HackerNoon has curated startup-friendly packages to solve your marketing challenges. startup-friendly packages startup-friendly packages Meet our sponsors: Meet our sponsors: Meet our sponsors: Wellfound: Join the #1 global, startup-focused community . At Wellfound, we're not just a job board—we're the place where top startup talent and the world's most exciting companies connect to build the future. Wellfound: Join the #1 global, startup-focused community Join the #1 global, startup-focused community Notion: Notion is trusted and loved by thousands of startups as their connected workspace—from building product roadmaps to tracking fundraising. Try Notion with unlimited AI, FREE for up to 6 months , to build and scale your company with one powerful tool. Get your offer now ! Notion: Try Notion with unlimited AI, FREE for up to 6 months Get your offer now ! Hubspot: If you’re looking for a smart CRM platform that meets the needs of small businesses, look no further than HubSpot. Seamlessly connect your data, teams and customers in one easy-to-use scalable platform that grows with your business. Get started for free . Hubspot: Get started for free Get started for free Bright Data: Startups that leverage public web data can make faster, data-driven decisions, giving them a competitive edge. With Bright Data’s scalable web data collection , businesses can grow from a small operation to an enterprise by harnessing insights at every stage. Bright Data: Bright Data’s scalable web data collection Bright Data’s scalable web data collection Algolia: Algolia NeuralSearch is the world's only AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform combining powerful keyword and natural language processing in a single API. Algolia: AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform

Startups of The Year 2024: 2,472 Startups Nominated in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

Стартапы 2024 года: 2472 стартапы намінаваны ў Порт-Морсбі, Папуа-Новая Гвінея

Startups de l'any 2024: 2.472 startups nominades a Port Moresby, Papua Nova Guinea

Startups des Jahres 2024: 2.472 Startups in Port Moresby, Papua-Neuguinea nominiert

Startups del año 2024: 2.472 startups nominadas en Port Moresby, Papúa Nueva Guinea

استارت‌آپ‌های سال 2024: 2472 استارت‌آپ نامزد در پورت مورسبی، پاپوآ گینه نو

Vuoden startupit 2024: 2 472 startuppia ehdokkaana Port Moresbyssä, Papua-Uusi-Guineassa

2024年のスタートアップ・オブ・ザ・イヤー：パプアニューギニアのポートモレスビーで2,472社のスタートアップがノミネート

2024년 올해의 스타트업: 파푸아뉴기니 포트모르즈비에서 지명된 2,472개 스타트업

Dithomo tša Ngwaga wa 2024: Dithomo tše 2,472 tše di Kgethilwego ka Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

Стартапи године 2024: 2.472 стартупа номинована у Порт Моресбију, Папуа Нова Гвинеја

Masungulo ya Lembe ra 2024: 2,472 wa Masungulo lama Hlawuriweke ePort Moresby, Papua New Guinea

Các công ty khởi nghiệp của năm 2024: 2.472 công ty khởi nghiệp được đề cử tại Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

Self-hosting became a much easier and more viable option using docker. You don’t need to understand the source code or have no intent to customize stuff. Setting things that you are not familiar with made open source applications require their own experts. Docker made all of this almost like installing an app on your computer from a binary. In fact, I never installed Redis directly on my computer before, yet, I have half a dozen apps that have their own Redis instances humming happily on my server and I have zero concerns about how to set it up in case I need it directly on my projects. I’m going to give you my personal go-to way of how I host my applications like simple nodejs, php applications, WordPress sites, and many open source tools (that are also saas, but I choose to host my own instance). Portainer: My Container Management Maestro Portainer acts as my central command center for all things containerized. This handy tool lets me build, deploy, and manage both individual containers and entire stacks. Did I mention it runs as a lightweight container itself? Here’s a peek at my streamlined docker-compose.yml for Portainer: version: "3"
services:
  portainer:
    image: portainer/portainer-ce:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - 9000:9443
    volumes:
      - data:/data
      - /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock
volumes:
  data: Web UI Portainer’s web UI has pretty much everything you need to see and “do” for your stacks and containers. Secure Access I use Cloudflare zero trust to expose my portainer (and other private apps). As simple as pointing a subdomain to a port using a tunnel, then saying Zero trust that any network request to that subdomain requires Zero trust authenticated session. Portainer Gitops Let’s get to the juicy part, the magic factor for portainer: gitops integration. It’s not rocket science, but it’s the most important “need” when hosting your own apps. Certainly, if you are managing code, like templates, extensions, plugins, or basic stuff like your configuration files for an app’s server environments (like *sql, redis, node, php, nginx). This makes your simple projects also closer to “Infrastructure as Code” practices, without going through complex AWS, Azure, IaC models. Assuming you are keeping them in a VCS, favorably github, you treat your git flows (i.e: merge of a PR to a certain branch) as the main triggers for your deployments. Portainer comes with native gitops integration through both webhooks and polling (not recommended but can be used as a backup method). When there is a push to a branch you define, portainer re-runs your stack, builds your images if needed then restarts your containers with the changes. 🎩 Portainer is open source (zlib license) and free with Community Edition. It also has more advanced features in its Business license. I found a few areas that I wished had those advanced features but so far none of them became “blockers” in my use cases. I imagine using portainer for more team-wide/company-wide use cases may require Business license. At some point, I wanted to find a truly open-source and non-profit version of portainer and there are a few, but portainer (and its gitops integration) makes it a good enough combination that I didn’t want to bother replacing it. Check it out https://www.portainer.io/ Self-hosting became a much easier and more viable option using docker. You don’t need to understand the source code or have no intent to customize stuff. Setting things that you are not familiar with made open source applications require their own experts. Docker made all of this almost like installing an app on your computer from a binary. In fact, I never installed Redis directly on my computer before, yet, I have half a dozen apps that have their own Redis instances humming happily on my server and I have zero concerns about how to set it up in case I need it directly on my projects. I’m going to give you my personal go-to way of how I host my applications like simple nodejs, php applications, WordPress sites, and many open source tools (that are also saas, but I choose to host my own instance). Portainer: My Container Management Maestro Portainer acts as my central command center for all things containerized. This handy tool lets me build, deploy, and manage both individual containers and entire stacks. Did I mention it runs as a lightweight container itself? Here’s a peek at my streamlined docker-compose.yml for Portainer: version: "3"
services:
  portainer:
    image: portainer/portainer-ce:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - 9000:9443
    volumes:
      - data:/data
      - /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock
volumes:
  data: version: "3"
services:
  portainer:
    image: portainer/portainer-ce:latest
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - 9000:9443
    volumes:
      - data:/data
      - /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock
volumes:
  data: Web UI Portainer’s web UI has pretty much everything you need to see and “do” for your stacks and containers. Secure Access I use Cloudflare zero trust to expose my portainer (and other private apps). As simple as pointing a subdomain to a port using a tunnel, then saying Zero trust that any network request to that subdomain requires Zero trust authenticated session. Portainer Gitops Let’s get to the juicy part, the magic factor for portainer: gitops integration. It’s not rocket science, but it’s the most important “need” when hosting your own apps. Certainly, if you are managing code, like templates, extensions, plugins, or basic stuff like your configuration files for an app’s server environments (like *sql, redis, node, php, nginx). This makes your simple projects also closer to “Infrastructure as Code” practices, without going through complex AWS, Azure, IaC models. Assuming you are keeping them in a VCS, favorably github, you treat your git flows (i.e: merge of a PR to a certain branch) as the main triggers for your deployments. Portainer comes with native gitops integration through both webhooks and polling (not recommended but can be used as a backup method). When there is a push to a branch you define, portainer re-runs your stack, builds your images if needed then restarts your containers with the changes. 🎩 Portainer is open source (zlib license) and free with Community Edition. It also has more advanced features in its Business license. I found a few areas that I wished had those advanced features but so far none of them became “blockers” in my use cases. I imagine using portainer for more team-wide/company-wide use cases may require Business license. At some point, I wanted to find a truly open-source and non-profit version of portainer and there are a few, but portainer (and its gitops integration) makes it a good enough combination that I didn’t want to bother replacing it. Check it out https://www.portainer.io/ https://www.portainer.io/

