Month: August 2018

If you’re nostalgic about old tech and software, then get ready: Slack developer Felix Rieseberg has created an app that allows you to run Windows 95 on Windows, macOS and Linux (which is perhaps more practical than running it on an Apple Watch). If you’re interested in downloading it, you can grab it over at GitHub.

According to The Verge, you can easily run applications such as WordPad, MS Paint and Minesweeper within the app. Internet Explorer, sadly, doesn’t work. The good news is if you’re playing around and encounter problems, you can simply reset the instance and start over again.

If you’re worried about storage space or RAM, then fear not. The OS is just 129MB to download. Once you have it up and running, it will only take up about 200MB of RAM, even when you’re running multiple applications and utilities, as The Verge notes.

via Engadget
Windows 95 app brings nerd nostalgia to macOS, Windows and Linux

Protecting the data stored in your database may have been at the top of your priorities recently, especially with the changes that were introduced earlier this year with GDPR.

There are a number of ways to protect this data, which until not so long ago would have meant either using an encrypted filesystem (e.g. LUKS), or encrypting the data before it is stored in the database (e.g. AES_ENCRYPT or other abstraction within the application). A few years ago, the options started to change, as Alexander Rubin discussed in MySQL Data at Rest Encryption, and now MariaDB®, MySQL®, and Percona Server for MySQL all support encryption at-rest. However, the options that you have—and, indeed, the variable names—vary depending upon which database version you are using.

In this blog post we will take a look at what constitutes the maximum level of at-rest encryption that can be achieved with each of the latest major GA releases from each provider. To allow a fair comparison across the three, we will focus on the file-based key management; keyring_file plugin for MySQL and Percona Server for MySQL along with file_key_management plugin for MariaDB.

MariaDB 10.3

The MariaDB team take the credit for leading the way with at-rest encryption, as most of their features have been present since the 10.1 release (most notably the beta release of 10.1.3 in March 2015). Google donated the tablespace encryption, and eperi donated per-table encryption and key identifier support.

The current feature set for MariaDB 10.3 comprises of the following variables:

• aria_encrypt_tables
• aws_key_management_key_spec
• aws_key_management_log_level
• aws_key_management_master_key_id
• aws_key_management_region
• aws_key_management_rotate_key
• encrypt_binlog
• encrypt_tmp_disk_tables
• encrypt_tmp_files
• file_key_management_encryption_algorithm (see file_key_management)
• file_key_management_filekey (see file_key_management)
• file_key_management_filename (see file_key_management)
• innodb_encrypt_log
• innodb_encrypt_tables
• innodb_encryption_rotate_key_age
• innodb_encryption_rotation_iops
• innodb_encryption_threads

Maximising at-rest encryption with MariaDB 10.3

Using the following configuration would give you maximum at-rest encryption with MariaDB 10.3:

plugin_load_add = file_key_management
file_key_management_filename = /etc/mysql/keys.enc
file_key_management_filekey = FILE:/etc/mysql/.key
file_key_management_encryption_algorithm = aes_cbc
innodb_encrypt_log = ON
innodb_encrypt_tables = FORCE
Innodb_encrypt_threads = 4
encrypt_binlog = ON
encrypt_tmp_disk_tables = ON
encrypt_tmp_files = ON
aria_encrypt_tables = ON

This configuration would provide the following at-rest protection:

• automatic and enforced InnoDB tablespace encryption
• automatic encryption of existing tables that have not been marked with

  ENCRYPTED=NO

• 4 parallel encryption threads
• encryption of temporary files and tables
• encryption of Aria tables
• binary log encryption
• an encrypted file that contains the main encryption key

You can read more about preparing the keys, as well as the other key management plugins in the Encryption Key Management docs.

There is an existing bug related to encrypt_tmp_files (MDEV-14884), which causes the use of

mysqld --help --verbose

 to fail, which if you are using the official MariaDB Docker container for 10.3 will cause you to be unable to keep mysqld up and running. Messages similar to these would be visible in the Docker logs:

ERROR: mysqld failed while attempting to check config
command was: "mysqld --verbose --help --log-bin-index=/tmp/tmp.HDiERM4SPx"
2018-08-15 13:38:15 0 [Note] Plugin 'FEEDBACK' is disabled.
2018-08-15 13:38:15 0 [ERROR] Failed to enable encryption of temporary files
2018-08-15 13:38:15 0 [ERROR] Aborting

N.B. you should be aware of the limitations for the implementation, most notably log tables and files are not encrypted and may contain data along with any query text.

