World's most flexible menu builder platform (BETA)
A reliable menu engineering saarthi

QR2Z

Catching signals from others is how we started communicating as human beings. It all started, of course, with our vocal cords. Then we moved to smoke signals for long-distance communication. At some point, we discovered radio waves and are still using them for contact. This article will describe how you can tune in using and an SDR dongle. Fedora Linux My journey I got interested in radio communication as a hobby when I was a kid, while my local club, LZ2KRS, was still a thing. I was so excited to be able to listen and communicate with people worldwide. It opened a whole new world for me. I was living in a communist country back then and this was a way to escape just for a bit. It also taught me about ethics and technology. Year after year my hobby grew and now, in the Internet era with all the cool devices you can use, it’s getting even more exciting. So I want to show you how to do it with Fedora Linux and a hardware dongle. What is Ham Radio Amateur Radio (ham radio) is a popular hobby and service that brings people, electronics, and communication together. People use ham radio to talk across town, worldwide, or even into space, without the Internet or cell phones. What’s SWLing? To broadcast with your ham radio or SDR system, you need to obtain a license from a governmental body. But to intercept signals and listen to the open communication between two amateur radio stations, you don’t need one. The term SWLing comes from the abbreviation of Short Wave Listener, where you listen to stations communicating in the shortwave bands between 3 and 30 MHz. This can be used for long-distance communication using the , a layer of the Earth’s atmosphere. ionosphere To get started, you don’t need a license. Still, I recommend getting yourself an SWL sign to identify yourself in a listening contest. These are competitions for categories like who will discover the most connections in a month or who can listen to contacts from each country in the world. How to get an SWL Sign? There are two options: Contact your national radio club and ask them to issue one for you. I got my Czech one, OK1-36568, after a few weeks. Join the community and request a sign there. Short Wave Amateur Radio Listening You will get more information and help from either of these locations if you get stuck in some fashion! QSL Cards You can also use your sign to send QSL cards via post or electronically. This is a great way to communicate with people worldwide and make friends. Per Wikipedia, A QSL card is a written confirmation of either a two-way radio communication between two amateur radio or citizens band stations; a one-way reception of a signal from an AM radio, FM radio, television, or shortwave broadcasting station; or the reception of a two-way radio communication by a third party listener (in our case). A typical QSL card is the same size and made from the same material as a regular postcard; most are sent through snail mail. Replace the radio receiver with your Fedora Linux The focal point of the ham radio hobby is the radio transmitter/receiver. Most of the time, enthusiasts build their radio from scratch, but this differs from what I will write about here. SDR A software-defined radio (SDR) system is a radio communication system that uses software for the modulation and demodulation of radio signals. In other words, a piece of hardware and software replaces a radio transmitter/receiver. This helps you discover more in a way you are familiar with – a User Interface with built-in functions instead of the limited interface of a radio receiver. My explanation oversimplifies things, so if you want to go deep and read more about SDR, here is an excellent start. SDR Set Up under Fedora Linux Choosing the proper hardware If you search the Internet for an SDR dongle, you’ll find many ideas depending on your budget. In this tutorial, I’ll work with the one I have, which works well under Fedora 37. A note: The dongle covers frequencies from 25MHz to 1750MHz, which doesn’t cover the Short Wave bands. You would need an additional device to listen to them. This is included in the package I linked above. Some other hardware providers offer all-in-one products. Check if the dongle is visible Before installing anything, detect whether Fedora Linux recognizes your USB dongle. I hope you didn’t buy a fake one :-). Use the following command to list the USB devices on your system. lsusb One of the output lines (in the case of Nooelec) should be Realtek Semiconductor Corp. RTL2838 DVB-T Now proceed by installing the software you need Fedora offers a set of tools and drivers packaged as a group. Even though you would not use all the components in this package from the beginning, I recommend installing it. You’ll have more software to play with. sudo dnf group install 'Electronic Lab' I advise you to explore what’s in the group by running this command: sudo dnf group info 'Electronic Lab' Now check if you have everything set up correctly by running: rtl_test You should see something like this: Do not forget to kill this process because the device will be busy and cannot be used in the next step. A simple Ctrl + c works. Gqrx You have the dongle already in your device’s USB port and all the software you need to get started. Now it’s time to intercept your first signal. Start the program called . Don’t be alarmed by the strange interface. You’ll get used to it. Gqrx Configure the I/O Device Screen From the “Device” Dropdown, select the ‘ .’ RealtekRTL2838.. Leave the rest untouched for the moment. If you don’t see your device there, click the “ ” button at the bottom of the screen. Device Scan When your device is selected, click “OK,” and the dialogue will close. Configure the frequency screen Before you start intercepting signals, ensure there is something out there that proves everything works correctly. Since the dongle covers the FM radio band as well, do this: Locate your favorite radio station’s frequency. Mine is 105MHZ Set it in the Frequency field Select WFM (stereo) in the “Mode” dropdown. If you don’t do this, you will hear a sound. not Play And now, you need to start the reception by clicking the “play button” in your main menu. You will see the frequency visualized like this: If you hear a sound, everything will move to the next step. Check if everything is set up correctly if you don't hear anything. You may ask a question in the comments for this article; I can direct you to the proper forum to solve this. Feel free to play with some more FM broadcasts. You have the antenna for it in your pack. Let’s go Short Wave In the case of the Nooelec, you need to add one more device to the USB dongle and turn it on. Instructions on how to do that are included in the package you receive. In short, you plug the “Up Converter” into your USB dongle and make sure the switch is in the “convert” position. Some videos are available on how to do it if you get stuck. You will need an antenna and a good location Now things get trickier. If you live in an area where you don’t see an open space out your window or other buildings surrounding your building, you might have trouble catching a Short Wave radio amateur signal. Let’s try this to see if it works Try to be in the open. I usually listen from my terrace, which could be better but works under particular conditions. You would need a long wire to act as your antenna apart from the hardware. Try the antenna with the hardware initially – the telescoping one from , but it will catch only powerful signals. Nooelec Let’s go back to Gqrx Now with the converter, you need to make some changes to your device screen: Please note the – for the . This is required for the Up Converter to work. 125Mhz LNB LO field Tune your frequency to 14.100 Mhz and make sure your Mode is (standing for ) because this is this band’s main demodulation option. USB Upper sideband Then go to your screen, use the zoom slider, and set it to see about . In our case, you should have between 14.05 to 14.15 Mhz on your screen. FFT Settings 100 kHz Also, click the “ ” to see the information about the SW bands you are exploring. Enable Band Plan Then hit the play button and explore the space between 14.0 and 14.3 Mhz to get any amateur radio transmission. When intercepting a transmission, adjust your settings to improve your listening experience. It’s a journey that you have already started. Most probably, you will hear something like this: “CQ CQ CQ this is ..(followed by the radio license number spelled with the ). ham radio phonetic alphabet Listen very carefully, and by the call sign, you can determine the location of the radio amateurs’ country. You can visit the to learn more about them and even send them a QSL card confirming their connection. QRZCQ website . Keep the momentum going Now you have some tools and ideas for starting Short Wave Listening. This is the first step of an incredible and exciting journey you can have together with your Fedora Linux OS. You will discover the pleasure of , reading more about , how to be a part of a listening competition, and what mean. building your antenna for the specific band how the ionosphere helps those Q-codes This article was initially published in Fedora Magazine