Portainer Plus Gitops: a Simple Way to Deploy and Manage Your Self-hosted Applications

The tech industry is no stranger to supply chain disruptions, but the recent U.S. port strike is creating new challenges that could have lasting effects. On the first day of October, thousands of dockworkers left key ports at a standstill along the East and Gulf Coasts. As a result, the flow of critical tech components and finished goods has slowed dramatically. This disruption comes at a critical time, especially when the tech industry is still recovering from supply chain issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Tech Industry’s Supply Chain Dependence on Ports The tech industry greatly relies on ports, especially those along the East and Gulf Coasts of the U.S. Ports serve as entry points for many components and raw materials needed to manufacture and assemble electronic devices. These parts often involve semiconductors, screens, batteries, and more. A single delayed shipment of any of these components can ripple through the supply chain, affecting production timelines, product availability, and pricing across the market. To put it into perspective, U.S. ports handle the majority of global trade. According to the National Association of Manufacturers, the affected ports manage 51% of the nation’s containerized imports. These containers often carry crucial tech parts from places like Asia and Europe, which then become distributed to manufacturing hubs within the U.S. As such, any disruption in the flow of these goods results in delayed product releases. The tech industry has long depended on a finely-tuned global supply chain that operates on just-in-time principles. This method is where components are precisely delivered when needed to minimize warehousing costs and maximize efficiency. However, this approach leaves little room for error. When a disruption like the U.S. port strike occurs, there isn’t a buffer to absorb the delay. As a result, you get stalled production lines, which delay product releases and cause a shortage of tech products. How Tech Companies Are Adapting Their Logistics Strategies The U.S. port strike has far-reaching consequences on the economy. As cargo remains stuck at the ports, companies face increasing shipping costs, production slowdowns, and an inability to meet consumer demand. To mitigate these economic effects, businesses are swiftly adapting their logistics strategies. Enhanced Visibility and Use of Technology in Logistics A lack of supply chain visibility is one major challenge within the U.S. port strike. According to recent findings, around 45% of stakeholders report having limited visibility beyond their first-tier suppliers. Unfortunately, this makes responding quickly to disruptions or anticipating potential issues difficult. To combat this, companies are adopting tech-driven logistics solutions that provide greater transparency in the supply chain. For instance, digital platforms now offer real-time tracking of every part of the supply chain process, providing stakeholders with better visibility of where goods are in transit. With machine learning improving route optimization, these technologies allow more efficient delivery routes and rapid responses to unforeseen events. Rerouting Shipments and Shifting Transportation Methods Many companies have resorted to rerouting cargo to ports on the West Coast or Canada to bypass the backlogs on the East and Gulf Coasts. However, these options come with unique challenges. West Coast ports are already operating at high capacity — with some facilities reaching 71% — leaving little room to accommodate the redirected shipments. Additionally, rerouting involves longer travel times and higher costs due to the need to manage new logistics routes. Air freight is becoming an increasingly attractive option for transporting time-sensitive tech products. However, these expensive methods often lead to higher costs for end products. Despite the increased expenses, air transport offers faster shipping times. Manufacturing facilities can ensure they receive their goods on time, but this method only works for smaller, high-value items that can absorb additional shipping costs. Shifting Toward Localization and Supply Chain Diversification Companies are also shifting toward localization as a strategic response to the strike. By sourcing materials closer to their consumer markets, they reduce the dependency on overseas shipments and minimize the risk associated with port congestion. The strategy of nearshoring — moving supply chains closer to home — offers faster transportation times and more stable supply chain operations. This method also makes it easier to respond to disruptions without heavily relying on international ports or long-haul transportation. Navigating the Shifts in the Supply Chain The U.S. port strike is a reminder of how quickly global supply chains can go into disarray and create lasting effects on the tech industry. Therefore, it is more important than ever for organizations to adapt their logistics. The strike presents immediate challenges, so companies must prepare for events like these and devise long-term strategies that help them increase their resiliency. The tech industry is no stranger to supply chain disruptions, but the recent U.S. port strike is creating new challenges that could have lasting effects. On the first day of October, thousands of dockworkers left key ports at a standstill along the East and Gulf Coasts. As a result, the flow of critical tech components and finished goods has slowed dramatically. This disruption comes at a critical time, especially when the tech industry is still recovering from supply chain issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Tech Industry’s Supply Chain Dependence on Ports The tech industry greatly relies on ports, especially those along the East and Gulf Coasts of the U.S. Ports serve as entry points for many components and raw materials needed to manufacture and assemble electronic devices. These parts often involve semiconductors, screens, batteries, and more. A single delayed shipment of any of these components can ripple through the supply chain, affecting production timelines, product availability, and pricing across the market. To put it into perspective, U.S. ports handle the majority of global trade. According to the National Association of Manufacturers, the affected ports manage 51% of the nation’s containerized imports. These containers often carry crucial tech parts from places like Asia and Europe, which then become distributed to manufacturing hubs within the U.S. As such, any disruption in the flow of these goods results in delayed product releases. the affected ports manage 51% the affected ports manage 51% The tech industry has long depended on a finely-tuned global supply chain that operates on just-in-time principles. This method is where components are precisely delivered when needed to minimize warehousing costs and maximize efficiency. However, this approach leaves little room for error. When a disruption like the U.S. port strike occurs, there isn’t a buffer to absorb the delay. As a result, you get stalled production lines, which delay product releases and cause a shortage of tech products. How Tech Companies Are Adapting Their Logistics Strategies The U.S. port strike has far-reaching consequences on the economy. As cargo remains stuck at the ports, companies face increasing shipping costs, production slowdowns, and an inability to meet consumer demand. To mitigate these economic effects, businesses are swiftly adapting their logistics strategies. Enhanced Visibility and Use of Technology in Logistics A lack of supply chain visibility is one major challenge within the U.S. port strike. According to recent findings, around 45% of stakeholders report having limited visibility beyond their first-tier suppliers. Unfortunately, this makes responding quickly to disruptions or anticipating potential issues difficult. To combat this, companies are adopting tech-driven logistics solutions that provide greater transparency in the supply chain. around 45% of stakeholders around 45% of stakeholders For instance, digital platforms now offer real-time tracking of every part of the supply chain process, providing stakeholders with better visibility of where goods are in transit. With machine learning improving route optimization, these technologies allow more efficient delivery routes and rapid responses to unforeseen events. now offer real-time tracking now offer real-time tracking Rerouting Shipments and Shifting Transportation Methods Many companies have resorted to rerouting cargo to ports on the West Coast or Canada to bypass the backlogs on the East and Gulf Coasts. However, these options come with unique challenges. West Coast ports are already operating at high capacity — with some facilities reaching 71% — leaving little room to accommodate the redirected shipments. Additionally, rerouting involves longer travel times and higher costs due to the need to manage new logistics routes. with some facilities reaching 71% with some facilities reaching 71% Air freight is becoming an increasingly attractive option for transporting time-sensitive tech products. However, these expensive methods often lead to higher costs for end products. Despite the increased expenses, air transport offers faster shipping times. Manufacturing facilities can ensure they receive their goods on time, but this method only works for smaller, high-value items that can absorb additional shipping costs. Shifting Toward Localization and Supply Chain Diversification Companies are also shifting toward localization as a strategic response to the strike. By sourcing materials closer to their consumer markets, they reduce the dependency on overseas shipments and minimize the risk associated with port congestion. The strategy of nearshoring — moving supply chains closer to home — offers faster transportation times and more stable supply chain operations. This method also makes it easier to respond to disruptions without heavily relying on international ports or long-haul transportation. Navigating the Shifts in the Supply Chain The U.S. port strike is a reminder of how quickly global supply chains can go into disarray and create lasting effects on the tech industry. Therefore, it is more important than ever for organizations to adapt their logistics. The strike presents immediate challenges, so companies must prepare for events like these and devise long-term strategies that help them increase their resiliency.