One of the key features supported by MariaDB that is not yet supported by the other providers is the automatic, parallel encryption of tables that will occur when simply enabling

innodb_encrypt_tables

 . This avoids the need to mark the existing tables for encryption using

ENCRYPTED=YES

 , although at the same time it also does not automatically add the comment and so you would not see this information. Instead, to check for encrypted InnoDB tables in MariaDB you should check

information_schema.INNODB_TABLESPACES_ENCRYPTION

 , an example query being:

mysql> SELECT SUBSTRING_INDEX(name, '/', 1) AS db_name,
   ->   SUBSTRING_INDEX(name, '/', -1) AS db_table,
   ->   COALESCE(ENCRYPTION_SCHEME, 0) AS encrypted
   -> FROM information_schema.INNODB_SYS_TABLESPACES
   -> LEFT JOIN INNODB_TABLESPACES_ENCRYPTION USING(name);
+---------+----------------------+-----------+
| db_name | db_table             | encrypted |
+---------+----------------------+-----------+
| mysql   | innodb_table_stats   |      1    |
| mysql   | innodb_index_stats   |      0    |
| mysql   | transaction_registry |      0    |
| mysql   | gtid_slave_pos       |      0    |
+---------+----------------------+-----------+

As can be inferred from this query, the system tables in MariaDB 10.3 are still predominantly MyISAM and as such cannot be encrypted.

MySQL

Whilst the enterprise version of MySQL has support for a number of data at-rest encryption features as of 5.7, most of them are not available to the community edition. The latest major release of the community version sees the main feature set comprise of:

• innodb_redo_log_encrypt
• innodb_undo_log_encrypt
• keyring_file_data
• keyring_operations

The enterprise edition adds the following extra support:

• keyring_aws_cmk_id
• keyring_aws_conf_file
• keyring_aws_data_file
• keyring_aws_region
• keyring_encrypted_file_data
• keyring_encrypted_file_password
• keyring_okv_conf_dir

Maximising at-rest encryption with MySQL 8.0

Using the following configuration would give you maximum at-rest encryption with MySQL 8.0:

early-plugin-load=keyring_file.so
keyring_file_data=/var/lib/mysql/keyring
innodb_redo_log_encrypt=ON
innodb_undo_log_encrypt=ON

This configuration would provide the following at-rest protection:

• optional InnoDB tablespace encryption
• redo and undo log encryption

You would need to create new, or alter existing tables with the

ENCRYPTION=Y

 option, which would then be visible by examining

information_schema.INNODB_TABLESPACES

 , an example query being:

mysql> SELECT TABLE_SCHEMA AS db_name,
   ->    TABLE_NAME AS db_table,
   ->    CREATE_OPTIONS LIKE '%ENCRYPTION="Y"%' AS encrypted
   -> FROM information_schema.INNODB_TABLESPACES ts
   -> INNER JOIN information_schema.TABLES t ON t.TABLE_SCHEMA = SUBSTRING_INDEX(ts.name, '/', 1)
   ->                                        AND t.TABLE_NAME = SUBSTRING_INDEX(ts.name, '/', -1);
+---------+-----------------+-----------+
| db_name | db_table        | encrypted |
+---------+-----------------+-----------+
| sys     | sys_config      |     1     |
+---------+-----------------+-----------+

N.B. You are able to encrypt the tablespaces in 5.7, in which case you should use

information_schema.INNODB_SYS_TABLESPACES

 as the internal system views on the data dictionary were renamed (InnoDB Changes).

Unfortunately, whilst all of the tables in the mysql schema use the InnoDB engine (except for the log tables), you cannot encrypt them and instead get the following error:

ERROR 3183 (HY000): This tablespace can't be encrypted.

Interestingly, you are led to believe that you can indeed encrypt the

general_log

 and

slow_log

 tables, but this is in fact a bug (#91791).

Percona Server for MySQL

Last, but not least we have Percona Server for MySQL, which, whilst not completely matching MariaDB for features, is getting very close. As we shall see shortly, it does in fact have some interesting differences to both MySQL and MariaDB.

The current feature set for 5.7, which does indeed exceed the features provided by MySQL 5.7 and for the most part 8.0, is as follows:

• encrypt_binlog
• encrypt_tmp_files
• innodb_encrypt_online_alter_logs
• innodb_encrypt_tables
• innodb_temp_tablespace_encrypt
• keyring_file_data
• keyring_operations
• keyring_vault_config
• keyring_vault_timeout

Maximising at-rest encryption with Percona Server for MySQL 5.7

Using the following configuration would give you maximum at-rest encryption with Percona Server 5.7:

early-plugin-load=keyring_file.so
keyring_file_data=/var/lib/mysql-keyring/keyring
innodb_temp_tablespace_encrypt=ON
innodb_encrypt_online_alter_logs=ON
innodb_encrypt_tables=FORCE
encrypt_binlog=ON
encrypt_tmp_files=

This configuration would provide the following at-rest protection:

• automatic and enforced InnoDB tablespace encryption
• encryption of temporary files and tables
• binary log encryption
• encryption when performing online DDL

There are some additional features that are due for release in the near future:

• Encryption of the doublewrite buffer
• Automatic key rotation
• Undo log and redo log encryption
• InnoDB system tablespace encryption
• InnoDB tablespace and redo log scrubbing
• Amazon KMS keyring plugin

Just like MySQL, encryption of any existing tables needs to be specified via

ENCRYPTION=Y

 via an

ALTER

, however new tables are automatically encrypted. Another difference is that in order to check which tables are encrypted you can should the flag set against the tablespace in

information_schema.INNODB_SYS_TABLESPACES

, an example query being:

mysql> SELECT SUBSTRING_INDEX(name, '/', 1) AS db_name,
   ->    SUBSTRING_INDEX(name, '/', -1) AS db_table,
   ->    (flag & 8192) != 0 AS encrypted
   -> FROM information_schema.INNODB_SYS_TABLESPACES;
+---------+---------------------------+-----------+
| db_name | db_table                  | encrypted |
+---------+---------------------------+-----------+
| sys     | sys_config                |      1    |
| mysql   | engine_cost               |      1    |
| mysql   | help_category             |      1    |
| mysql   | help_keyword              |      1    |
| mysql   | help_relation             |      1    |
| mysql   | help_topic                |      1    |
| mysql   | innodb_index_stats        |      1    |
| mysql   | innodb_table_stats        |      1    |
| mysql   | plugin                    |      1    |
| mysql   | servers                   |      1    |
| mysql   | server_cost               |      1    |
| mysql   | slave_master_info         |      1    |
| mysql   | slave_relay_log_info      |      1    |
| mysql   | slave_worker_info         |      1    |
| mysql   | time_zone                 |      1    |
| mysql   | time_zone_leap_second     |      1    |
| mysql   | time_zone_name            |      1    |
| mysql   | time_zone_transition      |      1    |
| mysql   | time_zone_transition_type |      1    |
| mysql   | gtid_executed             |      0    |
+---------+---------------------------+-----------+

Here you will see something interesting! We are able to encrypt most of the system tables, including two that are of significance, as they can contain plain text passwords:

+---------+-------------------+-----------+
| db_name | db_table          | encrypted |
+---------+-------------------+-----------+
| mysql   | servers           |      1    |
| mysql   | slave_master_info |      1    |
+---------+-------------------+-----------+

In addition to the above, Percona Server for MySQL also supports using the opensource HashiCorp Vault to host the keyring decryption information using the keyring_vault plugin; utilizing this setup (provided Vault is not on the same device as your mysql service, and is configured correctly) gains you an additional layer of security.

You may also be interested in my earlier blog post on using Vault with MySQL, showing you how to store your credentials in a central location and use them to access your database, including the setup and configuration of Vault with Let’s Encrypt certificates.

Summary

There are significant differences both in terms of features and indeed variable names, but all of them are able to provide encryption of the InnoDB tablespaces that will be containing your persistent, sensitive data. The temporary tablespaces, InnoDB logs and temporary files contain transient data, so whilst they should ideally be encrypted, only a small section of data would exist in them for a finite amount of time which is less of a risk, albeit a risk nonetheless.

Here are the highlights:

Extra reading:

• Keep Sensitive Data Secure in a Replication Setup
• Binlog Encryption with Percona Server for MySQL
• Enabling InnoDB Tablespace Encryption on Percona XtraDB Cluster 5.7
• MySQL Encryption at Rest – Part 2 (InnoDB)

The post Comparing Data At-Rest Encryption Features for MariaDB, MySQL and Percona Server for MySQL appeared first on Percona Database Performance Blog.

via MySQL Performance Blog
Comparing Data At-Rest Encryption Features for MariaDB, MySQL and Percona Server for MySQL

All the videos from Laracon 2018 Chicago are now released on and available to watch

Visit Laravel News for the full post.

The post Laracon US 2018 Videos Are Now Released appeared first on Laravel News.

via Laravel News
Laracon US 2018 Videos Are Now Released

With the latest release of DaVinci Resolve 15, Blackmagic Design has radically made over its editing suite to create one of the best video-editing systems at any price — even against mainstream options like Premiere Pro CC and Apple’s Final Cut Pro X. It now comes with Fusion, a powerful visual effects (VFX) app used in Hollywood films, along with an excellent color corrector and audio editor. Despite doing more than most editors will ever need, the full studio release costs just $300, and you can get a stripped-down version with most features for a grand total of zero dollars.

I use Adobe’s Premiere Pro CC as part of its Creative Cloud suite, which costs more than $50 a month, so Resolve 15 is certainly a cheaper option. After trying it out for a week, would I be willing to switch? That would be tough, because I also do photo editing, and Creative Cloud includes Photoshop and Lightroom. If you’re looking strictly for video and audio editing, color correction and effects, however, Resolve is well worth a look. It is surprisingly easy to learn and use and has more speed and power than you’ll probably ever need.

