Tackling Developer Onboarding Complexity
A common thread in onboarding, and more broadly on reducing developer cognitive
load, is the concept of “golden paths” or “paved paths.” Ultimately, the idea is
to reduce complexity and get to the bare bones of what needs to be learned or
done to increase developer velocity and safety. Mostly, once the cultural
aspects of onboarding are covered, this comes back to the “golden path” platform
created for developers, which includes the tools and processes that are proven
to work but aren’t handcuffs. Once a developer knows how to walk, for example,
platforms should be flexible enough to let them run. Humanitec’s CEO, Kaspar von
Grünberg, said, “Perhaps more important than fancy golden paths is to agree on
the lowest common tech denominator to empower developers to work faster. Why run
ultra-complex things if there is an alternative? It is like taking a tractor to
do your grocery shopping, which is not productive. If you scatter things all
over the place, you are not getting the effects of scale, and the tools you
bring in are not delivering ROI. This is why I advocate for the value of
standardization. Standardization forms the lowest common tech denominators,
clearing the way for individual freedom where needed.”
How devops in the cloud breaks down
First is the obvious issue: talent. To do devops in the cloud, you need devops
engineers who understand how to build and use toolchains. More important, you
need engineers who know how to build toolchains using cloud-based tools. Some
(but not many) people out there have these skills. I see many companies fail to
find them and even pull back devops to traditional platforms just so they can
staff up. Sadly, that’s not a bad strategy right now. Second, the cloud rarely
has all the tools you’ll need for most devops toolchains. Although we have a
tremendous number of devops tools, either sold by the public cloud providers or
by key partners that sell devops cloud services, about 10% to 20% of the tools
you’ll need don’t exist on your public cloud platform. You will have to
incorporate another provider’s platform, which then leads to multicloud
complexity. Of course, the need for those absent tools depends on the type of
application you’re building. This shortage is not as much of a problem as it
once was because devops tool providers saw the cloud computing writing on the
wall and quickly filled in the tool shortages.
Tesla is set to introduce its prime 'Optimus' robot
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"Autopilot/AI team is also working on Optimus and (actually smart)
summon/autopark, which have end of month deadlines," Musk wrote while responding
to a Tesla fan club account on Twitter. Musk's Texas-based company is reportedly
considering ambitious plans to use thousands of humanoid robots within its
factories before eventually extending to millions globally, per a job posting.
According to Musk, who is now promoting a vision for the company that extends
far beyond producing self-driving electric cars, the robot industry may
eventually be worth more than Tesla's automobile income. A source familiar with
the situation claimed that as Tesla holds more internal discussions on robotics,
the buzz is growing within the organization. ... For Tesla to be successful, it
will have to display robots performing various spontaneous acts. Such evidence
might help Tesla stock, which is currently down 25 percent from its 2021 peak,
according to Nancy Cooke, a professor of human systems engineering at Arizona
State University.
Researchers Say It'll Be Impossible to Control a Super-Intelligent AI
Rules such as 'cause no harm to humans' can't be set if we don't understand the
kind of scenarios that an AI is going to come up with, suggest the authors of
the new paper. Once a computer system is working on a level above the scope of
our programmers, we can no longer set limits. "A super-intelligence poses a
fundamentally different problem than those typically studied under the banner of
'robot ethics'," wrote the researchers. "This is because a superintelligence is
multi-faceted, and therefore potentially capable of mobilizing a diversity of
resources in order to achieve objectives that are potentially incomprehensible
to humans, let alone controllable." Part of the team's reasoning came from the
halting problem put forward by Alan Turing in 1936. The problem centers on
knowing whether or not a computer program will reach a conclusion and answer (so
it halts), or simply loop forever trying to find one. As Turing proved through
some smart math, while we can know that for some specific programs, it's
logically impossible to find a way that will allow us to know that for every
potential program that could ever be written.
The Mutating Cyber Threat
Although each best practice is important, having a programmatic approach is
essential for success, Kaun said. “Too many organizations look at security as a
list of individual tasks such as perimeter protection and patching, but in
reality they all have to work together.” As best practices mature and become
part of corporate culture, and as people become educated and equipped to apply
those best practices, true change and improved security begins to evolve. “A
common adage in security is ‘people, processes, and technology,’ Cusimano noted.
“Two of those involve people because people have to adhere to the processes.”
The human element is the ultimate toolset, including awareness, collaboration,
support, and maintenance. “A proper security program is properly educated and
equipped people applying best practice policy and procedures, aided by
technology,” Kaun said. “While the right technology will accelerate the effort,
if you do not have the global view, the appropriate people, and contextual data
to act upon, you will struggle.” Establishing that culture is critical but won’t
happen overnight, Cusimano said. He recalled the transition to a safety-first
culture in many manufacturing plants.