Mastering Shortwave Listening (SWL) with Fedora Linux and Software Defined Radio

In this article, we will look at how to schedule tasks using the . Quartz is the de facto standard of scheduling libraries for Java applications. Quartz supports running jobs at a particular time, repeating job executions, storing jobs in a database, and Spring integration. Quartz framework Spring-annotations for scheduling The easiest way to use Quartz in Spring applications is to use the annotation. Next, we will consider an example of a Spring Boot application. Let's add the necessary dependency in @Scheduled build.gradle implementation 'org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-quartz' and consider an example package quartzdemo.tasks;

import org.springframework.scheduling.annotation.Scheduled;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Component;

import java.util.Date;

@Component
public class PeriodicTask {

    @Scheduled(cron = "0/5 * * * * ?")
    public void everyFiveSeconds() {
        System.out.println("Periodic task: " + new Date());
    }

} Also, for the annotation to work, you need to add a configuration with the annotation. @Scheduled @EnableScheduling package quartzdemo;

import org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication;
import org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.SpringBootApplication;
import org.springframework.scheduling.annotation.EnableScheduling;

@SpringBootApplication
@EnableScheduling
public class QuartzDemoApplication {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(QuartzDemoApplication.class, args);
    }

} The result will be a text output in the console every five seconds. Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 18:24:50 EDT 2022
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 18:24:55 EDT 2022
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 18:25:00 EDT 2022
... The annotation supports the following parameters: @Scheduled - Allows you to run a task at a specified fixed interval. fixedRate - Execute a task with a fixed delay between the completion of the last invocation and the start of the next. fixedDelay - The parameter is used with and to wait before the first execution of the task with the specified delay. initialDelay fixedRate fixedDelay - Set the task execution schedule using the cron-string. Also supports macros (or ), , , (or ), and . cron @yearly @annually @monthly @weekly @daily @midnight @hourly By default, , and are set in milliseconds. This can be changed using the parameter, setting the value from to . fixedRate fixedDelay initialDelay timeUnit NANOSECONDS DAYS Furthermore, you can use properties in @Scheduled annotation: application.properties cron-string=0/5 * * * * ? PeriodicTask.java @Component
public class PeriodicTask {

    @Scheduled(cron = "${cron-string}")
    public void everyFiveSeconds() {
        System.out.println("Periodic task: " + new Date());
    }

} To use properties, you can utilize , , and parameters instead of , and accordingly. fixedRateString fixedDelayString initialDelayString fixedRate fixedDelay initialDelay Directly use Quartz In the previous example, we executed scheduled tasks, but at the same time, we could not dynamically set the start time of the job, or pass parameters to it. To solve these problems, you can directly use Quartz. The main Quartz interfaces are listed below: is an interface to be implemented by the classes that contain the business logic that we wish to have executed Job defines instances and data that are related to it JobDetails Job describes the schedule of job execution Trigger is the main Quartz interface that provides all manipulation and searching operations for jobs and triggers Scheduler To work with Quartz directly, it is not necessary to define a configuration with the annotation, and instead of the dependency, you can use . @EnableScheduling org.springframework.boot:spring-boot-starter-quartz org.quartz-scheduler:quartz Let's define SimpleJob class: package quartzdemo.jobs;

import org.quartz.Job;
import org.quartz.JobExecutionContext;

import java.text.MessageFormat;

public class SimpleJob implements Job {

    @Override
    public void execute(JobExecutionContext context) {
        System.out.println(MessageFormat.format("Job: {0}", getClass()));
    }

} To implement interface, you need to implement only one method that accepts a parameter of type. contains information about the job instance, trigger, scheduler, and other information about the job execution. Job execute JobExecutionContext JobExecutionContext Now let's define an instance of the job: JobDetail job = JobBuilder.newJob(SimpleJob.class).build(); And create a trigger that will trigger after five seconds: Date afterFiveSeconds = Date.from(LocalDateTime.now().plusSeconds(5)
        .atZone(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant());
Trigger trigger = TriggerBuilder.newTrigger()
        .startAt(afterFiveSeconds)
        .build(); Also, create a scheduler: SchedulerFactory schedulerFactory = new StdSchedulerFactory();
Scheduler scheduler = schedulerFactory.getScheduler(); The is initialized in “stand-by” mode, so we have to invoke method: Scheduler start scheduler.start(); Now we can schedule the execution of the job: scheduler.scheduleJob(job, trigger); Farther, when creating , let's add additional data and use it when executing a Job: JobDetails QuartzDemoApplication.java @SpringBootApplication
public class QuartzDemoApplication {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(QuartzDemoApplication.class, args);
        onStartup();
    }

    private static void onStartup() throws SchedulerException {
        JobDetail job = JobBuilder.newJob(SimpleJob.class)
                .usingJobData("param", "value") // add a parameter
                .build();

        Date afterFiveSeconds = Date.from(LocalDateTime.now().plusSeconds(5)
                .atZone(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant());
        Trigger trigger = TriggerBuilder.newTrigger()
                .startAt(afterFiveSeconds)
                .build();

        SchedulerFactory schedulerFactory = new StdSchedulerFactory();
        Scheduler scheduler = schedulerFactory.getScheduler();
        scheduler.start();
        scheduler.scheduleJob(job, trigger);
    }
} SimpleJob.java public class SimpleJob implements Job {

    @Override
    public void execute(JobExecutionContext context) {
        JobDataMap dataMap = context.getJobDetail().getJobDataMap();
        String param = dataMap.getString("param");
        System.out.println(MessageFormat.format("Job: {0}; Param: {1}",
                getClass(), param));
    }

} It is important to note that all values that are added to must be serializable. JobDataMap JobStore Quartz stores data about , , and other information in . By default, the in-memory is used. This means that if we have scheduled tasks and shut down the application (for example, when restarting or crashing) before they are fired, then they will never be executed again. Quartz also supports JDBC-JobStore for storing information in a database. JobDetail Trigger JobStore JobStore Before using JDBC-JobStore, it is necessary to create tables in the database that Quartz will use. By default, these tables are prefixed with . QRTZ_ The Quartz source code contains for creating tables for various databases, such as Oracle, Postgres, MS SQL Server, MySQL, and others, and also has a ready-made XML file for Liquibase. SQL scripts Also, QRTZ tables can be automatically created when launching the application by specifying the property. spring.quartz.jdbc.initialize-schema=always For simplicity, we will use the second method and the H2 database. Let's configure a data source, use JDBCJobStore and create QRTZ tables in application.properties: spring.datasource.url=jdbc:h2:mem:testdb
spring.datasource.driverClassName=org.h2.Driver
spring.datasource.username=sa
spring.datasource.password=

spring.quartz.job-store-type=jdbc
spring.quartz.jdbc.initialize-schema=always For these settings to be taken into account, the Scheduler must be created as a Spring bean: package quartzdemo;

import org.quartz.*;
import org.springframework.boot.CommandLineRunner;
import org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication;
import org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.SpringBootApplication;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Bean;
import org.springframework.scheduling.annotation.EnableScheduling;
import org.springframework.scheduling.quartz.SchedulerFactoryBean;
import quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob;

import java.time.LocalDateTime;
import java.time.ZoneId;
import java.util.Date;