How Will the US Port Strike Affect the Global Tech Industry?

Your software is excellent. So, what’s preventing your customers from knowing more about—and adopting—more of your software offerings? Cross-portfolio access to your software applications and features can help customers derive value from a greater number of your products. Yet, three common impediments may be in the way of getting customers to embrace the valuable features and services that you provide. 1. They Don’t Know About All You Offer. If you’ve used Microsoft Word for word processing, you’ve probably also tried Microsoft Excel for creating and editing spreadsheets, both part of Microsoft 365 (formerly the Microsoft Office Suite). Maybe you use Adobe Acrobat Pro and occasionally have tried to edit some photos in Adobe Photoshop; both applications are part of Adobe Creative Cloud. In each of these examples, you’ve explored the offerings within a software supplier’s portfolio. The need for users to explore the software they use from their preferred providers isn’t just limited to what’s available from these ubiquitous offerings. Software producers across a wide variety of industries—medical, payments, restaurant management, fintech, security, and many more—offer robust software suites and portfolios. They include a variety of applications; each application includes varied, evolving features. Customers may select to do business with a company for a particular application or function of that app. Those same customers are likely looking for other functionalities to support their business. Maybe the customer needs an advanced function that may be available in different versions. Maybe they require limited-time access (such as for seasonal or project-based needs) to a particular application or feature. Maybe they’re looking for a new app to meet a specific need. If they don’t know what you offer, they’ll look elsewhere. You’re missing out on business. 2. You Make It Difficult for Customers to Try New Things. You sold a perpetual license to a customer for your flagship application. Maybe that user loves it and is loyal to that product. When you release a new feature, is it available to that user? Or are they locked into a restrictive software license, such as a perpetual monetization model (for which they paid for unlimited use of a particular software version), perhaps meaning that they can only get that new great feature if they upgrade to a newer version? Do they require a full year’s subscription for the product they need for just two weeks? If your entitlement management process (how access to software, devices, systems, and content is administered) is overly restrictive, you may be undermining business growth. By restricting access to your software products, you’re inherently preventing the exploration and adoption of your product. You’re preventing customers from learning about and trying everything you offer. 3. Your Approach to Software Monetization Isn’t Flexible Enough to Match Capacity and Demand. Each of your customers rides the waves of busy seasons in their particular business. When things are hectic, their demand for your product may go up. Perhaps they need additional users to access your software. Perhaps they would like to access your software’s premium features. Perhaps they need an additional application in your portfolio. If you’re unable to deliver the capacity that they demand, you’re missing out on opportunities to sell your entire portfolio to that account. __Elastic access __is a flexible approach that can remedy this mismatch. Rather than providing a static leased licensing capacity, elastic access offers an agile approach to the delivery of flexible usage rights. This pay-per-use approach (using what is sometimes called “prepaid,” “flexible credits,” “metered tokens,” or “consumptive tokens”) is highly practical for products and services where fluctuating usage patterns are likely. Customers can exchange prepaid credits to access any offering within your portfolio. This approach provides usage rights that stretch to accommodate your customers’ need for sporadic periods of higher consumption, allowing them to pay for specifically what they need during seasonal peaks, for specific projects, or for short-term occasional use by a particular license holder. Not only does a customer gain access to the product they need, but it helps align the expense you charge with the value that customers receive from your products. With elastic access, every consumptive event is reflected in real time. You benefit from real-time, granular usage data. This provides rapid software usage insights that can help product managers see the results of changes to products, influencing product roadmap and pricing/packaging decisions, while also supporting cross-sell and upsell initiatives. A flexible approach can also help software companies expand into new markets by providing easy entry to offerings. Access to Your Entire Portfolio Benefits the Entire Business Customers want to buy software in ways that fit their needs. Instant scalability, streamlined procurement, cost optimization and cost allocation functionality, and the ability to try new offerings without committing to long-term subscriptions are all essential for many customers. When you provide these, it benefits your bottom line, supporting customer retention and recurring revenue. Reducing friction in the sales process is always good business. Your software is excellent. So, what’s preventing your customers from knowing more about—and adopting—more of your software offerings? Your software is excellent. So, what’s preventing your customers from knowing more about—and adopting—more of your software offerings? Cross-portfolio access to your software applications and features can help customers derive value from a greater number of your products. Yet, three common impediments may be in the way of getting customers to embrace the valuable features and services that you provide. 1. They Don’t Know About All You Offer. If you’ve used Microsoft Word for word processing, you’ve probably also tried Microsoft Excel for creating and editing spreadsheets, both part of Microsoft 365 (formerly the Microsoft Office Suite). Maybe you use Adobe Acrobat Pro and occasionally have tried to edit some photos in Adobe Photoshop; both applications are part of Adobe Creative Cloud. In each of these examples, you’ve explored the offerings within a software supplier’s portfolio. The need for users to explore the software they use from their preferred providers isn’t just limited to what’s available from these ubiquitous offerings. Software producers across a wide variety of industries—medical, payments, restaurant management, fintech, security, and many more—offer robust software suites and portfolios. They include a variety of applications; each application includes varied, evolving features. Customers may select to do business with a company for a particular application or function of that app. Those same customers are likely looking for other functionalities to support their business. Maybe the customer needs an advanced function that may be available in different versions. Maybe they require limited-time access (such as for seasonal or project-based needs) to a particular application or feature. Maybe they’re looking for a new app to meet a specific need. If they don’t know what you offer, they’ll look elsewhere. You’re missing out on business. 2. You Make It Difficult for Customers to Try New Things. You sold a perpetual license to a customer for your flagship application. Maybe that user loves it and is loyal to that product. When you release a new feature, is it available to that user? Or are they locked into a restrictive software license, such as a perpetual monetization model (for which they paid for unlimited use of a particular software version), perhaps meaning that they can only get that new great feature if they upgrade to a newer version? Do they require a full year’s subscription for the product they need for just two weeks? If your entitlement management process (how access to software, devices, systems, and content is administered) is overly restrictive, you may be undermining business growth. By restricting access to your software products, you’re inherently preventing the exploration and adoption of your product. You’re preventing customers from learning about and trying everything you offer. 3. Your Approach to Software Monetization Isn’t Flexible Enough to Match Capacity and Demand. Each of your customers rides the waves of busy seasons in their particular business. When things are hectic, their demand for your product may go up. Perhaps they need additional users to access your software. Perhaps they would like to access your software’s premium features. Perhaps they need an additional application in your portfolio. If you’re unable to deliver the capacity that they demand, you’re missing out on opportunities to sell your entire portfolio to that account. __ Elastic access __is a flexible approach that can remedy this mismatch. Rather than providing a static leased licensing capacity, elastic access offers an agile approach to the delivery of flexible usage rights. This pay-per-use approach (using what is sometimes called “prepaid,” “flexible credits,” “metered tokens,” or “consumptive tokens”) is highly practical for products and services where fluctuating usage patterns are likely. Elastic access Customers can exchange prepaid credits to access any offering within your portfolio. This approach provides usage rights that stretch to accommodate your customers’ need for sporadic periods of higher consumption, allowing them to pay for specifically what they need during seasonal peaks, for specific projects, or for short-term occasional use by a particular license holder. Not only does a customer gain access to the product they need, but it helps align the expense you charge with the value that customers receive from your products. With elastic access, every consumptive event is reflected in real time. You benefit from real-time, granular usage data. This provides rapid software usage insights that can help product managers see the results of changes to products, influencing product roadmap and pricing/packaging decisions, while also supporting cross-sell and upsell initiatives. A flexible approach can also help software companies expand into new markets by providing easy entry to offerings. Access to Your Entire Portfolio Benefits the Entire Business Customers want to buy software in ways that fit their needs. Instant scalability, streamlined procurement, cost optimization and cost allocation functionality, and the ability to try new offerings without committing to long-term subscriptions are all essential for many customers. When you provide these, it benefits your bottom line, supporting customer retention and recurring revenue. Reducing friction in the sales process is always good business.

