News Aggregator

How to Perform Custom Error Handling With ANTLR

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 21:13:43

ANTLR is a very popular parser generator that helps build parsers for various language syntaxes, especially query languages or domain-specific languages. This tool provides default error handling, which is useful in many circumstances, but for more robust and user-friendly applications, more graceful error handling is required. In this article, we will describe this requirement with a simple example and will guide you through the process of implementing custom error handling with ANTLR.

Operational Principles, Architecture, Benefits, and Limitations of Artificial Intelligence Large Language Models

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 20:13:43

Abstract Large Language Models (LLMs) are sophisticated AI systems designed to understand and generate human-like text, leveraging extensive datasets and advanced neural network architectures. This paper provides a comprehensive overview of LLMs, detailing their purpose, operational principles, and deployment architectures. The purpose of LLMs spans various applications, including content creation, customer support, and personalized tutoring. The operational mechanics of LLMs are rooted in deep learning techniques, especially neural networks, and involve extensive training on diverse textual datasets to learn language patterns and contextual understanding. The paper distinguishes between server-side and on-device LLM implementations, each offering unique advantages and limitations. Server-side LLMs operate in cloud environments, providing scalable resources and centralized updates, but face challenges like latency and data privacy concerns. Conversely, on-device LLMs run locally on user devices, offering benefits such as lower latency and enhanced privacy, but are constrained by device capabilities and require manual updates. By examining these two deployment paradigms, the paper aims to illustrate the trade-offs involved and the potential of LLMs to transform human-computer interaction and automate complex language-based tasks, paving the way for future advancements in AI-driven applications. Understanding Large Language Models LLM is an advanced AI system for understanding and generating human-like text based on the input it receives. They are trained on vast datasets comprising books, articles, websites, and other forms of written language, enabling them to perform a variety of tasks, including: Answering questions Writing essays or articles Assisting with programming Translating languages Engaging in conversations These models leverage deep learning techniques, particularly neural networks, to process and understand nuanced language patterns.

How to Ensure Cross-Time Zone Data Integrity and Consistency in Global Data Pipelines

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 19:13:43

In the modern interconnected world, companies increasingly work on a global level, requiring the data to be managed across different time zones. This creates challenges in preserving data integrity, especially when handling time-sensitive information. The need for strong cross-timezone data management has never been more paramount. Let's see the main considerations and best practices for maintaining consistency in global data pipelines. The Fundamental Challenge At its core, the challenge of cross-time zone data integrity stems from the simple fact that different parts of the world experience time differently. For example, if it is 5:00 PM on a Thursday, local time in Pacific Daylight Time, then it's Friday in most parts of the world. This difference can generate a myriad of problems—from timestamps not in sync to conflict of schedules and data inconsistencies which can severely impact operations.

Role of Cloud Architecture in Conversational AI

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 18:13:43

Imagine a world where customer support is instant, personalized, and available 24/7—this is the promise of conversational AI. From smart chatbots to virtual assistants, these technologies leverage natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning to create seamless, human-like interactions. But behind every smooth conversation lies a robust backbone: cloud architecture. By delivering scalability, speed, and security, the cloud ensures that conversational AI systems perform flawlessly, even under fluctuating demands.

Metrics at a Glance for Production Clusters

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 17:43:43

Keeping a close eye on your production clusters is not just good practice — it’s essential for survival. Whether you’re managing applications at scale or ensuring robust service delivery, understanding the vital signs of your clusters through metrics is like having a dashboard in a race car, giving you real-time insights and foresight into performance bottlenecks, resource usage and the operational health of your car. However, too much happens in any cluster. There are so many metrics to track that the huge observability data you may collect could become another obstacle to viewing what is actually happening with your cluster. That’s why you should only collect the important metrics that offer you a complete picture of your cluster’s health without overwhelming you.

Beyond Simple Responses: Building Truly Conversational LLM Chatbots

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 16:13:43

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand. Please rephrase your question.” We’ve all been there. You’re trying to get help from a chatbot, thinking you’re being crystal clear, and then bam—this frustrating response appears. Just when you think you’re having a productive conversation, the bot fails to grasp context, forgets what you said two messages ago, or simply can’t handle anything beyond its pre-programmed scripts. I still remember spending 20 minutes with a customer service bot last year, only to end up calling the support line anyway. The experience leaves users disappointed and companies questioning the value of their chatbot investments.