@SpringBootApplication
@EnableScheduling
public class QuartzDemoApplication {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(QuartzDemoApplication.class, args);
    }

    @Bean()
    public Scheduler scheduler(SchedulerFactoryBean factory) throws SchedulerException {
        Scheduler scheduler = factory.getScheduler();
        scheduler.start();
        return scheduler;
    }

    @Bean
    public CommandLineRunner run(Scheduler scheduler) {
        return (String[] args) -> {
            JobDetail job = JobBuilder.newJob(SimpleJob.class)
                    .usingJobData("param", "value") // add a parameter
                    .build();

            Date afterFiveSeconds = Date.from(LocalDateTime.now().plusSeconds(5)
                    .atZone(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant());
            Trigger trigger = TriggerBuilder.newTrigger()
                    .startAt(afterFiveSeconds)
                    .build();

            scheduler.scheduleJob(job, trigger);
        };
    }

} Thread pool configuration Quartz runs each task in a separate thread, and you can configure a thread pool for schedulers. It should also be noted that by default, tasks launched via the annotation and directly via Quartz are launched in different thread pools. We can make sure of this: @Scheduled PeriodicTask.java @Component
public class PeriodicTask {

    @Scheduled(cron = "${cron-string}")
    public void everyFiveSeconds() {
        System.out.println(MessageFormat.format("Periodic task: {0}; Thread: {1}",
                new Date().toString(), Thread.currentThread().getName()));
    }

} SimpleJob.java public class SimpleJob implements Job {

    @Override
    public void execute(JobExecutionContext context) {
        JobDataMap dataMap = context.getJobDetail().getJobDataMap();
        String param = dataMap.getString("param");
        System.out.println(MessageFormat.format("Job: {0}; Param: {1}; Thread: {2}",
                getClass(), param, Thread.currentThread().getName()));
    }

} the output will be: Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:22:45 EDT 2022; Thread: scheduling-1
Job: class quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob; Param: value; Thread: quartzScheduler_Worker-1
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:22:50 EDT 2022; Thread: scheduling-1
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:22:55 EDT 2022; Thread: scheduling-1
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:23:00 EDT 2022; Thread: scheduling-1 The thread pool for tasks contain only one thread. @Scheduled Let's change the scheduler settings for @Scheduled tasks: package quartzdemo;

import org.springframework.context.annotation.Configuration;
import org.springframework.scheduling.annotation.SchedulingConfigurer;
import org.springframework.scheduling.concurrent.ThreadPoolTaskScheduler;
import org.springframework.scheduling.config.ScheduledTaskRegistrar;

@Configuration
public class SchedulingConfiguration implements SchedulingConfigurer {

    @Override
    public void configureTasks(ScheduledTaskRegistrar taskRegistrar) {
        ThreadPoolTaskScheduler threadPoolTaskScheduler = new ThreadPoolTaskScheduler();

        threadPoolTaskScheduler.setPoolSize(10);
        threadPoolTaskScheduler.setThreadNamePrefix("my-scheduled-task-pool-");
        threadPoolTaskScheduler.initialize();

        taskRegistrar.setTaskScheduler(threadPoolTaskScheduler);
    }

} the output will now be like this: Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:44:10 EDT 2022; Thread: my-scheduled-task-pool-1
Job: class quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob; Param: value; Thread: quartzScheduler_Worker-1
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:44:15 EDT 2022; Thread: my-scheduled-task-pool-1
Periodic task: Thu Jul 07 19:44:20 EDT 2022; Thread: my-scheduled-task-pool-2 As you can see, these settings affected only the tasks set using annotations. Now let's change the settings of the scheduler that we work with Quartz directly. This can be done in two ways: through the properties file or by creating a bean . SchedulerFactoryBeanCustomizer Let's use the first method. If we hadn't initialized Quartz via Spring, we would have to register properties in the quartz.properties file. In our case, we need to register properties in application.properties, adding the prefix to them. spring.quartz.properties. application.properties spring.quartz.properties.org.quartz.threadPool.threadNamePrefix=my-scheduler_Worker
spring.quartz.properties.org.quartz.threadPool.threadCount=25 Let's launch the application. Now the output will be like this: Periodic task: Sat Jul 23 10:45:55 MSK 2022; Thread: my-scheduled-task-pool-1
Job: class quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob; Param: value; Thread: my-scheduler_Worker-1 Now the thread in which the task is started is called . my-scheduler_Worker-1 Multiple schedulers If you need to create several schedulers with different parameters, you must define several . Let's look at an example. SchedulerFactoryBeans package quartzdemo;

import quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob;
import org.quartz.*;
import org.springframework.beans.factory.annotation.Qualifier;
import org.springframework.boot.CommandLineRunner;
import org.springframework.boot.SpringApplication;
import org.springframework.boot.autoconfigure.SpringBootApplication;
import org.springframework.context.annotation.Bean;
import org.springframework.scheduling.annotation.EnableScheduling;
import org.springframework.scheduling.quartz.SchedulerFactoryBean;

import javax.sql.DataSource;
import java.time.LocalDateTime;
import java.time.ZoneId;
import java.util.Date;
import java.util.Properties;

@SpringBootApplication
@EnableScheduling
public class QuartzDemoApplication {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        SpringApplication.run(QuartzDemoApplication.class, args);
    }

    @Bean("customSchedulerFactoryBean1")
    public SchedulerFactoryBean customSchedulerFactoryBean1(DataSource dataSource) {
        SchedulerFactoryBean factory = new SchedulerFactoryBean();
        Properties properties = new Properties();
        properties.setProperty("org.quartz.threadPool.threadNamePrefix", "my-custom-scheduler1_Worker");
        factory.setQuartzProperties(properties);
        factory.setDataSource(dataSource);
        return factory;
    }

    @Bean("customSchedulerFactoryBean2")
    public SchedulerFactoryBean customSchedulerFactoryBean2(DataSource dataSource) {
        SchedulerFactoryBean factory = new SchedulerFactoryBean();
        Properties properties = new Properties();
        properties.setProperty("org.quartz.threadPool.threadNamePrefix", "my-custom-scheduler2_Worker");
        factory.setQuartzProperties(properties);
        factory.setDataSource(dataSource);
        return factory;
    }

    @Bean("customScheduler1")
    public Scheduler customScheduler1(@Qualifier("customSchedulerFactoryBean1") SchedulerFactoryBean factory) throws SchedulerException {
        Scheduler scheduler = factory.getScheduler();
        scheduler.start();
        return scheduler;
    }

    @Bean("customScheduler2")
    public Scheduler customScheduler2(@Qualifier("customSchedulerFactoryBean2") SchedulerFactoryBean factory) throws SchedulerException {
        Scheduler scheduler = factory.getScheduler();
        scheduler.start();
        return scheduler;
    }

    @Bean
    public CommandLineRunner run(@Qualifier("customScheduler1") Scheduler customScheduler1,
                                 @Qualifier("customScheduler2") Scheduler customScheduler2) {
        return (String[] args) -> {
            Date afterFiveSeconds = Date.from(LocalDateTime.now().plusSeconds(5).atZone(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant());

            JobDetail jobDetail1 = JobBuilder.newJob(SimpleJob.class).usingJobData("param", "value1").build();
            Trigger trigger1 = TriggerBuilder.newTrigger().startAt(afterFiveSeconds).build();
            customScheduler1.scheduleJob(jobDetail1, trigger1);

            JobDetail jobDetail2 = JobBuilder.newJob(SimpleJob.class).usingJobData("param", "value2").build();
            Trigger trigger2 = TriggerBuilder.newTrigger().startAt(afterFiveSeconds).build();
            customScheduler2.scheduleJob(jobDetail2, trigger2);
        };
    }

} Output: Job: class quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob; Param: value2; Thread: my-custom-scheduler2_Worker-1
Job: class quartzdemo.jobs.SimpleJob; Param: value1; Thread: my-custom-scheduler1_Worker-1 The full source code is available over on . GitHub Conclusion Quartz is a powerful framework for automating scheduled tasks. It can be used both with the help of simple and intuitive Spring annotations and with fine customization and tuning, which provides a solution to complex problems.