Why Aren’t Customers Exploring Your Entire Software Portfolio?

By Ezra Strauss, Head of Partnerships at Portal I’m proud to be writing this article about a partnership that will reshape the landscape of Web3 gaming. Portal and Immutable have come together to redefine how games are distributed, monetized, and experienced in the Web3 space. This collaboration isn’t just a strategic business move; it’s a personal milestone for me, reuniting with former colleagues at Immutable, as we aim to push the boundaries of what’s possible in gaming. Together, we’re setting the stage for a new era in the Web3 world, where seamless user experiences and cutting-edge technology converge. But what does this partnership really mean for gamers, developers, and the broader gaming ecosystem? To understand the impact, we need to explore the synergies between Portal and Immutable and why this collaboration has the potential to accelerate the adoption of Web3 gaming. Addressing the Web3 Gaming Challenge The Web3 space has long been a promise of ownership, decentralization, and community-driven innovation. Gaming, in particular, has proved a fertile ground for Web3 disruption - a classic case of innovative technology giving rise to new, high-growth business models. The industry has always always been an early adopter of new tech, from cheap home computing in the 1990s and UGC in the 2010s - to blockchain and AI in the 2020s. This culture of early adoption has led to meteoric growth over the past 3 decades, with gaming now worth $300bn+ yearly. But the Web3 gaming sector has encountered one key challenge—how to reach mainstream audiences. Games built on blockchain technology have struggled with accessibility, distribution, and monetization in ways that traditional gaming companies do not. Players want seamless access and rewards; developers want a robust infrastructure to build games. This is where Portal and Immutable step in. At Portal, we’ve been laser-focused on solving Web3 distribution—connecting games with players through frictionless products that aggregate users across multiple chains. From discovering a Web3 game to playing it, buying in-game assets, joining its community and ultimately becoming an evangelist, our product suite caters to every stage in the prospective Web3 gamer’s journey. By making this process seamless, we massively boost the chances of mass adoption. Ultimately, we want Web3 gaming to be the most accessible and rewarding online experience, period. The first step on this journey is simplifying the payments in the space. With Portal Pay, our cross-chain payments offering, we’re helping games take payments in over 5,000 cryptocurrencies on any chain. Gamers can pay in whatever token they want, and with Pay’s SmartSwap feature, games only receive the token they need. For example, a gamer who only plays Solana-based games might only have $SOL in their Phantom wallet. With Portal Pay, they can buy into a sale on Ethereum without having to bridge, swap, or even create a new wallet. By removing these pain points for both games and gamers, we’re widening the TAM of every game onchain, improving liquidity in the gaming ecosystem in the process. Immutable, on the other hand, has developed a sophisticated gaming platform that allows developers to confidently build and deploy Web3 games while prioritizing usability and security. By leveraging their extensive ecosystem and technology like zero-knowledge (zk) scaling, Immutable empowers developers to create groundbreaking gaming experiences. The Power of Synergy: Portal + Immutable This partnership is about more than just technology integration—it’s about creating a holistic, streamlined experience for players and developers alike. By integrating Immutable chains into the Portal platform, we are enabling game developers to access Portal Pay, our seamless payment and rewards solution, for their in-game economies. This enhances the way transactions, rewards, and player engagement are handled, which is critical in Web3’s user-first world. In addition, Portal’s cross-chain technology is designed to bring users from every blockchain into a single, vibrant ecosystem of games. This is a game-changer for developers on the Immutable platform who now have access to a much broader audience. Gamers can experience titles from Immutable’s impressive roster of games, like Gods Unchained and Guild of Guardians, with less friction, while developers can benefit from Portal’s comprehensive tools to boost monetization and player retention. We’re tackling the liquidity issue head-on, too. By introducing advanced liquidity solutions through this partnership, developers will be able to capture more value from their in-game assets and transactions, while players are rewarded more effectively for their engagement. This adds a new level of depth to the gaming economy and significantly enhances the user experience. A Vision for the Future: Web3 Gaming Meets the Mainstream Looking at the broader picture, the partnership between Portal and Immutable signals the beginning of a Web3 gaming revolution. Data from DappRadar indicates that Web3 gaming generated $3.1 billion in 2023, yet it remains a small fraction of the $184.4 billion global gaming market. The potential for growth is enormous, especially as mainstream audiences begin to realize the benefits of decentralized gaming—true ownership of in-game assets, seamless cross-platform experiences, and innovative monetization strategies. Our collaboration with Immutable is focused on making Web3 gaming more accessible, scalable, and lucrative for everyone involved. We’re already seeing indicators that Web3 gaming will grow exponentially. According to a report by Citi, the Metaverse economy could be worth up to $13 trillion by 2030, and gaming will be at the heart of this digital revolution. As the boundaries between digital and physical worlds continue to blur, Portal and Immutable are uniquely positioned to drive the gaming sector’s transformation, not just in the Web3 space but across the global industry. The Road Ahead: Innovation Through Collaboration For me, personally, this partnership is the culmination of years of dedication to pushing the frontiers of gaming. Working alongside the brilliant team at Immutable, some of whom I’ve had the privilege of collaborating with in the past, has reignited the passion I have for the possibilities that lie ahead. We’re not just enhancing distribution and monetization; we’re creating an entirely new blueprint for how gaming can—and will—thrive in a decentralized world. The next steps in this journey are exciting. With Immutable’s zk-based scaling technology, games can continue to drive down costs and improve scalability, making Web3 games more accessible than ever before. And as Portal continues to innovate with our distribution layer, developers will be able to focus on what they do best: building the next generation of AAA games on any chain, while we connect them with players from around the globe. This is just the beginning. The collaboration between Portal and Immutable is poised to accelerate the adoption of Web3 gaming and bring the future of gaming into the present. Together, we are setting a new standard for what gaming can be—and I couldn’t be more excited for what’s to come. About Ezra Strauss Ezra Strauss is the Head of Partnerships at Portal, a leader in Web3 gaming distribution. Previously, he held roles at Immutable, where he contributed to their mission of revolutionizing blockchain gaming. Ezra is passionate about building synergies between technology and gaming to create experiences that are accessible, rewarding, and enjoyable for players worldwide. About Portal Portal is building the distribution layer for Web3 and beyond. An ecosystem that’s bringing together users from every chain and connecting them with the best dApps in the space – starting with gaming. Via frictionless products, a pioneering liquidity layer, and a world-class network, Portal is helping Web3 solve distribution – aggregating users into a single, vibrant ecosystem in the process. Builders of top-level games and dApps can now focus on creating AAA experiences on any chain – Portal is connecting them to users from around the world. Portal’s advisors include Jamie King, Rockstar Games Co-Founder, Russell Hanson, former CSO of Consensys, Matt Dixon, former Head of BD, EA Games, and John Yao, CEO Team Secret eSports. Portal is proudly represented by WME. For more information, users can follow Portal on X: https://x.com/Portalcoin This story was distributed under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here. By Ezra Strauss, Head of Partnerships at Portal I’m proud to be writing this article about a partnership that will reshape the