New features

As before, DaVinci Resolve 15 is nearly platform agnostic, running on macOS, Windows 10 and Linux. However, it now has four modules (editing, color correction, audio effects and visual effects) all in one app. It was unveiled at the same time as Blackmagic’s Pocket Cinema Camera 4K (BMPCC 4K) and was designed to handle the extra-large and heavy files from that camera. As such, the editing module is not only much easier to use, but faster and more powerful.

Blackmagic improved the already excellent Color module, added more built-in effects, and tweaked the Fairlight audio editing app. It also supports a lot of new video formats, though some, like the MKV files used in YouTube videos, still don’t play.

The biggest change is the addition of Fusion, a Lego-like compositing app used in blockbusters like The Martian, Avengers: Age of Ultron and Kingsman: The Secret Service. Blackmagic sells Fusion as a standalone app (also for $300), so the integrated Resolve version isn’t quite as complete. But it has nearly all the same tools, including 3D compositing, particle effects, 3D text tools, keying, painting, rotoscoping and more. There are also a ton of additions in Color and the Fairlight audio package; for a complete list of features, check here.

Editing and Media

The first thing you’ll notice when opening a DaVinci Resolve 15 project is the sheer speed of the app. Blackmagic has dramatically improved performance for large projects, even if you’re working in 4K with thousands of clips, effects and timelines. That’s to the credit of the new video playback engine, which is better optimized to use both your CPU and your GPU (or multiple GPUs if you have the Studio version). The result is lower latency, faster UI refresh and rendering and better support for tricky formats like H.264 and RAW video.

Compared with Adobe’s latest version of Premiere Pro CC 2018, DaVinci Resolve 15 is faster in a couple of ways but slower in others. On my Windows 10 laptop with NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q graphics and an 8th-gen Intel Core i7 CPU, Resolve loaded 4K H.264 clips from Panasonic’s GH5S camera much, much more quickly than its rival. However, when rendering a timeline with the same files, it was Premiere Pro that had the edge. Why so? Checking the task manager, it appears that Resolve is using the GPU better for playback, while Premiere taps it more during rendering.

The gold standard for media organization is Avid’s Media Composer, which is designed for large projects with thousands of clips that might be viewed and worked on by dozens of people at a time. Resolve isn’t as powerful, as it lacks screenplay integration and other advanced features. However, it’s pretty complete otherwise, and I found that I liked it better than Premiere CC for organizing, scaling and searching clips.

I also prefer Resolve 15’s cutting tools over Premiere Pro’s. It’s more intuitive for operations like trimming heads and tails of clips, slipping and sliding (moving a clip relative to other clips or changing its in and out point), unlinking clips and more. I also love the “dynamic” trimming that lets you adjust clips while playing them, and the latest version gives you better control over it. One thing I do miss on Premiere, however, is the “Track Select Forward” editing tool that lets you grab the lead clip to move an entire timeline.

Resolve now supports tabbed timelines like Premiere does. It also has a cool feature called “stacked timelines” that lets you position one edit on top of another and drag clips between them. This is particularly handy for editors who throw all their best material into one timeline, then drag the clips over to the final edit. Finally, the new “optical flow” is a great addition, as it calculates fake “tween” frames to smooth slow motion, even if you didn’t shoot at a high frame rate.

Color and audio

Before it was an editing app, DaVinci Resolve was a color correction tool, so it’s very powerful for that chore. Since it’s aimed at professionals, though, the color wheels, curves and bars aren’t very user friendly. Adobe’s color corrector is better for normals, because it looks more like Lightroom than something you’d see in a fancy post-production studio.

The power is there if you take the time to learn it, though. Much like Fusion, Color uses Lego-like “nodes” that let you layer together clips and color correction effects. You can also use “power windows,” complete with a motion tracker, to selectively adjust regions of an image. A good example is the “face refinement” feature that lets you track faces and then brighten your subject’s eyes, smooth their complexion and lighten or darken their face, without affecting the rest of the shot.

Resolve 15 also uses so-called look-up tables (LUTs) to create custom looks or instantly adjust footage from Sony, RED, Panasonic, Blackmagic and other video-centric cameras. The new version makes it a lot easier to browse through those to find just the right look. You can also more easily grab color settings from previous timelines and projects. Finally, the already good noise reduction system has been improved, and Resolve now supports Dolby Vision (for a price) and HDR 10+, the latest HDR system from Samsung and others.