How to Schedule Jobs With Quartz in Spring Boot

Cómo programar trabajos con cuarzo en Spring Boot

Many companies, as they grow, figure out the need to change their brand identities. But we should not assume that they evolved their brands because their original one was simply poor. Have you ever considered that an inferior brand that a start-up uses makes a lot of sense to their initial user? In this essay, I want to focus on the importance of having a brand that speaks the language of your early-stage customers. To get started, let's look at the story of Stripe: Stripe(.com) is a growing payments service. Now, a nice name that is easy to type and speak over the phone. It could be more beautiful and it suits well to the stage that they are at - an at-scale stage. But it wasn't always like that when they started, as revealed by the company's co-founder Patrick Collison: Stripe wasn't called Stripe back then… It was called /dev/payments because we, you can tell, we were great branding experts. (Greylock, 2015, 0h4m30s) Calling a company "/dev/payments" would not indeed make much sense - using the general branding hat as we know it. But luckily they were not branding experts at the time, as they were appealing their initial service to high-tech start-ups that needed an easy payments solution for their Linux systems. For that community, "/dev/payments" was an expression that made a lot of sense with their crowd; it fit with the domain's language. Perhaps they didn't notice what they did, fine. But maybe also the very fact that they were not branding experts, as pointed out by Patrick, perfectly helped them at that moment. They did not have the time (or branding expertise) to screw things up. Taking inspiration from Stripe's case, the following are a few points for entrepreneurs looking at how to better position their brand at the early stage: Don't spend time seeking a romantic "at-scale" brand Trying to look for your future brand, such as a lasting brand, would be a waste of time and it could even take focus away. Instead, come up with a culture-fit brand or, at least, try not to find a brand name that is too neutral or distant. If you have both, of course, go for it. But also remember to try out the different brand directions as you are running your many MVP experiments. You should think of your initial brand name as a test: if you have one that is meaningful and ridiculously nice for a niche of people, then you may be using your time correctly. Your brand may not be perfect, it’s necessary When looking at a brand that helps connect with a niche of users, and their culture, we create an initial story, a discussion. More importantly, it reminds us that everything is yet dynamic in the early stage, that much more will come as we learn with the initial customers, when we find them, the real or right ones. A name, a prototype, an early product - these things not perfect - exist to let us open the discussion with customers. Customers are the ones that can help us to understand the language. And that language is key to the development of the ultimate brand. When started, it wasn't . Instead, and as part of many experiments, they launched their initial service as tailored to a neighborhood at Menlo Park, California - a network called Lorelei neighborhood: Nextdoor.com Nextdoor.com And, we were very lucky, we found a community down in Menlo Park, willing to be her guinea pig. It's the Lorelei neighborhood, this is a photograph that I took one afternoon when I was down in Menlo Park one of the four times that I had to go down and pitch the idea of next door to a group of 10 folks that represented the homeowners association in Lorelei. (Sarah Leary, ProductSF 2016, 0h10m14s) The future brand name will naturally come "The name resulted in misspellings and confusion to those outside the company, so the company renamed itself Stripe" says Wikipedia. If you have a good reason to change your name, you are doing things correctly. Therefore, seek an initial culture-fit representation and drive it to the next stage! In the end, changing it or not won't be up to you - your audience will make that call. References Greylock. (2015, November 4th). Blitzscaling 11: Patrick Collison on Hiring at Stripe and the Role of a Product-Focused CEO [video]. Retrieved https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrDZhAxpKrQ Paul Graham. (2013, July). Do Things That Don't Scale. Retrieved from http://paulgraham.com/ds.html ProductSF 2016 (2016, November 10) Nextdoor Co-Founder Sarah Leary on The Journey of the Pivot. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/tvHAcc2UOl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stripe_(company)

Startups: Stop Romanticizing Your Brand and Tailor it for Early Adopters

A QR Code (Quick Response Code) is a two-dimensional barcode that was introduced in 1994. It is a machine-readable optical label that stores the information about the product to which it is attached. A single QR code can hold up to 4,000 characters. It consists of patterns of black squares which can be scanned and translated into human readable information using an imaging device. Not long ago, QR codes were limited to redirect users to certain web pages or URLs. Today, QR codes aren’t limited to sharing information, but they can do much more. From promoting business products to mobile contactless payments, QR codes are making our life easier in a lot of ways. Excessive use of mobile phones, internet, and remote devices has changed the way consumers and businesses interact. It has given rise to digital marketing where almost every organization is trying to engage clients available on the internet. QR codes can help marketers track performance of the products. Here are some of the applications of QR codes: QR Codes On Packaging According to a , 52 percent of consumers would purchase a product again if they receive premium packaging the first time. Therefore, it is important to create beautiful and appealing packaging on the products. Millennials want aesthetically pleasing packaging with minimal design. QR codes can help you achieve that. Also, GMO products in the US requires to have QR codes on the products so that customers can learn more about the product and its ingredients. So, it is a common practice to include QR codes on product packaging. research QR Codes For Cashless Payments Retail stores can use QR codes to facilitate quick cashless payment systems. Walmart was amongst the first to use QR code for cashless payments. These can be very helpful in attracting millenials who like the idea of cashless ecosystem. No need to carry cash with you when you can make payment with your smartphones. Now, we can see QR codes at almost all the retail stores, and consumers can make payments easily with the help of their smartphone. Social Media Social media is also using QR codes. Giants like Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat allow users to follow accounts by scanning QR codes. WhatApp allows you to open your messages on your computer by scanning a code. All you have to do is scan a code with your phone, and you’re good to go. Brands can use QR codes to build presence on social media by driving more and more users on their accounts. It saves you the hassle of looking up for those accounts by easily redirecting you to the page that you’re looking for. Tracking Performance Metrics For marketers, it is very important to keep track of performance metrics. It is usually not easy to see how well a marketing campaign is performing. But QR codes can help with the problem. Based on the number of scans, marketers can understand if the marketing campaign or the product itself is performing well or not. It will help them create better marketing strategies. Multi URL QR Codes — How Do They Help? Whether you own a restaurant, retail store, or a travel agency, multi URL QR codes can help you customize your deals according to the time of the day. In simple words, a multi URL QR code is a single code to redirect to multiple online resources. Key features of multi URL QR codes are: · System-based redirection · Time-based redirection · Location-based redirection · Real-time statistics · Print-ready reports · Custom designed QR codes · High-grade flexibility Let’s learn more about multi URL QR code’s time-based redirection. Set Different URLs per Time Time-based redirection is the best way to promote limited offers using the same QR codes you’ll be using after the offer ends. Some cases of using time-based redirection in multi URL QR codes are listed below: 1. For instance, you can let users avail breakfast, lunch, dinner, and midnight deals at your website or local store using the same QR code. When the time duration for breakfast ends, the users will be automatically redirected to the lunch offer page and so on. Sounds fair enough? 2. Another use-case of time-based redirection is offering discounts on your restraint menu or store products during the Christmas holidays. All users need to do is scan the QR code, avail the discounted coupons or offers, and make the purchase. 3. Moreover, you can use to do A/B testing of your campaigns to see what converts best from the same QR code at different times. A dynamic multi URL QR code allows you to change the saved information anytime. Thereby, when the offer ends, you can simply replace the offer landing page with a new one. And anyone can create QR codes. Using a like QRzebra, you can create QR codes, customize them per your brand, and track real-time data including time, date, location, device type, and the total number of scans. QR codes make our life faster and easier. From faster checkouts to increased number of sales, there are a lot of reasons we cannot overlook the importance of QR codes. Also, if you’re a business, it is important that you seek out each and every tool to maximize ROI. QR code generator with logo