landscape of Web3 gaming. Portal and Immutable have come together to redefine how games are distributed, monetized, and experienced in the Web3 space. This collaboration isn’t just a strategic business move; it’s a personal milestone for me, reuniting with former colleagues at Immutable, as we aim to push the boundaries of what’s possible in gaming. Together, we’re setting the stage for a new era in the Web3 world, where seamless user experiences and cutting-edge technology converge. But what does this partnership really mean for gamers, developers, and the broader gaming ecosystem? To understand the impact, we need to explore the synergies between Portal and Immutable and why this collaboration has the potential to accelerate the adoption of Web3 gaming. Addressing the Web3 Gaming Challenge Addressing the Web3 Gaming Challenge The Web3 space has long been a promise of ownership, decentralization, and community-driven innovation. Gaming, in particular, has proved a fertile ground for Web3 disruption - a classic case of innovative technology giving rise to new, high-growth business models. The industry has always always been an early adopter of new tech, from cheap home computing in the 1990s and UGC in the 2010s - to blockchain and AI in the 2020s. This culture of early adoption has led to meteoric growth over the past 3 decades, with gaming now worth $300bn+ yearly. But the Web3 gaming sector has encountered one key challenge—how to reach mainstream audiences. Games built on blockchain technology have struggled with accessibility, distribution, and monetization in ways that traditional gaming companies do not. Players want seamless access and rewards; developers want a robust infrastructure to build games. This is where Portal and Immutable step in. At Portal, we’ve been laser-focused on solving Web3 distribution—connecting games with players through frictionless products that aggregate users across multiple chains. From discovering a Web3 game to playing it, buying in-game assets, joining its community and ultimately becoming an evangelist, our product suite caters to every stage in the prospective Web3 gamer’s journey. By making this process seamless, we massively boost the chances of mass adoption. Ultimately, we want Web3 gaming to be the most accessible and rewarding online experience, period. The first step on this journey is simplifying the payments in the space. With Portal Pay, our cross-chain payments offering, we’re helping games take payments in over 5,000 cryptocurrencies on any chain. Gamers can pay in whatever token they want, and with Pay’s SmartSwap feature, games only receive the token they need. For example, a gamer who only plays Solana-based games might only have $SOL in their Phantom wallet. With Portal Pay, they can buy into a sale on Ethereum without having to bridge, swap, or even create a new wallet. By removing these pain points for both games and gamers, we’re widening the TAM of every game onchain, improving liquidity in the gaming ecosystem in the process. Immutable, on the other hand, has developed a sophisticated gaming platform that allows developers to confidently build and deploy Web3 games while prioritizing usability and security. By leveraging their extensive ecosystem and technology like zero-knowledge (zk) scaling, Immutable empowers developers to create groundbreaking gaming experiences. The Power of Synergy: Portal + Immutable The Power of Synergy: Portal + Immutable This partnership is about more than just technology integration—it’s about creating a holistic, streamlined experience for players and developers alike. By integrating Immutable chains into the Portal platform, we are enabling game developers to access Portal Pay, our seamless payment and rewards solution, for their in-game economies. This enhances the way transactions, rewards, and player engagement are handled, which is critical in Web3’s user-first world. In addition, Portal’s cross-chain technology is designed to bring users from every blockchain into a single, vibrant ecosystem of games. This is a game-changer for developers on the Immutable platform who now have access to a much broader audience. Gamers can experience titles from Immutable’s impressive roster of games, like Gods Unchained and Guild of Guardians, with less friction, while developers can benefit from Portal’s comprehensive tools to boost monetization and player retention. We’re tackling the liquidity issue head-on, too. By introducing advanced liquidity solutions through this partnership, developers will be able to capture more value from their in-game assets and transactions, while players are rewarded more effectively for their engagement. This adds a new level of depth to the gaming economy and significantly enhances the user experience. A Vision for the Future: Web3 Gaming Meets the Mainstream A Vision for the Future: Web3 Gaming Meets the Mainstream Looking at the broader picture, the partnership between Portal and Immutable signals the beginning of a Web3 gaming revolution. Data from DappRadar indicates that Web3 gaming generated $3.1 billion in 2023, yet it remains a small fraction of the $184.4 billion global gaming market. DappRadar The potential for growth is enormous, especially as mainstream audiences begin to realize the benefits of decentralized gaming—true ownership of in-game assets, seamless cross-platform experiences, and innovative monetization strategies. Our collaboration with Immutable is focused on making Web3 gaming more accessible, scalable, and lucrative for everyone involved. We’re already seeing indicators that Web3 gaming will grow exponentially. According to a report by Citi , the Metaverse economy could be worth up to $13 trillion by 2030, and gaming will be at the heart of this digital revolution. As the boundaries between digital and physical worlds continue to blur, Portal and Immutable are uniquely positioned to drive the gaming sector’s transformation, not just in the Web3 space but across the global industry. report by Citi The Road Ahead: Innovation Through Collaboration The Road Ahead: Innovation Through Collaboration For me, personally, this partnership is the culmination of years of dedication to pushing the frontiers of gaming. Working alongside the brilliant team at Immutable, some of whom I’ve had the privilege of collaborating with in the past, has reignited the passion I have for the possibilities that lie ahead. We’re not just enhancing distribution and monetization; we’re creating an entirely new blueprint for how gaming can—and will—thrive in a decentralized world. The next steps in this journey are exciting. With Immutable’s zk-based scaling technology, games can continue to drive down costs and improve scalability, making Web3 games more accessible than ever before. And as Portal continues to innovate with our distribution layer, developers will be able to focus on what they do best: building the next generation of AAA games on any chain, while we connect them with players from around the globe. This is just the beginning. The collaboration between Portal and Immutable is poised to accelerate the adoption of Web3 gaming and bring the future of gaming into the present. Together, we are setting a new standard for what gaming can be—and I couldn’t be more excited for what’s to come. About Ezra Strauss About Ezra Strauss About Ezra Strauss Ezra Strauss is the Head of Partnerships at Portal , a leader in Web3 gaming distribution. Previously, he held roles at Immutable, where he contributed to their mission of revolutionizing blockchain gaming. Ezra is passionate about building synergies between technology and gaming to create experiences that are accessible, rewarding, and enjoyable for players worldwide. Portal About Portal About Portal About Portal Portal is building the distribution layer for Web3 and beyond. An ecosystem that’s bringing together users from every chain and connecting them with the best dApps in the space – starting with gaming. Via frictionless products, a pioneering liquidity layer, and a world-class network, Portal is helping Web3 solve distribution – aggregating users into a single, vibrant ecosystem in the process. Portal Builders of top-level games and dApps can now focus on creating AAA experiences on any chain – Portal is connecting them to users from around the world. Portal’s advisors include Jamie King, Rockstar Games Co-Founder, Russell Hanson, former CSO of Consensys, Matt Dixon, former Head of BD, EA Games, and John Yao, CEO Team Secret eSports. Portal is proudly represented by WME. For more information, users can follow Portal on X: https://x.com/Portalcoin https://x.com/Portalcoin This story was distributed under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here . here

