Brent Sordyl's blog

Boost your dev environment with Vagrant (presentation)

Brent Sordyl — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 14:23:43 +0000

What if you could get rid of the quote "does not work on my machine"?

(Full Story: http://danielcsgomes.com/talks/boost-your-dev-environment-with-vagrant-phplx/#.Ub8Zk_aAcxZ )

Dell builds a government cloud of its own on OpenShift and OpenStack

Brent Sordyl — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 19:23:43 +0000

Dell Cloud for U.S. Government builds on Red Hat’s OpenStack implementation and Dell’s platform-as-a-service component will be based on Red Hat’s OpenShift. That choice of OpenStack as basis is interesting because Dell recently nixed plans to offer an OpenStack-based public cloud but also said its private cloud offerings would still draw upon the OpenStack open-source stack. For the record, Red Hat’s OpenStack is technically still in preview although it’s likely that general availability will be announced this week at its Red Hat Summit. OpenShift became generally available yesterday.

(Full Story: http://gigaom.com/2013/06/11/dell-builds-a-gov-cloud-of-its-own/ )

9 Qualities Of Truly Confident People – Dharmesh Shah

Brent Sordyl — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 15:53:22 +0000

1. They take a stand not because they think they are always right… but because they are not afraid to be wrong. 2. They listen ten times more than they speak. 3. They duck the spotlight so it shines on others. 4. They freely ask for help. 5. They think, “Why not me?” 6. They don’t put down other people. 7. They aren’t afraid to look silly… 8. … And they own their mistakes. 9. They only seek approval from the people who really matter.

(Full Story: http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130606150641-658789-9-qualities-of-truly-confident-people )

Why Big Data Is Not Truth – NYTimes.com

Brent Sordyl — Sun, 02 Jun 2013 14:53:29 +0000

Myth 1: Big Data is New Myth 2: Big Data Is Objective Myth 3: Big Data Doesn’t Discriminate Myth 4: Big Data Makes Cities Smart Myth 5: Big Data Is Anonymous Myth 6: You Can Opt Out

(Full Story: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/01/why-big-data-is-not-truth/ )

Best Practices for Designing a Pragmatic RESTful API | Vinay Sahni

Brent Sordyl — Thu, 30 May 2013 15:38:59 +0000

TL;DR An API is a user interface for a developer – so put some effort into making it pleasant Use RESTful URLs and actions Use SSL everywhere, no exceptions An API is only as good as its documentation – so have great documentation Version via the URL, not via headers Use query parameters for advanced filtering, sorting & searching Provide a way to limit which fields are returned from the API Return something useful from POST, PATCH & PUT requests HATEOAS isn’t practical just yet Use JSON where possible, XML only if you have to You should use camelCase with JSON, but snake_case is 20% easier to read Pretty print by default & ensure gzip is supported Don’t use response envelopes by default Consider using JSON for POST, PUT and PATCH request bodies Paginate using Link headers Provide a way to autoload related resource representations Provide a way to override the HTTP method Provide useful response headers for rate limiting Use token based authentication, transported over OAuth2 where…

(Full Story: http://www.vinaysahni.com/best-practices-for-a-pragmatic-restful-api )

The Art of Finding Anyone’s Email Addresses | LifeAfterCubes

Brent Sordyl — Tue, 28 May 2013 20:09:01 +0000

(Full Story: http://www.lifeaftercubes.com/2013/05/22/the-art-of-finding-anyones-email-addresses/ )

Big Data is bovine excrement says Obama’s Big Data man • The Register

Brent Sordyl — Tue, 28 May 2013 19:38:59 +0000

Reed would rather it had not come into such wide use, if only because he feels most people contemplating an investment in “Big Data” probably don’t have enough data to qualify for the term as he understands it.

(Full Story: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/28/big_data_is_bovine_excrement_says_obamas_big_data_man/ )

Simple Team Performance Management – iDoneThis

Brent Sordyl — Tue, 28 May 2013 15:23:25 +0000

Reply to an evening email reminder with what you did that day. The next day, get a digest with what everyone on the team got done.

(Full Story: https://idonethis.com/ )

Openshift Under The Hood: OpenShift on AWS EC2, Part 1: From the wheels up

Brent Sordyl — Tue, 28 May 2013 12:54:08 +0000

The host configuration is complex enough that even for a small service it is best to use a Configuration Management System (CMS) to configure and manage the system, but the CMS can’t start work until the hosts exist and have network communications. The CMS itself must be installed and configured. Once the hosts exist and are bound together then the CMS can do the rest of the work and a clean boundary of control and access is established. This will later allow the bottom layer (establishing hosts and installing/configuring the CMS) to be replaced without affecting the actual service installation above. So the goal here is: create and connect hosts with a CMS installed using EC2.

(Full Story: http://cloud-mechanic.blogspot.com/2013/05/openshift-on-aws-ec2-part-1-from-wheels.html )

In Media, Big Data Is Booming but Big Results Are Lacking – AllThingsD

Brent Sordyl — Tue, 28 May 2013 12:38:28 +0000

Until recently, we have had startlingly few case studies of the transformative power of Big Data on which to model our own big changes in media. Instead we’ve had IT initiatives that promised big insights, but ended up delivering big databases and bigger IT bills. For once, it’s not the IT department’s fault — it’s those of us who are using the data (and, more often, aren’t using it) who are to blame.

(Full Story: http://allthingsd.com/20130520/in-media-big-data-is-booming-but-big-results-are-lacking/?mod=thisweek )