Real-World Applications Of QR Codes Today

I read the whitepaper so you don’t have to. What is Tor? The Onion Routing Protocol (TOR) was designed by the US Navy in the mid 1990s at the U.S Naval Research Labatory[0]. The pre-alpha version of Tor was released to the public in September of 2002 [1] and the Tor project, the company that maintains Tor, was started in 2006. Here is a quote from the paper titled “Tor: The Second-Generation Onion Router” on what Tor is in a nutshell: Tor is a circuit based low-latency anonymous communication service [2] The core principle of Tor is “onion routing” which is a technique for anonymous communication over a public network. In onion routing messages are encapsulated in several layers of encryption, analogous to encapsulation in the OSI 7 layer model [3]. It is called onion routing because onions have layers and this networking protocol also has layers. The resulting ‘onion’ (fully encapsulated message) is then transmitted through a series of nodes in a network (called onion routers) with each node peeling away a layer of the ‘onion’ and therefore uncovering the data’s next destination. When the final layer is decrypted you get the plaintext of the original message. The original author remains anonymous because each node in the network is only aware of the preceding and following nodes in the path (except the first node that does know who the sender is, but doesn’t know the final destination). This has led to ‘attacks’ on which the NSA runs servers in order to attempt to be the first and last nodes in the network. If the NSA server is the first node, it knows where the message is from. If the NSA server is the last node, it knows the final destination and what the message says. [4] Overview Onion Routing is a distributed overlay network designed to anonymise TCP-based applications like web browsing, secure shell and instant messaging. Clients a path through the network and build a where each onion router in the paths knows the predecessor and the successor, but no other nodes in the circuit. choose circuit Packets flows down the network in fixed-size cells which are unwrapped by a symmetric key at each node and relayed downstream. The notion of a symmetric key comes from Symmetric-Key Encryption Algorithms. Symmetric-Key Encryption Algorithms, a detour In Symmetric Key Encryption the same key is used for both Alice (sender) and Bob (receiver) as opposed to public key encryption where these keys differ. This makes it faster and easier to use than Public Key encryption, but this also causes two problems: The key needs to be stored securely Transfer of key may not be secured. If a third party figures out the key, either by attacking the transfer of the key or some other method they will be able to decrypt all communications encrypted with this key. Symmetric Key encryption is also much less computationally expensive than public key encryption, which is useful in a network like this. is a set of cryptographic protocols based on algorithms that require two separate keys: Public Key Cryptography Public-key — Which is public and visible by others Private-key — Which is private and meant to be kept secret. These two keys are mathematically linked. In public key cryptography the use of the public key is to encrypt plaintext and the use of the private key is to decrypt encrypted text. This means that anyone can encrypt plaintext for a specific person but only that person can decrypt it. The two keys are very large prime numbers. Assume q and p are two separate and equally large prime numbers and then n = pq. n is used to encrypt the message and p and q are used to decrypt the message. This works because factorisation is hard to compute. Given a very (very) large number, find the factors of that number which are prime numbers. Often times the numbers are in hexadecimal. Digital Signatures Another useful tool of cryptography to know is digital signatures. Digital Signatures use public-key cryptography. A digital signature is a digital version of a physical signature. Often times you can say you have cryptographically / digitally signed a document. Only the person with the private key can produce valid digital signatures which allow them to sign a document alot more securely than a physical written signature. Alice wants to digitally sign a message, m. In order to do that Alice must have: Alice then uses a signing function to produce a digital signature: The internals of the signing function isn’t necessary to know. The function takes a message, a private key and it will produce a digital signature. exact Anyone can use the public key to verify a digital signature: If anyone knows how to put spaces in trueorfalse (in mathjax) I will greatly appreciate the help! I say that a signing function isn’t necessary to know however if you want to learn a few go ahead. The reason I haven’t added them to this document is because someone from 2–3 years time might read this and signing functions could be completely different. Tor itself Tor requires alot of users to create anonmity and thus if Tor was hard to use users wouldn’t adopt it so easily making it less anonymous. Because of this, the usabillity isn’t just a design choice of Tor but a . If Tor isn’t usable or designed nicely, it won’t be used and thus it won’t be secured. security requirement Tor has therefore had to make some design decisions that may not improve security but improve usabillity. Disadvantages Tor is not a completely decentralised peer-to-peer system like many people believe it to be. If it was completely peer to peer it wouldn’t be very usable. Tor requires a set of directory servers that manage and keep the state of the network at any given time. Tor is not secure against end to end attacks. An end to end attack is where an entity has control of both the first and last node in a path, as stated earlier. This is a problem that cyber security experts have yet to solve, so Tor does not have a solution to this problem. Tor does not provide protocol-normalisation like Privoxy or the Anonymizer, meaning that If senders want anonymity from responders while using complex and variable protocols like HTTP, Tor must be layered with a ﬁltering proxy such as Privoxy to hide differences between clients, and expunge protocol features that leak identity. [2] Tor does not hide the identity of the sender. In 2013 during the Final Exams period at Harvard a student tried to delay the exam by sending in a fake bomb threat. The student used Tor and Guerillar Mail (a service which allows people to make disposable email addresses) to send the bomb threat to school officials. [5] The student was caught, even though he took precautions to make sure he wasn’t caught. Gurillar mail sends an originating IP address header along with the email that’s sent so the receiver knows where the original email came from. With Tor, the student expected the IP address to be scrambled but the authorities knew it came from a Tor exit node (Tor keeps a list of all nodes in the directory service) so the authoriies simply looked for people who were accessing Tor at the time the email was sent. Onion Routing So given the network above we are going to simulate a very basic onion routing protocol. The laptop on the left is the sender and the server rack on the right is the receiver. So we start off by encrypting a message with 3 layers of encryption (Tor typically uses 3 nodes, so therefore 3 layers of encryption are needed) The first layer is stripped off on the first machine. Something important to note here is that every machine only knows what the predecessor is or what the sucessor is, it does not know what the final goal is unless it is the last node in the path. As it travels down the path, more and more layers are stripped away. The second (middle) node does not know where the message originated or where the final destination is. The final node knows what the message is and where it’s going, but it doesn’t know who sent it. The computer then reads the content of the message which might be “connect me to Facebook” and it then connects to Facebook and receives a message back as a response. Because the node doesn’t know where the original message came from, it sends it back through the network to the predecessor and says “pass this back through the network”. But before doing this, it adds it’s own level of encryption back. Eventually the original node receives a fully