AI-Driven Test Automation Techniques for Multimodal Systems

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 15:28:43

Abstract The prominent growth of multimodal systems, which integrate text, speech, vision, and gesture as inputs, has introduced new challenges for software testing. Traditional testing frameworks are not designed to address the dynamic interactions and contextual dependencies inherent to these systems. AI-driven test automation solutions provide transformative solutions by automating test scenario generation, bug detection, and continuous performance monitoring, ensuring efficient testing workflows and integration testing between multiple AI models. This paper presents a comprehensive review of AI-driven techniques employed for the automated testing of multimodal systems, and critically handling integration of diversified tools, scenario generation frameworks, test data creation approach, and their role in continuous integration pipelines.

The Smart Way to Talk to Your Database: Why Hybrid API + NL2SQL Wins

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 14:28:43

Hybrid is not a fallback — it's the real strategy. Introduction Databases weren't designed to "listen," meaning to understand flexible human intentions. They were designed to "obey" or strictly execute SQL commands. Now it's time to teach them both.

Building Resilient Identity Systems: Lessons from Securing Billions of Authentication Requests

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 13:28:43

As workforce becomes more digital, identity security has become the center of enterprise cyber security. This is particularly challenging given that more than 40 billion authentication requests are processed each day, across platforms and devices, and more solutions than ever are being created in order to successfully enable users to establish their identity online, in a manner that is both fluid and resilient. These systems have to perform 99.9% without a hitch, block cyber threats and be foolproof. The stakes are high—81% of data breaches are attributed to compromised credentials. Security is as much about user experience as it is about safety. If authentication takes longer than 30 seconds, 65% of users will simply abandon their transactions. Having spent years building authentication risk assessment systems, I’d like to use that experience to communicate some key insights I’ve gained about securing identities at scale, while also measuring attack in a way that meets your security objectives, and minimizing friction for legitimate users.

Integrating Model Context Protocol (MCP) With Microsoft Copilot Studio AI Agents

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 12:28:43

AI assistants are getting smarter. They can write code, summarize reports, and help users solve complex problems. But they still have one big limitation. They can’t access live data or internal systems. As a result, their answers are often not in real time. The Model Context Protocol (MCP) is a new solution to this problem. It acts like a universal connector between AI models and enterprise tools. With MCP, AI systems can access up-to-date data during a conversation. That means smarter answers, fewer hallucinations, and better results.

How To Build Resilient Microservices Using Circuit Breakers and Retries: A Developer’s Guide To Surviving

Aggregated on: 2025-05-19 11:28:43

What’s up, fellow geeks? Think of the time when you are treated at a busy pizza place. The pizza oven broke down, and with new orders coming in, the entire kitchen is at a standstill. If we take that oven as a flaky, unreliable third-party API, there you go—microservices disaster! With retries and circuit breakers at your disposal, you can ensure your system keeps sizzling instead of crashing down. In this guide, I will share these patterns assuming we are doing some pair programming at a whiteboard. We will look at some code (Hystrix and Resilience4J), tell war stories, revel in my failures (hint: wild retries), and have a good time. Let’s get down to it, shall we?

Using Python Libraries in Java

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 22:28:42

Advantages and Disadvantages of Python and Java Java and Python are among the most widely used languages in the world (see Figure 1 below). Figure 1: Overview of programming languages from statista.com Both languages have their strengths and weaknesses and are popular in different fields. Unlike other articles, such as those from Tom Radcliffe which analyzes which language is technically better implemented, this article focuses on presenting practical use cases with explicit examples. Let us check the following table that provides a brief overview, of which language is best suited for which field (✅ = advantage, and ❌ = disadvantage).