A lot of editors don’t like dealing with audio, but here again, DaVinci Resolve 15 treats users a bit better than Premiere Pro does. Everyday tools like audio dissolves and fades are a bit easier to find, for one thing. And when you need to do advanced sweetening, jumping into the dedicated Fairlight audio editor is more seamless than switching to Audition CC, which is a completely separate app from Premiere.

Fairlight improvements include new ADR (aka automated dialogue replacement) tools, a “normalize audio level” function to make it easier to set levels and change the pitch of clips, and numerous refinements of the UI, controls and commands for playback and editing. On the Fairlight FX side, there are 13 new audio effects available both in Edit and Fairlight, including plugins for repairing audio, adding effects and simulating concert halls and other spaces.

Fusion

Fusion is one heck of a powerful VFX package. It lets you work in a full 3D space (with cameras, lighting and shaders) and do particle effects, warping, keying, color correction, painting and a whole lot more. Now that it’s embedded in DaVinci Resolve, you can work with multiple clips directly from the Edit timeline and quickly see them in context with the rest of your program.

Such power comes with an equally breathtaking learning curve, however. The good news is that using Fusion is pretty fun, and Blackmagic provides tutorials and resources to help you grok it. Much like other compositing programs, including Autodesk’s Flame, Nuke and the (defunct) Apple program Shake, Fusion is a node-based VFX package that lets you layer multiple effects and clips by linking them together like Legos.

To use Fusion in DaVinci Resolve 15, you simply park the playhead (the line showing the current frame) over the clip or clips you want to affect and click the Fusion button. They then appear as nodes, and you’re ready to create some effects. For instance, you might have one node as a foreground green-screen shot, one as a background and another for text. You can then apply a chroma key, color corrector, warper, particles or whatever else you want to do, and output the whole thing to an output node. When you go back to Edit, you’ll see the (hopefully) glorious final result. If it’s not all that you hoped for, you can go back and tweak.

Fusion has 2D and 3D text tools with macros that let you do advanced motion graphics and particles that can interact with other 3D objects, along with masking, tracking, match-moving, rotoscoping and warping tools.

As mentioned, Fusion was originally designed to do special effects for big-budget films, so you might say that it’s heavy overkill for the average user. But if you don’t need all that power, most of the basics (transitions, scaling and moving, stabilization, color correction etc.) are available in the Edit or Color modules. So there’s no need to dip into Fusion until you’re ready.

If you pay for DaVinci Resolve 15 Studio, you do get a few things not available in the free version. That includes support for multiple GPUs, advanced noise reduction, the face tracker, a number of effects and filters, and support for 3D and VR. Finally, Studio offers easy multi-user collaboration and unlimited network rendering.

Wrap-up

Blackmagic Design has always been an interesting company, selling products like the RAW-video-capable Pocket Cinema Camera 4K at prices far below rivals like RED. Even at $300, DaVinci Resolve 15 seems underpriced. It’s stout enough to work with 8K RAW video files from RED and ARRI cameras that cost $50,000 and up. You can even connect one of Blackmagic’s crazy control surface consoles if you’re working with picky clients.

The redesigned Edit module is more powerful than ever and, to my surprise, pretty easy to grasp. I find that I now prefer using it for media organization and cutting over Premiere Pro CC. It’s also faster than its rival Premiere Pro CC in many ways.

All that said, it’s not for everyone. Adobe’s software still does certain things better, like warp video stabilization (it has many more controls), and I found that it rendered complex timelines quicker. Adobe is also on the cutting edge with its AI-powered Sensei tools, which help regular users color-match and automatically reduce (“duck”) music during dialogue.

It also has tight integration with apps like After Effects (Adobe’s rival Fusion product) and especially Photoshop. Many one-man-band video editors who also do photography might not want to learn a new product when they’re already paying for Photoshop and Lightroom anyway.

But if you’re just into video editing, give the free version of DaVinci Resolve 15 a whirl. If you like it and find you need the extra features in the paid version, you can step up to Studio for not a lot of cash. You’ll never be tied to a monthly plan, and you get all the subsequent versions for free. Things that seem too good to be true usually aren’t, but Resolve 15 is an exception to that rule — it’s a truly elegant and powerful editor that costs nearly nothing.

via Engadget
DaVinci Resolve 15 is a free, Hollywood-grade video editor

via MakeUseOf.com
How to Chop Down a 20,000 Email Inbox to Zero in 30 Minutes

Work-Bench, a New York City venture capital firm that spends a lot of time around Fortune 1000 companies, has put together The Work-Bench Enterprise Almanac: 2018 Edition, which you could think of as a State of the Enterprise report. It’s somewhat like Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends report, but with a focus on the tools and technologies that will be having a major impact on the enterprise in the coming year.

Perhaps the biggest take-away from the report could be that the end of SaaS as we’ve known could be coming if modern tools make it easier for companies to build software themselves. More on this later.

