RESTX is a relatively new and interesting approach to Restful API. It up scales on performance by utilizing a custom built dependency injection container. It also provides a feature rich as well as modular approach to pluggable development for meeting the flexibility needs of any business domain requirements. There is even a useful API docs built in, as well as developer friendly testing and an admin console. There is also a very unique integration with MongoDB. Although, it does not limit one to a specific backend.
16 August 2014
2 August 2014
Organizational Ethics
It is time that organizations had a separate department to study the moral and ethical dilemmas of employees and their employers as well as the business practices. Such departments could be spin-off from compliance and even their governance services. We live in a growing capitalist economy where businesses are dictated with shareholder value without the forethought or care for either employees or customers for that matter. We need to strive for more ethically run businesses that have their own internal audit department for which scrutiny for compliance can be provided in a fair manner and with an established code of conduct. Also, such departments can track employee ethics both internally and externally to combat discrimination in the workplace but also to protect the reputation of the business as a whole. Such departments could also act as third-party mediators that can handle a whole suite of investigation for which the manager or a human resources time may be wasted. While formal and publicly run organizations for such may not be an answer, more thorough approaches need to be taken to protect the rights of employees as well as employers in the workplace. A linked data approach to integrated ethical boundaries could also be a stepping stone in a more interconnected direction. Reducing staff as a way of cutting back on cost of businesses seems to be an almost typical answer from management who may ultimately be the real culprit to bare the blame for the missed performance. It seems for many businesses, fairness goes out the door soon as it starts losing money on the balance sheets. However, it is usually such practices that not only lead to more mistakes and dire performance consequences but also distaste from current as well as former employees. Institutional discrimination in the workplace is also a big dilemma that is often overlooked. Also, another aspect crucial to businesses is whether 'something is the right thing to do given the current circumstances' is also an ethical aspect that many organizations lack in their internal processes as well as part of their strategy. Perhaps, it is time in civilized societies we started caring more for our environment, our employees, and not just for shareholder value. This will not only help businesses take responsibility for their actions but also be held accountable both to their employees, customers, as well as within the global space of things for their cumulative effects to an economy.
28 July 2014
PaaS 2014
Cloud services are becoming a competitive landscape both for developers and businesses. Each solution has its own advantages, unique stickiness factor, and drawbacks. The variety of services and providers on offer in the market makes the decision all the more difficult. One obviously has to weigh out the pros and cons of each unique set of requirements. The following links may help in deciding on which way to lean for either the business, the individual developer, and even a newcomer to the cloud way of doing things.
27 July 2014
Lemonade
Lemonade is the ultimate thirst quencher for humid and hot weather. Not only is it a delight on the taste buds but it also has many medicinal benefits. In the times that we live in, lemonade can be the natural drink of choice to cleanse the body of toxins. There are just so many amazingly good recipes around for making lemonade and the many ways in which one can embellish on the flavor. There really should be more open lemonade stands scattered around big cities to cool people of their busy lives in the hot weather. For many it also brings nostalgic memories of childhood of the time when lemonade stands provided the first passage into experiencing the cycle of sales and business during the holiday season. While for others, it may mean the time of family gatherings. A few drink ideas and recipe links are included below.
20 July 2014
Linked Data For Organizations
Often organizations have many business units or functional departments. At times, such departments are working in effect separate from one another without little to no sharing of knowledge. Interdepartmental interaction is vital in todays business organizations not only for efficiencies but also for controlling risk. As we move into the Web 3.0 era and into more use of HTML5, we are gradually going to witness an emergence of semantic web on the internet. It is only plausible to assume that while many organizations run their own intranets that such internal systems will also be interlinked in a semantic web, adding much value to the business and providing a means for better engagements as well as insight into business productivity. In a lot of organizations service-oriented architecture is already the main stay of how applications and services are designed. By extending this model into a more resource friendly approach, one can easily move towards a more linked data based enterprise. Once enterprises have their interdepartments interlinked semantically, they could look to harnessing better business partnerships in a web of data. Thus, such interlinked business partnerships can allow for better synergy and cost effective means for all businesses involved. Security could also be managed internally as to what types of information is exposed. Object orientation already provides options for information hiding and encapsulation. Such approaches can be taken further to represent the encapsulation of data sharing. One could then query interdepartmental and even in B2B/B2C contexts using a SPARQL endpoint to facilitate flexibility of access to information. Although, compliance and governance may still be a requirement for many organizations which may already be met through their existing SOA implementations. Linked data can prove useful for organizations as many look to cost cutting measures, outsourcing, increasing customer engagement, improving business partnerships, attaining better business performance, as well as gaining insights into their market position. Linked data all in all would extend towards a smarter connected organization and a smarter place to work.
Semantic Nature
Understanding our Earth is important as it provides for valuable answers. Nature provides us a means of developing cures as well as a way of understanding our place on Earth. As humans we want to be able to track all the living things on Earth and develop a connection with them. Nature also provides a huge amount of data on human life and the transitive effects overtime. Taking inspiration from Noah could be one form of improving on the Linnaeus taxonomy schema and providing a universal Semantic Web of Nature. This would allow for a linked data for scientists and the development of connected services for much needed research. One could then also utilize the open community on modifications to a type as new species and sub-species are discovered, similar in approach to Freebase and Wikipedia. Knowledge discovery in such a connected manner would allow for a multitude of research options for collaboration and interconnected sharing of both interests and findings. Often having two of each is enough to build a taxonomy similar to the Noah's Ark. Also, linked data on nature and wildlife would enable more applications in tracking animal behavior patterns as well as when they become at risk of extinction. Even total population counts through animal tagging can be semantically enabled. Perhaps, even the approach to Internet of Things would take ubiquity of applications to new heights. One could even build a taxonomy of animal communication and provide for natural language parsers in this domain. Semantic Web holds the key to unlocking a lot of the untapped potential of machines of today in providing for much needed intelligence for smart applications, especially for the real-world, where problems not only have complexities in uncertainty but also in multiple dimensions. There is much that we still do not know about the world we live in. The more we are able to contextualize and utilize machines for reasoning, the more we become productive and efficient in discovering knowledge.
19 July 2014
Open Source ETL
ETL Tools are fundamental these days to an enterprise data workflow process especially as part of data integration. Firstly, data is extracted from external sources. The data is then transformed through a quality assurance process to meet specific needs. The data is then loaded to the target database. With extensive and diverse big data needs, the role of ETL tools has become ever more important for data processing requirements. There are plenty of commercial and open source tools in the market. Sometimes designing one's own solution suffices over a third party option. The below is a list of tools and libraries that may be available open source alternatives with their own unique approaches and limitations. One can also always utilize the cloud especially AWS EMR for same purpose of ETL.
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16 July 2014
Metadata And Catalogs
Book publishing is a big business. However, overtime it has become more and more competitive both because of Amazon but also because of more people looking to use eBooks. Cataloging is often also a major focal aspect to libraries. Therefore, there is an aspect of downstream as well as upstream of workflow. Metadata is critical to most such publishing and cataloging endeavors. There have been many evolving metadata initiatives on the horizon both in past, current, and for the future. Also, many community works, especially in research, are also incorporating open metadata aspects with annotations. In long run, linked data will prove to be quite useful for connecting publishers and various libraries in a web of interconnected data for access. There may even be a synergy between publishers, libraries, educators, and learners as each plays a role in the various workflow process. Such aspects will also bring with them many challenges of data integration. The below links provide for much fuel for thought in the area as well as the way things in the area are moving towards.
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