Infrastructure as Code (IaC) Beyond the Basics

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 21:28:42

Infrastructure as Code, or IaC, is now an inalienable part of the majority of modern cloud-native projects. Previously, generation of scripts for configuration and using your environments as a moving target has been tiresome. Then came advanced tooling with even stronger assurance for a standardized, stable, and scalable setup. Nevertheless, most teams are still at the ‘hello world’ stage of IaC, with little understanding of how to level up and manage, organize, and govern it as the work progresses. This article aims to discuss how to maximize the use of IaC — focusing on the organization of modules, versioning, and policy.

Endpoint Security Controls: Designing a Secure Endpoint Architecture, Part 2

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 20:28:42

As we understood the foundational principles for designing and reviewing endpoint security controls in Part 1, we also covered key topics such as standardizing and enrolling approved devices and operating systems, enforcing strong authentication and centralized identity management, and validating trusted network access. We explored endpoint configuration hardening — including secure boot, BIOS/UEFI settings, app whitelisting, and drift monitoring — as well as privilege management using RBAC and Just-in-Time access. Additionally, we discussed patch and vulnerability management, malware protection through EDR, software installation controls, restrictions on removable media, secure local data storage practices, and enforcing encryption across devices and media — all supported by strong auditing, compliance, and user awareness measures.

Unit Testing Large Codebases: Principles, Practices, and C++ Examples

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 19:13:42

Unit tests are often overlooked in the software development process but there are a lot of nice side effects of writing unit tests. After writing production software code for more than a decade, which has served billions of users for planet scale applications, I can confidently say that unit tests hold a critical place in software development lifecycle. Despite the importance of unit tests, many engineers often overlook them due to timeline constraints or their over reliance on manual testing. There is also a misconception that unit tests slow down software development which is not necessarily true. As a matter of fact, study reveals that test driven development (TDD) may have a positive impact on software development productivity. In the long run, unit tests make iterating on code easier and faster.

Secure by Design: Modernizing Authentication With Centralized Access and Adaptive Signals

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 18:28:42

Introduction Managing identity and access management (IAM) for large-scale enterprises is a complex challenge, particularly when dealing with legacy systems that cannot be transitioned from overnight to modern authentication. Traditional migration often spans years, leaving enterprises burdened with technical debts and inconsistent authentication systems. This study introduces a scalable architecture that accelerates the migration process, enabling thousands of legacy applications to transition to modern authentication. The challenge becomes even more intricate when organizations rely on a combination of internal and third-party platforms. The proposed solution simplifies and centralizes authentication processes, making it adaptable to any OpenID Connect (OIDC) provider while seamlessly integrating with internal engineering systems. By addressing these complexities, this architecture enhances the security, eliminates technical debts, and ensures operational scalability.

The Full-Stack Developer's Blind Spot: Why Data Cleansing Shouldn't Be an Afterthought

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 17:28:42

My development team lead was three weeks into building a slick React dashboard for a client when everything fell apart. The app looked great in demos with test data. We were ready to connect it to our production database. Then all hell broke loose.

Debugging With Confidence in the Age of Observability-First Systems

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 16:28:41

Enterprises are embracing cloud-native architectures in today’s era. The boundaries between development, testing and production environments are dissolving at a rapid pace. Organizations strive to release software at an accelerated pace due to market demands. The conventional QA mindset of bug prevention before they go to production is evolving into a more proactive approach. This shift brings in the need for observability to converge and empower engineering teams to perform debugging in production confidently. Let’s look at how test automation strategies complement observability and how they can empower teams to debug smarter, efficiently and quicker with fewer sleepless nights. The Rise of Observability-First Engineering Today’s engineering landscape is complex with the rise of distributed ecosystems and cloud native micro-service architectures. In such environments, conventional log validations and reactive monitoring approaches are no longer sufficient. Observability - measuring systems state based on the external performance has become critical.