encrypted packet containing the response from Facebook. Because the original node has both private and public keys it can fully decrypt the message. One of the key properties here is that once a node decrypts a layer, it cannot tell how many more layers there are to decrypt. It could be as small as 1 or 2 or as large as 200 layers of encryption. The first node knows who sent the message but it doesn’t know what the message says because it is encrypted. The last node knows what the message says but it can’t tell where it came from. How is a circuit created? Each machine, when it wants to create a circuit, chooses the exit node first, followed by the other nodes in the circuit. All paths in the circuit obey these rules: We do not choose the same router twice for the same path. We do not choose any router in the same family as another in the same path. (Two routers are in the same family if each one lists the other in the “family” entries of its descriptor.) We do not choose more than one router in a given /16 subnet. We don’t choose any non-running or non-valid router unless we have been configured to do so. By default, we are configured to allow non-valid routers in “middle” and “rendezvous” positions. The first node must be a Guard node. A guard node is a privileged node because it sees the real IP of the user. It’s ‘expensive’ to become a guard node (maintain a high uptime for weeks and have good bandwidth) Something important to note here is that Tor uses the Diffie-Hellman algorithm to set up session keys between the user and onion routers. Diffie-Hellman Diffie-Hellman is a way of a shared secret between two people in such a way that the secret can’t be seen by observing the communication. You’re not sharing information during the key exchange, you’re creating a key together. generating Now for some basic knowledge on Diffie-Hellman, taken from here I come up with two prime numbers, and and tell you what they are x y You then pick a secret number ( ) but don’t tell anyone. Instead you compute and send that result back to me (we’ll call it ) a A I do the same thing, but we’ll call my secret number and the computed number . So I compute and send you the result. b B Now you take the number I sent you and do the exact same operation with it. So that’s . I do the same operation with the result you sent me, The cool part here is that the answer I get at step 5 is the same answer you get at step 4. It comes down to a cool property of modulo components: Tor Hidden Services In a traditional network you have a definite input and a definite output. You know where your data is going. In a Tor Hidden Service you input some data but no outside force can see where it’s going. It is possible to communicate with a server without the user or the server knowing who eachother are. When a server is set up on Tor to act as a hidden service, the server sends a message to some selected Onion Routers asking if they want to be an introduction point to the server. It is entirely up to the server as to who gets chosen as an introduction point and it doesn’t matter who is chosen. The introduction points know that they are going to be introducing people to the server. The server will then create something called a hidden service descriptor which has a public key and the IP address of each introduction point. It will then send this hidden service descriptor to a distributed hash table which means that every onion router will hold some part of the information of the hidden service descriptor. If you try to look up a hidden service the introduction point responsible for it will give you the full hidden service descriptor. The key for this hash table is the onion address and the onion address is derived from the server. The idea is that the onion address isn’t publicised over the whole Tor network but instead you find it another way like from a friend telling you or on the internet (addresses ending in .onion). So almost every single onion router will have minimal knowledge about the hidden service unless they explicitly want to find it. If you want to access an onion address you would first request the descriptor off of the hash table and the descriptor has, let’s say 4 or 5 IP addresses of introductory nodes. You pick one at random and you’re going to ask the introduction point to introduce you to the server and instead of making a connection directly to the server you make a rendezvous point at random in the network from a given set of Onion Routers. You then make a circuit to that rendezvous point and you send a message to the rendezvous point asking if it can introduce you to the server using the introduction point you just used and then it says “I want you to send a message, X, to the server”. The rendezvous point makes a circuit to the introduction point and sends it the word X and its IP address. The introduction point sends the message to the server and the server can choose to accept it or do nothing. If the server accepts the message it will then create a circuit to the rendezvous point. The server sends the rendezvous point to the server and the rendezvous point looks at both messages and if they’re the same then it will then act as another hop on the circuit and connect them directly. Another important thing to note is that every single Tor packet (called a cell) is exactly 512kb and they are all encrypted. Tor does this so people cannot guess that larger cells are images / media. In short, a hidden service works like this, taken from : here A hidden service calculates its key pair (private and public key, asymmetric encryption). Then the hidden service picks some relays as its . introduction points It tells its public key to those over Tor circuits. introduction points After that the hidden-service creates a , containing its public key and what its are. hidden service descriptor introduction points The hidden service signs the with its private key. hidden service descriptor It then uploads the to a (DHT). hidden service descriptor distributed hash table Clients learn the .onion address from a hidden service out-of-band. (e.g. public website) (A $hash.onion is a 16 character name derived from the service’s public key.) After retrieving the .onion address the client connects to the DHT and asks for that $hash. If it exists the client learns about the hidden service’s public key and its . introduction points The client picks a relay at random to build a circuit to it, to tell it a . The picked relay acts as . one-time secret rendezvous point The client creates a , containing the address of the and the , before encrypting the message with the hidden service’s public key. introduce message rendezvous point one-time secret The client sends its message over a Tor circuit to one of the , demanding it to be forwarded to the hidden service. introduction points The hidden service decrypts the with its private key to learn about the and the . introduce message rendezvous point one-time secret The hidden service creates a , containing the and sends it over a circuit to the . rendezvous message one-time secret rendezvous point The tells the client that a connection was established. rendezvous point Client and hidden service talk to each other over this . All traffic is end-to-end encrypted and the just relays it back and forth. Note that each of them, client and hidden service, build a circuit to the ; at three hops per circuit this makes six hops in total. rendezvous point rendezvous point rendezvous point _Support the content you love. Buy a Coffee for Brandon Skerritt with Ko-fi.com_ko-fi.com Buy Brandon Skerritt a Coffee. ko-fi.com/hacker _Go to paypal.me/BrandonSkerritt and type in the amount. Since it's PayPal, it's easy and secure. Don't have a PayPal…_www.paypal.me Pay Brandon Skerritt using PayPal.Me References [0] — [1] — [2] — [3] — [4] — [5] — [6] — http://www.onion-router.net/Publications/JSAC-1998.pdf http://archives.seul.org/or/dev/Sep-2002/msg00019.html http://fermatslibrary.com/s/tor-the-second-generation-onion-router http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/1094702/ https://cyber-peace.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Attacking-Tor_-how-the-NSA-targets-users-online-anonymity-_-World-news-_-theguardian.pdf http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/12/17/student-charged-bomb-threat/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRYzre4bf7I

How does Tor *really* work?