Driving the Future of Web3 Gaming: A New Era With Portal and Immutable

Web3 Gaming-in gələcəyini idarə etmək: Portal və Dəyişməz Yeni Era

Impulsando el futuro de los juegos Web3: una nueva era con Portal e Immutable

Pokretanje budućnosti Web3 igranja: Nova era s portalom i nepromjenjivim

מניע את העתיד של משחקי Web3: עידן חדש עם פורטל ובלתי ניתן לשינוי

Web3ゲームの未来を推進する: PortalとImmutableによる新時代

„Web3“ žaidimų ateitis: nauja era su portalu ir nekintamais

Napędzamy przyszłość gier Web3: Nowa era z Portalem i Immutable

د ویب 3 لوبو راتلونکي چلول: یو نوی دوره د پورټل او نه بدلیدونکي سره

Покретање будућности Веб3 игара: Нова ера са порталом и непроменљивим

ขับเคลื่อนอนาคตของ Web3 Gaming: ยุคใหม่ด้วยพอร์ทัลและ Immutable

推动 Web3 游戏的未来：门户和不可变的新时代

Ukushayela Ikusasa Lemidlalo Ye-Web3: Inkathi Entsha Enephothali Nengaguquki

After reading extensively about the best databases for Rails development, I finally settled on PostgreSQL (mainly because my instructor on YouTube used it). I decided to switch from SQLite to PostgreSQL, and I was very pleased with the results. Following tutorials on how to build with PostgreSQL using the Ruby on Rails framework was smooth, and integrating the PostgreSQL database (DB) was seamless—until I decided to revamp my PC and reinstall Ubuntu Linux. The backstory is that I had a PC running an Ubuntu Linux distribution, but during the OS installation, I had mistakenly installed it on a partition with limited space. I tried to find a workaround to increase the partition size since I still had some free space on the disk and a Windows OS on another partition with plenty of space. As I needed more space for additional software installations, I attempted various mounting and unmounting techniques. Eventually, I figured out a way to expand the /root partition. After weighing my options, I decided that a fresh installation of Ubuntu 24.04 would be the best solution. This way, I could allocate the entire 500GB of space to Ubuntu, and I had also read DHH’s views on transitioning to open-source development tools, moving away from Mac and Windows systems. You can read more about it here. I quickly backed up my important data and created a live USB drive. Before I knew it, I was on track to turn my PC into the best software development tool ever 🤗. Without further ado, I proceeded with the reinstallation. Once completed, I launched my terminal and typed wget -qO- https://omakub.org/install | bash to install the Omakub Ubuntu setup. The process took some time, as it’s an all-in-one suite of software for developers. I won’t go into too much detail about Omakub and its Omakase spirit—I’ll write something nice about it later. After installing Omakub, my PC was fresh and fully equipped with a beautiful UI, along with Ruby, Python, Node, Docker, VS Code, Neovim, and other packages. The Rails framework was also installed with that single command. Just imagine the satisfaction of getting everything set up with a single command. I then connected my external drive and restored all the backed-up data, including my test projects. I launched my terminal, navigated to my directory, then to my test project, started my server with rails server, and clicked on the link to my localhost. Voila! 'ActiveRecord' errors, blah blah. I was confused. The actual error was "unable to connect to the database on port 5432." Maybe I'm a noob here, but I’ve always used default settings for my database during development. I kept at it, trying to figure out what was causing the error. I searched online for solutions, checked Stack Overflow, explored Ubuntu communities, and did other Google searches—I still couldn’t resolve it. Sudo this, su that—nothing worked. I removed and reinstalled PostgreSQL, but the problem persisted. Initially, I thought the Omakub installation was faulty. I was about to remove it when I decided to fork my project using the default database, SQLite. It worked instantly. This vindicated Omakub 😂. But now, I had to make PostgreSQL work by any means necessary. I considered using Docker since it would encapsulate my app, allowing all dependencies to work independently of the host machine. Ahh! Complexities! I reminded myself that I was just trying to get a handle on this framework within 6 weeks before shipping out my products. So, I decided against using Docker for now. I wanted to understand why PostgreSQL wasn’t working on my PC and continued searching for a solution. Yes! I finally found it 😂 The fix was ridiculously simple, but I wasn’t thinking in that direction. I had assumed that Omakub had broken my system. I decided to search for how to set up a profile in PostgreSQL and found a helpful post on Medium—thanks to the writer. I created my PostgreSQL database profile using the Postgres commands, then opened my app files in VS Code, edited the database.yml file to include the username and password, and ran rails db:create. It worked! My app connected to the database, and my server started running. Hurray! 127.0.0.1:3000 finally worked. This story is for anyone who has experienced PostgreSQL port 5432 issues while being a noob at Ruby on Rails. After reading extensively about the best databases for Rails development, I finally settled on PostgreSQL (mainly because my instructor on YouTube used it). I decided to switch from SQLite to PostgreSQL, and I was very pleased with the results. Following tutorials on how to build with PostgreSQL using the Ruby on Rails framework was smooth, and integrating the PostgreSQL database (DB) was seamless—until I decided to revamp my PC and reinstall Ubuntu Linux. The backstory is that I had a PC running an Ubuntu Linux distribution, but during the OS installation, I had mistakenly installed it on a partition with limited space. I tried to find a workaround to increase the partition size since I still had some free space on the disk and a Windows OS on another partition with plenty of space. As I needed more space for additional software installations, I attempted various mounting and unmounting techniques. Eventually, I figured out a way to expand the /root partition. After weighing my options, I decided that a fresh installation of Ubuntu 24.04 would be the best solution. This way, I could allocate the entire 500GB of space to Ubuntu, and I had also read DHH’s views on transitioning to open-source development tools, moving away from Mac and Windows systems. You can read more about it here . I quickly backed up my important data and created a live USB drive. Before I knew it, I was on track to turn my PC into the best software development tool ever 🤗. here Without further ado, I proceeded with the reinstallation. Once completed, I launched my terminal and typed wget -qO- https://omakub.org/install | bash to install the Omakub Ubuntu setup. The process took some time, as it’s an all-in-one suite of software for developers. I won’t go into too much detail about Omakub and its Omakase spirit—I’ll write something nice about it later. wget -qO- https://omakub.org/install | bash After installing Omakub, my PC was fresh and fully equipped with a beautiful UI, along with Ruby, Python, Node, Docker, VS Code, Neovim, and other packages. The Rails framework was also installed with that single command. Just imagine the satisfaction of getting everything set up with a single command. I then connected my external drive and restored all the backed-up data, including my test projects. I launched my terminal, navigated to my directory, then to my test project, started my server with rails server , and clicked on the link to my localhost. rails server Voila! 'ActiveRecord' errors, blah blah. I was confused. The actual error was "unable to connect to the database on port 5432." Maybe I'm a noob here, but I’ve always used default settings for my database during development. I kept at it, trying to figure out what was causing the error. I searched online for solutions, checked Stack Overflow, explored Ubuntu communities, and did other Google searches—I still couldn’t resolve it. Sudo this, su that—nothing worked. I removed and reinstalled PostgreSQL, but the problem persisted. Initially, I thought the Omakub installation was faulty. I was about to remove it when I decided to fork my project using the default database, SQLite. It worked instantly. This vindicated Omakub 😂. But now, I had to make PostgreSQL work by any means necessary. I considered using Docker since it would encapsulate my app, allowing all dependencies to work independently of the host machine. Ahh! Complexities! I reminded myself that I was just trying to get a handle on this framework within 6 weeks before shipping out my products. So, I decided against using Docker for now. I wanted to understand why PostgreSQL wasn’t working on my PC and continued searching for a solution. Yes! I finally found it 😂 The fix was ridiculously simple, but I wasn’t thinking in that direction. I had assumed that Omakub had broken my system. I decided to search for how to set up a profile in PostgreSQL and found a helpful post on Medium —thanks to the writer. Medium I created my PostgreSQL database profile using the Postgres commands, then opened my app files in VS Code, edited the database.yml file to include the username and password, and ran rails db:create . database.yml rails db:create It worked! My app connected to the database, and my server started running. Hurray! 127.0.0.1:3000 finally worked. This story is for anyone who has experienced PostgreSQL port 5432 issues while being a noob at Ruby on Rails.