Accelerating Debugging in Integration Testing: An Efficient Search-Based Workflow for Impact Localization

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 15:13:41

The Problem: Debugging at Scale With frequent software releases, one of the challenges faced in software debugging is localizing potential impact-causing changes. However, testing every change one by one is impractical, especially when dealing with a large set of changes over time. Here I refer to a group of commits or changes as a "build." Each build has a number associated with it

Data Quality: A Novel Perspective for 2025

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 14:13:41

Data quality is no longer a back-office function; it has become a strategic imperative for organizations leveraging data to drive decision-making, analytics, and AI. As data volumes grow exponentially and applications become more sophisticated, ensuring high-quality data is critical for operational success. This article explores novel approaches to data quality in 2025, focusing on emerging trends, techniques, and tools that redefine the landscape. Data Quality as a Strategic Asset Traditionally, data quality was seen as a compliance-driven task aimed at cleaning up datasets for reporting purposes. In 2025, this perspective has shifted dramatically. Organizations now treat data quality as a strategic asset that directly impacts business outcomes. High-quality data fuels reliable AI models, accelerates decision-making, and enhances customer experiences.

Building Resilient Networks: Limiting the Risk and Scope of Cyber Attacks

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 13:13:41

In the current era of nearly ubiquitous computing, security threats are growing, especially for large organizations that have to maintain complex networks and safeguard sensitive data. While this complexity has also led to the proliferation of a wide range of tools available to organizations to boost network security, a foundational strategy still remains one of the most effective ways to protect organizational networks: that of network segmentation. However, network segmentation as a tool has stayed far from stagnant, with recent developments and innovations turning it into a more complex and sometimes misunderstood topic. In this article, we will explore what network segmentation is, why it's important, and how it can be applied to optimize network performance and security. Figure 1. Network segmentation, a conceptual diagram

How Can Developers Drive Innovation by Combining IoT and AI?

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 12:13:41

In the contemporary era, the exponential growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) has shifted the digital terrain. As these two technologies improve further, their amalgamation offers remarkable opportunities for developers to create more innovative, efficient, and highly adaptive solutions across industries. However, the actual value is in working with IoT and AI purposefully — understanding their nuances, potential pitfalls, and best practices to benefit from their full potential. Let's dive into how the conscious combination of IoT and AI can be a game-changer for developers.

AI-Driven Root Cause Analysis in SRE: Enhancing Incident Resolution

Aggregated on: 2025-05-16 11:28:41

Introduction Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) is one of the key pillars for organizations. SRE teams are responsible for maintaining the system's scalability and reliability. One of the key challenges SRE teams face is dealing with alert floods, parsing cryptic logs, and the pressure of SLA timers. These challenges make Root Cause Analysis (RCA) of an incident really tough. With the increasing complexity of distributed infrastructure, identifying RCA and resolving incidents become more difficult. Because conventional troubleshooting methods require manual log analysis and the review of multiple data sources, they are very time-consuming and demand a large employee workforce. In this article, we will examine how Artificial Intelligence (AI) is benefiting Root Cause Analysis (RCA) in incident management by automating processes, reducing resolution time, and improving overall system reliability. This article delves into the techniques used and challenges faced.

AWS to Azure Migration: A Cloudy Journey of Challenges and Triumphs

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 22:13:41

So, you are considering migrating your infrastructure from AWS to Azure? Congratulations! You have officially joined the ranks of people who thought a simple cloud swap was a quick weekend project — and now you’re probably questioning your life choices. But don’t worry, it is not as crazy as it sounds. In fact, it can be a pretty smooth ride if you know what you’re getting into (or at least, if you have a strong coffee supply). The cloud wars are heating up. AWS has been the big player for years, and Azure has been right there, lurking, always trying to steal the spotlight. But sometimes, you realize the place you have been renting is just not quite the right fit anymore. Maybe AWS is too complicated. Or maybe Azure just offers a few things that AWS cannot (no, really, it happens). Whatever the reason, migrating from AWS to Azure is not something to shy away from — unless, of course, you have something else to do like binge-watch an entire season of your favorite show.

Integrating Google BigQuery With Amazon SageMaker

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 21:13:41

Today, organizations often need to leverage services across different cloud platforms to maximize their data science capabilities. One common scenario is analyzing data stored in Google BigQuery using Amazon SageMaker's advanced machine learning tools. This article presents a comprehensive guide to establishing a direct connection between Google BigQuery and Amazon SageMaker Studio through Data Wrangler, offering a cost-effective and secure solution that eliminates the need for data duplication and reduces data transfer overhead.