While the report writers state that their findings are based at least partly on anecdotal evidence, it is clearly an educated set of observations and predictions related to the company’s work with enterprise startups and the large companies they tend to target.

As they wrote in their Medium post launching the report, “Our primary aim is to help founders see the forest from the trees. For Fortune 1000 executives and other players in the ecosystem, it will help cut through the noise and marketing hype to see what really matters.” Whether that’s the case will be in the eye of the reader, but it’s a comprehensive attempt to document the state of the enterprise as they see it, and there are not too many who have done that.

The big picture

The report points out the broader landscape in which enterprise companies — startups and established players alike — are operating today. You have traditional tech companies like Cisco and HP, the mega cloud companies like Amazon, Microsoft and Google, the Growth Guard with companies like Snowflake, DataDog and Sumo Logic and the New Guard, those early stage enterprise companies gunning for the more established players.

As the report states, the mega cloud players are having a huge impact on the industry by providing the infrastructure services for startups to launch and grow without worrying about building their own data centers or scaling to meet increasing demand as a company develops.

The mega clouders also scoop up a fair number of startups. Yet they don’t devote quite the level of revenue to M&A as you might think based on how acquisitive the likes of Salesforce, Microsoft and Oracle have tended to be over the years. In fact, in spite of all the action and multi-billion deals we’ve seen, Work-Bench sees room for even more.

It’s worth pointing out that Work-Bench predicts Salesforce itself could become a target for mega cloud M&A action. They are predicting that either Amazon or Microsoft could buy the CRM giant. We saw such speculation several years ago and it turned out that Salesforce was too rich for even these company’s blood. While they may have more cash to spend, the price has probably only gone up as Salesforce acquires more and more companies and its revenue has surpassed $10 billion.

About those mega trends

The report dives into 4 main areas of coverage, none of which are likely to surprise you if you read about the enterprise regularly in this or other publications:

• Machine Learning
• Cloud
• Security
• SaaS

While all of these are really interconnected as SaaS is part of the cloud and all need security and will be (if they aren’t already) taking advantage of machine learning. Work-Bench is not seeing it in such simple terms, of course, diving into each area in detail.

The biggest take-away is perhaps that infrastructure could end up devouring SaaS in the long run. Software as a Service grew out of couple of earlier trends, the first being the rise of the Web as a way to deliver software, then the rise of mobile to move it beyond the desktop. The cloud-mobile connection is well documented and allowed companies like Uber and Airbnb, as just a couple of examples, to flourish by providing scalable infrastructure and a computer in our pockets to access their services whenever we needed them. These companies could never have existed without the combination of cloud-based infrastructure and mobile devices.

End of SaaS dominance?

But today, Work-Bench is saying that we are seeing some other trends that could be tipping the scales back to infrastructure. That includes containers and microservices, serverless, Database as a Service and React for building front ends. Work-Bench argues that if every company is truly a software company, these tools could make it easier for companies to build these kind of services cheaply and easily, and possibly bypass the SaaS vendors.

What’s more, they suggest that if these companies are doing mass customization to these services, then it might make more sense to build instead of buy, at least on one level. In the past, we have seen what happens when companies try to take these kinds of massive software projects on themselves and it hardly ever ended well. They were usually bulky, difficult to update and put the companies behind the curve competitively. Whether simplifying the entire developer tool kit would change that remains to be seen.

They don’t necessarily see companies running wholesale away from SaaS just yet to do this, but they do wonder if developers could push this trend inside of organizations as more tools appear on the landscape to make it easier to build your own.

The remainder of the report goes in depth into each of these trends, and this article just has scratched the surface of the information you’ll find there. The entire report is embedded below.

via TechCrunch
Work-Bench enterprise report predicts end of SaaS could be coming

defaults write com.dteoh.SlowQuitApps delay -int 5000

via MakeUseOf.com
15 Free Open-Source Mac Apps You Must Install

You don’t have to be a designer to make the most of your 3D printer. There are thousands upon thousands of free things you can download and print — and some of them are pretty useful.

I belong and contribute to a site called Thingiverse. It allows users to upload 3D models and download other’s designs for free. There are other places to find free designs online, such as YouMagine, but I believe Thingiverse is the largest, with respect to the number of both members and designs uploaded. They also allow you the ability to modify designs if the creator built the model in a language called openSCAD.

The discussion of what 3D printer to buy, what materials to use, and how to use and maintain it are beyond the scope of this post. What I wanted to show was some of the most useful things I’ve printed.

Sunglasses Holder

Let’s start up with a simple 3D printed object: a sun/safety glasses holder for your vehicle visor.

I downloaded and printed several different designs until I found this one. Each previous design I tried either didn’t stay on the visor very well or the sunglasses would fall out while I was driving. I didn’t like this design at first either, because it would slip off the visor when I tried removing the sunglasses, even though it held the sunglasses well. Much like the iPhone 4, I discovered that I was using it wrong.