Postgresql and Port 5432 issues on Ubuntu 24.04

AI image manipulation tools have come a long way in the last few years. It’s quite easy nowadays to create beautiful, stylistic portraits of people and animals. But AI models are highly unpredictable. So most tools rely on the user (or some human) to weed out bad generations and find the best one. This is the classic “human in the loop” problem that often plagues AI tools. Turns out, with some clever tricks and careful tuning, you can build a pipeline that reliably works for the vast majority of pets. It is extremely resilient to variations in pose, lighting etc. In this post, I’ll dive deeper into how it works and all the neat little tricks that enable this. Here’s some examples of portraits you can generate with this pipeline. Let’s get started! The Key Ingredients IPAdapter The crux of the technique is the IPAdapter. It’s essentially a way to prompt a model using an image instead of text (it literally stands for Image Prompt Adapter). So instead of taking a text embeddings, it uses an image to get the embeddings. This is super powerful because it can accurately capture the style and structure in an image directly, instead of someone having to translate what they want from an image into text. In our ComfyUI IPAdapter node, we have two inputs, one for style and one for composition. We use a watercolor painting image for style, and feed the original image for composition (since we want to keep the same composition, but change the style). ControlNets Now that we have a way to keep the style consistent, we can turn our attention to faithfully representing the pet. IPAdapters bias heavily towards image quality, and image likeness suffers. So we need to do something to be able to keep the output looking like the same object as the input. The answer to that is ControlNet. ControlNets are another cool technique to provide additional constraints to the image generation process. Using a ControlNet, you can specify constraints in the form of edges, depth, human pose etc. A great feature of ControlNets is that they can be stacked. So you can have an edge controlnet that forces the output to have similar edges as the input, and also a depth controlnet that forces the output to have a similar depth profile. And that’s exactly what I do here. It turns out that controlnets are not just stackable with other controlnets, but they can also work in tandem with IPAdapter mentioned above. And so those are the tools we’ll use for this - IPAdapter with a source image to get the style, ControlNet with canny edge detector to constrain based on edges, and controlnet with depth to constrain based on depth profile. That’s really all you need in terms of techniques, but what I’ve learnt from experimenting with machine learning for production is that a lot of the value of these things comes from taking the time to tune all your parameters perfectly. So I want to talk a little bit about that. Finetuning Have you ever found a model with amazing example outputs, tried it on your own images and realized they look terrible? Often, the only reason for that is that the model hasn’t been finetuned for your images. It can feel like a complete blocker sometimes, because where do we even start with finetuning a pre-trained model?! Here’s what I’ve learnt about the topic. This extends beyond this particular pipeline too, so it’s good knowledge to have generally. ControlNets ControlNets are very powerful, so you have to be careful to control their effect on the output. Luckily, the custom nodes in ComfyUI let us reduce the effect of controlnets, and also stop their effects at any point. So we set the edge detector to 75% strength and make it stop influencing the generation at 75% and the depth detector stops at 30%. The reason we stop them at the end rather than just reducing their strength is that this allows the network to “clean up” any artifacts caused by them in the last few steps without being constrained externally. It just makes the image prettier. So it’s using just it’s training data to make things look as nice as possible, ignoring the edges and depth. The other big thing to tune is the KSampler. There’s a lot of little things going on here, but I’ll just briefly touch on some of them: KSampler - Steps First we have the steps. This is literally the number of times the model will repeatedly run. The more it runs, the more stylized your output gets, and the further away it will get from the original image. The effects of this are often not that obvious, so it’s worth playing around with it. KSampler - CFG Then there’s CFG. I honestly don’t fully understand this, but from its name - Classifier Free Guidance - I’m assuming it controls how much the model is allowed to modify the image unconstrained by the prompts in order to make it look better. This also affects the output image significantly, so is worth playing around with. Denoise Another neat little trick I use here is to start the image generation process with the input image  instead of a blank image, and keep the denoising low. This ensures that the output will look similar in terms of colors and textures. Text Prompt One thing you’ll notice I never mentioned is the text prompt until now! Surprising, since that’s usually the only conditioning that you normally provide to diffusion models. But in this case, we have so many other ways of conditioning that the text prompts usually just get in the way. So in this case, the prompt is literally just “a dog”. I do use the text prompt a little more in some of the more stylized portraits, like the chef dog or the one in the bathroom. Adding accessories In essence, this is more or less just an “AI Filter” that converts images into watercolor portraits. But it’s amazing how flexible this can be. For example, to make the portrait of the dog taking a shower, I literally just put images together in an image editing tool and used that as the input! The model takes care of unifying everything and cleaning up the image. Conclusion Now remove the background, add some text and Boom! You have a beautiful portrait that captures all the little details of your pet, and always paints them in the best light! Huge thanks to @cubiq for his work on ComfyUI nodes and his awesome explainer series on youtube! Most of this pipeline was built and explained by him in his videos. If you want a pet portrait without going through all this trouble, consider buying one from here: pawprints.pinenlime.com! AI