SEO is arguably the fastest-changing industry of all, and it only seems to be growing. There are a variety of reasons for this, but one main factor that has changed SEO as we know it today from what was possible 8-10 years ago is how Google ranks webpages in their search engine results page (SERP). Nowadays there aren't any shortcuts or simple ways to rank your website higher on SERPs - you either need good content + user engagement/interaction or else nothing will happen at all. SEO may have been easy 10+ years ago when keyword stuffing could get websites into the top ten slots; however, now such tactics no longer work, they can actually do more harm than help with rankings. Modern Google search algorithms take into account many little things: from the quality and uniqueness of content to adaptation for mobile versions and voice search. In this article, we'll discuss the top 7 SEO trends of 2021. Trend # 1: Google's Page Experience Update 2021 saw the emergence of a new ranking algorithm from Google. The main idea behind the Page Experience Update focuses on evaluating websites based on user experience. In simple terms, if a resource is safe, convenient, and attractive to people, it gets high positions in the search results. User experience will be measured using Core Web Vitals metrics. These indicators include: LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) - analyzes the loading speed of a web resource, that is, the time it takes for the main block of content (text, images, and videos) to be displayed. This is an important indicator. If the site takes a long time to load, this negatively affects the visitor's reaction. The optimal value is loading the main content in 2.5 seconds. FID (First Input Delay) - an assessment of the site's interactivity. Determines the time between the time visitor entered the web resource and began to interact with the content, and how the website reacted to the action. The optimal FID is up to 100 ms. CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift) - visual stability analysis. The indicator calculates unexpected "jumps" of the content block during the display of a web page. The optimal CLS is less than 0.1 (i.e., 0 to 1 hop). Trend # 2: Mobile Friendly In early 2021, Google began to use another important indicator for ranking web resources - Mobile Friendly. This is due to the fact that a significant part of search queries is done using smartphones. Therefore, all website owners should prepare their high-quality mobile versions. It is important that they not only exist but also have a stylish design, load quickly and work stably. You can evaluate the mobile version of the site in by assessing the quality of resource optimization. Google Search Console After the test, you can view the report and recommendations for improving the mobile version of your website. Trend # 3: Safety To get into the TOP ranking of search engines, a resource must be not only beautiful, convenient, and interesting. It is important to take care of its safety. Web developers and SEOs should pay attention to: the presence of a secure HTTPS protocol. Every day we read the news about the leakage of personal data of Internet users. For this, it is important to correctly configure the HTTPS protocol; lack of malware and unsafe content. The presence of viruses is often evidenced by the pessimization of the web resource, warnings from hosting providers, and user complaints. You should regularly use from Yandex and from Google; Site status check Safe Browsing banners and pop-ups. Such elements not only annoy visitors but also slow down the page loading speed. Trend # 4: EAT EAT is an acronym that has been one of the most important ranking factors since 2018. It stands for: Е (expertise) А (authoritativeness) T (trustworthiness) This metric is not important for all sites. For example, if the resource is dedicated to the most beautiful representatives of K-POP, then E-AT will not be important, since the likability of a particular singer is a subjective indicator. But if the site is devoted to medical or financial topics, the E-A-T factor will play one of the determining roles in the ranking. How is EAT assessed? For YMYL (Your money or Your Life) topics (finance, health, jurisprudence), the author's expertise is important. That is, an article on the selection of contraceptives will clearly be more useful for an Internet user if it is written by a certified gynecologist. 1. Expertise: Nevertheless, expertise can also be referred to in everyday topics. To confirm the author's expertise, the page must contain information about him. Just a photo and a surname are not enough. It is important to make markup that confirms the identity of the author. On his page should be placed information that will prove the expertise: diplomas of higher education, certificates, etc. In this case, the author's regalia must correspond to the subject in which he works. If he writes about medicines, a pharmacist or medical diploma does not hurt. The company or person who runs the page must be respected by industry experts or opinion leaders. This factor is assessed by Google assessors. They look for information about authority on the Internet. 2. Authority: It is understood that the texts on the pages will be truthful and accurate. Assessors check this factor by paying attention to the authors of the content, the credibility, and the authority of the sources. 3. Credibility: To improve performance for EAT, the analyst Search Quality Manager Gary Ils advises that it is worth using references to authoritative sources. It's important to keep track of the relevance of the data and check the facts. It will also be useful to provide more information about the authors, which will confirm their expertise. Trend # 5: Long Tailed Key Phrases Long-tail search terms are key phrases of 5 or more words. They are not high-frequency, but they are capable of generating about 50-70% of organic traffic. Longtails help users find information faster. Trend # 6: A large number of traffic sources Search engines respond well to resources that attract traffic from different places. This signals that the website is popular and interesting to different audiences. The SEO trend is certainly not new, but in 2021 it continues to gain momentum. Developers, optimizers, and business owners need to pay attention to the development of such areas to attract users: video hosting sites - YouTube, Daily Motion; social networks - Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, etc .; messengers - Telegram, WhatsApp, Viber. Don't forget about forums, directories, display and contextual advertising, blogs, and so on. Trend # 7: Local SEO There is a trend towards an increase in the number of search queries, which are accompanied by the phrases "close", "close", "near", etc. For example, people often search: "A pharmacy near me." Do not neglect the registration of the company on maps and directories. If a person is looking for a pharmacy, restaurant, or gym, the search engine will first show them the websites of places that are close to the user. If you don’t have expertise in local SEO, you can always look up . SEO Services in Toronto, Miami, Malaysia, Singapore, New York Summary Following the precepts of EAT, we dealt with the latest trends in search engine promotion. A lot has changed, but the basic things have remained unshakable: in order to be at the top of the rankings, it is important to work on the usability of the site, solve technical problems in a timely manner and generate quality content.