To use it correctly, you push down on the lever with your thumb to release the sunglasses, then you hold the clip in place with your thumb while you grab the sunglasses with your fingers.

I’ve had this clip in my truck for many months and it has kept my sunglasses securely all that time. I like the simplicity of the design and the fact that it prints very quickly.

Goto Thing

USB Cable Reel

I found this cable reel many months ago and it’s been one of the most useful cord organizers that I’ve printed. It consists of three pieces: the outer shell and a 2-part spool created by screwing two end caps together.

Assembly is easy; you simply slip the cord through the two holes in the outer shell, and then screw the two end caps together inside the shell to form the spool. The slot in one end cap captures the cord in the middle of the spool.

Once assembled, you twist the spool while holding the outer shell stationary. The cord winds up inside the wrapper for storage. When you need the cord you pull on both ends and only unspool what you need.

One of the cool things about 3D printing is that you can modify your prints, and if you break it, you can always print another one. I couldn’t slip the transformer of this Black & Decker charger through the outer shell, so I just cut some slots that allowed me to slip the cord into the shell. It made dealing with this charger cord much easier.

Goto Thing

Portable Hard Drive or Power Bank Cable Mount

As I mentioned, Thingiverse isn’t the only place to find free 3D models. I found this portable hard drive cable holder on YouMagine. I’m not using it on a portable hard drive though, I am using it on something similar, a USB power bank.

It is a series of “fingers” that hold the USB cable. To attach it to the power source or hard drive, you simply use a rubber band looped around the first and last finger.

The first time I printed this cable mount I used PLA, which is a common plastic used in 3D printing, but I found that the fingers were too stiff, and they wouldn’t bend enough to allow the cable to pass between them. So I tried printing it with flexible filament and it worked well — the fingers have some give and I can easily remove and replace the cable.

I’ve used this power bank with this cable holder at many different media events, and the cable holder has held up well and kept the USB cord tangle free in my pocket.

Goto Thing

Pegboard Glasses Holder

If you search the Thingiverse website, you’ll find a ton of pegboard accessories — some of them robust and useful, others not so sturdy. One of the most unique and useful pegboard accessories I’ve found is a glasses holder.

This glasses holder is made for 1/4″ pegboard. It has stubby legs that fit firmly into the pegboard. I’ve found that 3D printed accessories made for 1/8″ pegboard just don’t have tough-enough pins or legs and they tend to snap off — one of the disadvantages of plastic over metal.

The holder is designed to hold glasses by the nose pads, and while it looks like the glasses are just balanced on the holder, it actually holds them quite well. Plus it also makes a pretty handy holder for earmuffs and other hearing protection.

Goto Thing

Magnetic Boxes

I find these customizable magnetic boxes handy. All you need are a few rare-earth magnets and they’ll stick to most metal surfaces (unless you have a stainless steel fridge).

When you open the page for this thing you’ll find a link that says “open in customizer.” For this to work you’ll need to sign into Thingiverse. Once you’re there you’ll see a screen like the one below that allows you to change all the different parameters.

Most of the parameters are pretty self-explanatory and you can see the changes to the model you’ve made in real-time on the right. Once you are done, you click the “Create Thing” button in the upper right. It usually takes a few minutes and you’ll be notified that you can download your customized box file.

Goto Thing

Toolbox Bins

I really like these drawer organizing bins, and they are one of the designs that you can customize to fit your needs. For example, I have three different sized boxes, shown above. Besides the square ones, the ones in the top of the toolbox are longer than the ones in the drawers because the drawers are not as deep as the top. That’s the beauty of printing your own boxes, you can use all the space effectively.

Unfortunately, modifying these boxes is a little more advanced, as the author doesn’t have the customizer turned on. Rather, you have to download and install openSCAD and then download the boxes’ .scad file to modify the model. It really isn’t that complex, I can show you below.

Most models have a bunch of variables that you can modify in the beginning of the file. In this case, the important variables are length, width, and height. Once you change the variables to the size you require, you simply click the render button (the cube with the hourglass), then click the STL button next to it to save the file to a format you can load into your printer.

Goto Thing

Battery Mounts

Finally, I wanted to show you these M18 battery covers I found that I repurposed into hangers for the batteries. Sometimes you don’t find exactly what you need and you might not have the skills to model something that will work.

Here, I’ve repurposed a few holes by enlarging them and drilling my own. Then I counter-sunk them so the battery could still slide into the the cover.

3D prints are usually machinable, if you print them with enough infill. I printed this particular model with 50% infill. A lower infill is done to decrease printing time and to reduce the amount of filament used. Inside the counter-sinks, you can see that the internal structure has voids.