image manipulation tools have come a long way in the last few years. It’s quite easy nowadays to create beautiful, stylistic portraits of people and animals. But AI models are highly unpredictable. So most tools rely on the user (or some human) to weed out bad generations and find the best one. This is the classic “human in the loop” problem that often plagues AI tools. Turns out, with some clever tricks and careful tuning, you can build a pipeline that reliably works for the vast majority of pets. It is extremely resilient to variations in pose, lighting etc. In this post, I’ll dive deeper into how it works and all the neat little tricks that enable this. Here’s some examples of portraits you can generate with this pipeline. Let’s get started! The Key Ingredients IPAdapter The crux of the technique is the IPAdapter. It’s essentially a way to prompt a model using an image instead of text (it literally stands for Image Prompt Adapter). So instead of taking a text embeddings, it uses an image to get the embeddings. This is super powerful because it can accurately capture the style and structure in an image directly, instead of someone having to translate what they want from an image into text. In our ComfyUI IPAdapter node, we have two inputs, one for style and one for composition. We use a watercolor painting image for style, and feed the original image for composition (since we want to keep the same composition, but change the style). ControlNets Now that we have a way to keep the style consistent, we can turn our attention to faithfully representing the pet. IPAdapters bias heavily towards image quality, and image likeness suffers. So we need to do something to be able to keep the output looking like the same object as the input. The answer to that is ControlNet. ControlNets are another cool technique to provide additional constraints to the image generation process. Using a ControlNet, you can specify constraints in the form of edges, depth, human pose etc. A great feature of ControlNets is that they can be stacked. So you can have an edge controlnet that forces the output to have similar edges as the input, and also a depth controlnet that forces the output to have a similar depth profile. And that’s exactly what I do here. It turns out that controlnets are not just stackable with other controlnets, but they can also work in tandem with IPAdapter mentioned above. And so those are the tools we’ll use for this - IPAdapter with a source image to get the style, ControlNet with canny edge detector to constrain based on edges, and controlnet with depth to constrain based on depth profile. That’s really all you need in terms of techniques, but what I’ve learnt from experimenting with machine learning for production is that a lot of the value of these things comes from taking the time to tune all your parameters perfectly. So I want to talk a little bit about that. Finetuning Have you ever found a model with amazing example outputs, tried it on your own images and realized they look terrible? Often, the only reason for that is that the model hasn’t been finetuned for your images. It can feel like a complete blocker sometimes, because where do we even start with finetuning a pre-trained model?! Here’s what I’ve learnt about the topic. This extends beyond this particular pipeline too, so it’s good knowledge to have generally. ControlNets ControlNets are very powerful, so you have to be careful to control their effect on the output. Luckily, the custom nodes in ComfyUI let us reduce the effect of controlnets, and also stop their effects at any point. So we set the edge detector to 75% strength and make it stop influencing the generation at 75% and the depth detector stops at 30%. The reason we stop them at the end rather than just reducing their strength is that this allows the network to “clean up” any artifacts caused by them in the last few steps without being constrained externally. It just makes the image prettier. So it’s using just it’s training data to make things look as nice as possible, ignoring the edges and depth. The other big thing to tune is the KSampler. There’s a lot of little things going on here, but I’ll just briefly touch on some of them: KSampler - Steps First we have the steps. This is literally the number of times the model will repeatedly run. The more it runs, the more stylized your output gets, and the further away it will get from the original image. The effects of this are often not that obvious, so it’s worth playing around with it. KSampler - CFG Then there’s CFG. I honestly don’t fully understand this, but from its name - Classifier Free Guidance - I’m assuming it controls how much the model is allowed to modify the image unconstrained by the prompts in order to make it look better. This also affects the output image significantly, so is worth playing around with. Denoise Another neat little trick I use here is to start the image generation process with the input image  instead of a blank image, and keep the denoising low. This ensures that the output will look similar in terms of colors and textures. Text Prompt One thing you’ll notice I never mentioned is the text prompt until now! Surprising, since that’s usually the only conditioning that you normally provide to diffusion models. But in this case, we have so many other ways of conditioning that the text prompts usually just get in the way. So in this case, the prompt is literally just “a dog”. I do use the text prompt a little more in some of the more stylized portraits, like the chef dog or the one in the bathroom. Adding accessories In essence, this is more or less just an “AI Filter” that converts images into watercolor portraits. But it’s amazing how flexible this can be. For example, to make the portrait of the dog taking a shower, I literally just put images together in an image editing tool and used that as the input! The model takes care of unifying everything and cleaning up the image. Conclusion Now remove the background, add some text and Boom! You have a beautiful portrait that captures all the little details of your pet, and always paints them in the best light! Huge thanks to @cubiq for his work on ComfyUI nodes and his awesome explainer series on youtube! Most of this pipeline was built and explained by him in his videos. If you want a pet portrait without going through all this trouble, consider buying one from here: pawprints.pinenlime.com!

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