Top 7 SEO Trends in 2021 Every Marketer Should Follow

is one of the most rapidly growing exchanges, swiftly making a reputation for itself by rapidly adding new services. It pioneered new products such as . It is unfortunate Americans cannot take advantage of this exchange. FTX basket trades, prediction markets, and fractionalized stock trading has invested in FTX (both entities founded by ). Alameda is a quantitative crypto trading business with a that is a prominent market maker on FTX. Alameda Research Sam Bankman-Fried $100 million AUM Alameda was one of the major liquidity providers and market makers in the industry within a year of its start, trading up to $1 billion per day. TUSD and USDC were also early liquidity partners. Moreover, , a decentralised exchange that is independent of the FTX ecosystem. FTX created Serum (SRM) Disclaimer : Throughout this article I have used referral links. Most of these services gives you additional discounts if you use referral links. FTX Products & Features 1. NFT Marketplace The marketplace appears to run on both the Ethereum blockchain and a network named Solana, which employs a proof-of-stake consensus mechanism and consumes substantially less power than Ethereum. FTX are a sort of cryptocurrency that may provide verifiable ownership and scarcity of any sort of asset. NFTs have been widely utilised for Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) digital art, music, and memes, among other sorts of material, to date. Some of FTX’s NFTs are linked to physical objects and “redeemable” for their physical equivalents. An NFT linked to an image of should result in three genuine KAWS statuettes; the same is true for an NFT linked to an FTX-branded condom. FTX levies a on each transaction or trade on NFTs. three KAWS statuettes 5% fee to both the buyer and the seller 2. Futures offers over that may be traded using a stablecoin as collateral, such as USD or USDT. FTX 100 futures pairings Futures contracts are paid using stablecoins. That is, you will be putting up . You don’t need a bank account to pay the futures when they expire this way. Instead, use a stable coin to make it easy to enter and exit a position. When you deposit stablecoins, they are converted into USD to cover your margin needs. stablecoins as collateral FTX also includes a structure of backstop liquidity providers that will step in if is required. clawback Sign Up on FTX & get 5% Off on Your Trading Fees 3. Leveraged Tokens Leveraged Tokens are a unique asset for cryptocurrency traders developed by FTX. These are ERC20 tokens with leveraged exposure to the trading pair of up to 3x. To begin trading leveraged coins, there is from the user’s FTX account balance. There are also exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that have leveraged exposure to a variety of existing and popular cryptocurrency assets. no margin need Using FTX leveraged tokens can assist a trader control risk. Any transaction being traded by the derivatives exchange. gains are immediately reinvested back into the underlying asset This implies that if your leveraged token investment is profitable, the tokens will automatically add 3x leveraged holdings to it. Conversely, if the position is negative, leveraged tokens will immediately lower risk. 4. MOVE Contracts Move Contracts enable you to trade depending on the movement of the price of a certain cryptocurrency while only risking a small amount of money. Movement can occur in any direction. They are futures contracts that expire based on the total amount of Bitcoin. It can be done on a daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly basis. Weekly contracts do not have to match to the calendar week. . This feature draws a large number of users to the exchange. The total volatility of the BTC during a certain time period is the major determinant 5. Options You may also trade Bitcoin options on FTX, which offer you the right but not the responsibility to purchase or sell the digital coin at a certain date and price. You can use leverage to go long or short on options, just like you can with futures. When it expires, . the contract will be settled for an amount equal to its expiry price in dollars 6. Prediction Markets They make it possible for users to trade in more conventional ways. It’s comparable to traditional betting. . You will either win and the contract will settle at 100%, or you will lose and it will settle at 0%. You may place a wager on any real-world occurrence One well-known example is betting on who will win the forthcoming elections. Each candidate will be given a contract. . They have the option to long or short each contract. The buy-in fee will be different for each contender and will be determined by their chances of winning Following the success of our presidential election prediction markets, we will strive to extend our prediction market service to . This process is already in motion, with Super Bowl prediction markets live on the platform and more intriguing markets on the way. include new events such as sports, e-sports, midterm elections, and more 7. Tokenized Stocks Tokenized stocks are the most exciting product from FTX. Giving qualified traders the opportunity to trade a tokenized stock is something that has never been done before in crypto. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year These are backed up 1:1 with shares held at a registered brokerage, entitling the trader to all of the economic . benefits of owning the stock: dividends, stock splits, and so on In addition to stock spot trading, we have implemented futures trading capability for these products, enabling customers to trade with up to 101x leverage in the same manner they would with any other market on FTX; . same collateral pool, same margin requirements, same everything 8. Spot Trading Similarly to a spot trading exchange, traditional traders may acquire a variety of popular digital assets on the market. , including BTC, ETH, LINK, FTT, PAXG, ADA and XRP. FTX presently supports over 100 trading pairings that may be exchanged for USD or USDT 9. OTC Desk Assume you are purchasing a big number of assets. In such situation, you may be allowed to purchase ‘over the counter,’ or ‘OTC.’ Professional traders typically pick this option since the . Another argument may be that it will have an impact on the price of that coin. order book may be too thin to complete the deal Most exchanges provide this option, however other than the spread for it. You have the option of requesting OTC quotations. It offers discounted prices. You may learn more about it by visiting the . FTX charges no fees FTX OTC Quote webpage Sign Up on FTX & get 5% Off on Your Trading Fees How to get started with FTX To open an account in FTX, go to the top right corner and . In the profile settings, you may safeguard your account by using . click on the Register option two-factor authentication Following that, you must complete your KYC. You can now deposit funds to trade; however, your account has a total . withdrawal restriction of $1,000 until KYC verification is completed https://help.ftx.com/hc/en-us/articles/360027668192-Individual-Account-KYC FTX Trading Fees https://help.ftx.com/hc/en-us/articles/360024479432-Fees FTT Token FTT is the . It provides some benefits to users, such as . It may be traded on the exchange’s Spot/Futures market. It can, for example, be exchanged on . FTX Exchange’s native token lower FTX trading fees Binance https://help.ftx.com/hc/en-us/articles/360024479432-Fees are available to FTT stakeholders, and . Maker refunds of up to 0.0030% it costs just 25 FTT to have no maker fees FTX US Review FTX.US offers , each with its own set of criteria. A client’s account must be verified if they wish to expand their limits or gain access to other financing options. Individual and corporate accounts have various needs, and each tier need more information. several account tiers https://help.ftx.us/hc/en-us/articles/360048666713-Account-Tiers-and-Limits FTX US Trading Fees https://help.ftx.us/hc/en-us/articles/360043579273-Fees Conclusion FTX is continually expanding, with more creative products and services being added to the platform. The exchange has already made a name for itself in the . Cryptocurrency derivatives market The unmatched assortment of crypto financial products accessible at . If you have a solid grasp of the complexities of trading derivatives, . FTX distinguishes it in the industry FTX can provide you with a plethora of chances Sign Up on FTX & get 5% Off on Your Trading Fees

FTX : The Fastest Moving Derivatives Exchange

In a recent blog post on , BioWare Austin and Anthem Executive Producer, Christian Dailey, announced that the game studio has opted to cease development on Anthem. This includes a previously announced fundamental restructure of the game that was being worked on under the name of Anthem NEXT, which will no longer see the light of day. BioWare’s official website This ends a tumultuous run for the online multiplayer game and so-called live service. The game launched in January 2019, where it received middling reviews and amassed disappointing sales, failing to hit publisher Electronic Arts’ expected six million copies sold by . March 2019 For the remaining players of the doomed title, Dailey did announce in his blog post that Anthem will continue running as a live service as it exists today. Whether BioWare will keep to that promise for the foreseeable future remains to be seen. Additionally, Dailey cited the COVID-19 pandemic and issues with “working from home during the pandemic” impacting productivity and development for what BioWare had planned for relaunching Anthem. Dailey added, “Not everything we had planned as a studio before COVID-19 can be accomplished without putting undue stress on our teams.” Ironically enough, it was reported by Jason Schreier in in April 2019 how much stress and pressure the development team for Anthem was put under so the game could make its launch date. Kotaku One anonymous former BioWare developer claimed, “I actually cannot count the amount of ‘stress casualties we had on Mass Effect: Andromeda or Anthem.” In terms of the future for BioWare, Daily noted that the team is looking to achieve “laser focus” in order to strengthen the next planned installment of Dragon Age and also Mass Effect, along with updates to Star Wars: The Old Republic. However, the sad end for Anthem definitely serves as a cautionary tale that should serve as an example to the entire video gaming industry. Otherwise, it will be a mistake that history is doomed to repeat. More Gaming News Pokémon Legends: Arceus Revealed Alongside Diamond and Pearl Remakes Ninja Gaiden: Master Collection Arrives for All Platforms on June 10 7 Nioh 2 Character Creation Codes on PC

QR2Z

qr2z.com

1 employees

Since 2022

COMPANY RANKING

QR2Z

EVERGREEN INDEX #8593

QR2Z WIKI

Apply to get your Tech Company News Page live on HackerNoon.com today!

QR2Z

qr2z.com

1 employees

Since 2022

COMPANY RANKING

QR2Z

EVERGREEN INDEX #8593

RELATED COMPANIESRANK

STORIES ABOUT QR2Z

QR2Z WIKI

Apply to get your Tech Company News Page live on HackerNoon.com today!