MIT and Databricks Report Finds Data Management Key to Scaling AI
“Data issues are more likely than not to be the reason if companies fail to
achieve their AI goals, according to more than two-thirds of the technology
executives we surveyed,” says Francesca Fanshawe, editorial director for MIT
Technology Review and editor of the report. “Improving processing speeds,
governance, and quality of data, as well as its sufficiency for models, are the
main data imperatives to ensure AI can be scaled.” Data security is also a
priority with leaders revealing they plan to increase spending on security
improvement by an average of 101% over the next three years. The leader group
also plans to invest 85% more in the same period on data governance, 69% more on
new data and AI platforms, and 63% more on existing platforms. The report lists
a few attributes of successful data and AI technology foundations, including a
democratization of data to involve a greater number of data literate employees
who can configure and improve AI algorithms. Openness is another attribute, with
open standards and data formats allowing organizations to source data, insights,
and tools externally to facilitate collaboration
Responsible AI, Blockchain in Safe and Ethical AI
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a broad field that includes machine learning and cognitive computing where computers are programmed to mimic cognitive functions such as learning and problem solving many times faster and more accurately than a human. AI or its subset Computational intelligence, when combined with blockchain systems, can create more robust cryptographic functionality and ciphers thereby making it more difficult for cyber hackers to compromise systems. When blockchain participants have increased control over their data, they have the potential to decide with which parties and for what purposes their data are shared. To collect participant data for use in an AI dataset, participant permissions will need to be obtained. ... The decentralized characteristics of smart blockchains can effectively help smart grids realize the transformation from centralization to distribution. The decentralization of smart blockchain breaks information barriers and realizes secure data sharing among multiple participants.
Worried about quiet quitting? These Dos and Don'ts could stop it becoming a problem
To understand the risk of quiet quitting in current employees, keep in touch
with former employees and find out what made them leave the company. Their
insight can help you improve culture for current employees and reduce further
resignations. Deal suggests conducting thorough exit interviews with employees
who leave the company and reaching out six months later to assess their
experience at their new job if they have one. This six-month communication
opportunity can be the route back to the former workplace for some employees. If
an employee expresses dissatisfaction at their new job and an interest in
returning to your company, see what you can do for them. Employees who left your
company on good terms, and later want to return to their old jobs, are called
boomerang employees, and they can be very beneficial to your company. ... But
beware: some employees may hesitate to ask for their old jobs back. They might
fear a response from former colleagues who were unhappy at their departure, or
they might be concerned about an employee they didn't like who is still in the
business. But if you're lucky, this is an opportunity to have excellent talent
return to your company.
DevOps Is Dead. Embrace Platform Engineering
Developers don’t want to do operations anymore, and that’s a bad sign for
DevOps, at least according to this article by Scott Carey and this Twitter
thread by Sid Palas. ... When developers in teams don’t agree on the extent to
which they should, or can, do operations tasks, forcing everyone to do DevOps in
a one-size-fits-all way has disastrous consequences. The primary consequence is
the increasing cognitive load put on developers. This has forced many teams to
reconsider how they balance the freedom that comes from developer self-service
with mitigating cognitive load through abstraction. Both are necessary:
Self-service capabilities are essential to moving quickly and efficiently. ...
Platform engineering uses a product approach to enable the right amount of
developer self-service and find the right level of abstraction for individual
organizations and teams. Successful platform teams combine user research,
regular feedback and marketing best practices to understand their developers,
create a platform that solves common problems and get internal buy-in from key
stakeholders.
SEO poisoning campaign directs search engine visitors from multiple industries to JS malware
Deepwatch came across the campaign while investigating an incident at a
customer where one of the employees searched for “transition services
agreement” on Google and ended up on a website that presented them with what
appeared to be a forum thread where one of the users shared a link to a zip
archive. The zip archive contained a file called "Accounting for transition
services agreement" with a .js (JavaScript) extension that was a variant of
Gootloader, a malware downloader known in the past to deliver a remote access
Trojan called Gootkit but also various other malware payloads. Transition
services agreements (TSAs) are commonly used during mergers and acquisitions
to facilitate the transition of a part of an organization following a sale.
Since they are frequently used, many resources are likely available for them.
The fact that the user saw and clicked on this link suggests it was displayed
high in ranking. When looking at the site hosting the malware delivery page,
the researchers realized it was a sports streaming distribution site that
based on its content was likely legitimate.
Quote for the day:
"Open Leadership: the act of
engaging others to influence and execute a coordinated and harmonious
conclusion." -- Dan Pontefract
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