Talking about modeling skills, I downloaded and printed several battery covers until I found one that worked well. When I find really good models I will usually look at other things the designer has uploaded. This particular user — Simhopp — has models for other battery brands that I’ve printed, and they all work as well as the Milwaukee design.

Goto Thing

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via ToolGuyd
Free and Useful Things I Have 3D Printed

Monster Hunter: World finally came out on PC last week. It’s a hell of a fun game, but the PC version has some frustrating technical problems. Fortunately, fans and modders have been working on unofficial fixes to improve things while we wait for official ones.

I’ve been playing the PC version of Monster Hunter: World for a few weeks now. The game is in better shape than it was when Capcom first sent out codes, but it still has some significant problems. The most widespread relate to performance, online connectivity, and crashes, the third of which can apparently corrupt your save and cause you to lose all your hard-earned progress. Here are a few things I’ve done to get the game running better.

1. Install Kaldaien’s ‘Special K’ mod.

Kaldaien, the same modder who made that brilliant graphics fix for the PC version of Nier: Automata, is back with a far-reaching remedy for many of Monster Hunter: World’s performance and stability issues. (Hat-tip to PC Gamer for catching this one.) It’s called “Special K” and it’s a cinch to install; you can find a download link and instructions on Steam.

I installed the mod last night and was impressed with how many small improvements it brought. It made my game run stably on the newest Nvidia drivers when it previously hadn’t. After several hours of sustained play I never once had the ERR12 graphics driver crashes that previously caused me to roll back to an older driver.

Special K also aims to rework how the game uses your CPU cores, which might give smoother performance for some. I noticed improvements on my end, but it could just be that I was finally using the optimized driver. (Others have reported that the game-optimized Nvidia driver actually gives them worse performance, so your mileage may vary.) Special K also adds the ability to take HUD-free screenshots, and finally (hooray!) makes it possible to alt-tab out of the game to check other apps without everything going to hell.

2. Try port forwarding to improve connectivity.

Most people playing MH: World on PC are having connectivity issues, and during busy times it can be all but impossible to get into a multiplayer session with other people. Capcom acknowledged the widespread reports of connection issues yesterday on Steam, saying it is “currently investigating the cause of this and are working with Valve to resolve the issue as soon as possible.”

I like playing Monster Hunter solo as much as anyone, but I’ve reached the part of the late-game where I’m spending more and more time farming monsters for parts, which is far easier and more enjoyable with others. So it was frustrating when, yesterday, I got “error code 50382-mw1” over and over and was unable to connect.

While looking through forum threads filled with other people discussing similar error messages, I saw several folks suggesting setting up router port forwarding to make it easier to connect. I am not a networking expert, but my understanding is that port forwarding has your router designate which incoming ports are talking to which outgoing ones, and can sometimes clear up networking issues in multiplayer games. I figured it couldn’t hurt to give it a shot, so I did. I followed the instructions over at portforward.com, which wasn’t too difficult.

I set up port forwarding after an hour of consistent failure to matchmake, and immediately got into a session on my next attempt. That’s anecdotal, of course, and I’ve seen others say that port forwarding didn’t help them get online. I’ve also had a few mid-session disconnects since setting it up, so it’s definitely not a cure-all. But if you’re getting connection failures as often as I was, it’s worth a shot.

3. Lower “Volume Rendering Quality” to improve your frame-rate.

I mentioned this in my initial impressions of the PC port a little while back, but it bears repeating: if you’re having trouble getting the game to stay above 60fps, start by lowering the Volume Rendering Quality setting. That’ll remove some of the hazy sheen the game puts on everything, and should get you a healthy frame-rate boost. I have mine set to low, but some people hate the way the effect looks and turn it off altogether.

I’ve also seen some people say they get smoother performance by switching to borderless fullscreen, and some Nvidia users say that they got improved performance by rolling back to Nvidia’s 398.36 driver.

4. Backup your save.

As is usually the case, the most worrying concerns from players involve the game corrupting or deleting their save files. It’s not clear if any specific thing in the game causes this to happen, but it seems like if the game crashes while in the middle of saving, you could lose all your progress.

As with Dark Souls Remastered earlier this year, the question is really, why take the risk? You can manually back up your save pretty easily. It’s located here:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\userdata\[Your Steam ID]\582010\remote

There are also a number of ways to get Windows to automatically copy a file every so often, and one Reddit user has made a script that’ll do it for you. Since it takes all of a minute to back up your save, there’s no good reason not to.

Hopefully Capcom will release some game updates with official fixes for some of the problems outlined here, and hopefully the game’s servers will get more stable and consistent as we get a little further from launch. Until then, these tweaks should help get things running more smoothly.

via Lifehacker
How To Get Monster Hunter: World Working Better On PC

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