Endpoint Security Controls: Designing a Secure Endpoint Architecture, Part 1

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 20:13:41

As organizations embrace digital transformation and hybrid work, the endpoint becomes both a critical productivity enabler and a significant security liability. Laptops, desktops, smartphones, and even IoT devices form the frontline in the battle for data integrity and organizational resilience. To secure this diverse landscape, endpoint security must be viewed not as a single product, but as a multi-layered architectural discipline. This article is structured in two parts:

Detection and Mitigation of Lateral Movement in Cloud Networks

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 19:43:41

How Hackers Bypass Lateral Movement Detection (And How to Stop Them) Detecting lateral movement has emerged as a crucial cybersecurity challenge today. Attackers who breach network perimeters follow a five-step process. They start with reconnaissance, move to their original compromise, spread laterally, establish persistence, and finally achieve their objectives. This systematic approach lets them quietly move through systems while they hunt for sensitive data and expand their control. Security teams must understand hackers' techniques to spot lateral movement quickly. Attackers commonly use pass-the-hash attacks, remote execution, privilege escalation, Kerberoasting, and targeted phishing campaigns. Traditional security measures struggle to stop these sophisticated lateral movement techniques. Most organizations only spot breaches after attackers have caused substantial damage.

Optimizing Integration Workflows With Spark Structured Streaming and Cloud Services

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 18:28:41

Data is everywhere and moving faster than ever before. If you are processing logs from millions of IoT devices, tracking customer behavior on an e-commerce site, or monitoring stock market changes in real time, your ability to integrate and process this data quickly and efficiently can mean the difference between your business succeeding or failing. Spark Structured Streaming comes in handy here. The combination of scalability offered by cloud services and the ability to handle real-time data streams makes it a powerful tool for optimizing integration workflows. Let's see how these two technologies can be used to design robust, high-performing data pipelines and how to deal with the actual world scenario of dealing with continuous data.

Designing a Java Connector for Software Integrations

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 17:13:41

IT systems need integration to achieve seamless data flow alongside enhanced operational efficiency. The expansion of businesses creates independent operational systems that restrict performance through object isolation and restrict time-sensitive information acquisition. The system's functions become oriented for better workflow coordination, which minimizes both repetition and creates unified operations. The creation of such connections necessitates comprehensive knowledge about technical and business needs, which include format patterns along with protocol standards. Java provides robust libraries alongside outstanding frameworks that lead organizations to choose Java when building scalable, customized solutions. A strategically developed connector fulfills present requirements while enabling future technology adjustments, thus becoming a sustainable factor that supports successful IT system integration.

Integration Isn’t a Task — It’s an Architectural Discipline

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 16:13:41

Let’s talk about integration. Not the glossy vendor slide-deck version, but the messy, deeply architectural reality of connecting systems in the enterprise. Despite all our advances in tooling and frameworks, the way many organizations approach integration still hasn’t changed. Too often, we default to short-term fixes — point-to-point links, overstuffed middleware, or bespoke connectors — because they’re “fast.” But that speed comes at a price: brittle systems, tight coupling, and long-term technical debt that can paralyze change.

Vibe Coding With GitHub Copilot: Optimizing API Performance in Fintech Microservices

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 15:28:41

In fintech, APIs power everything. Starting from payments to trading to real-time customer experiences, the API takes care of everything. Performance isn't optional, but it's critical for user trust and business success. As a fintech API and cloud optimization expert, I constantly face the challenge of balancing quick development with high performance. When Microsoft announced GitHub Copilot for free, I asked myself a real-world question: Can GitHub Copilot go beyond writing boilerplate code and help optimize fintech Microservice APIs?

Memory Leak Due to Time-Taking finalize() Method

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 14:28:41

All objects in Java implicitly inherit from java.lang.Object. This class contains multiple methods, which can be overridden in the child class. One such overridable method is finalize(). Before objects get garbage collected from memory, the JVM will execute the finalize(). So, if you need to close any resources that were opened in the class (like backend connections, Files…), it can be done in this method.

Customer 360: Fraud Detection in Fintech With PySpark and ML

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 13:13:41

Every bank uses Customer 360 to maintain its customer records in a unified way, and it can also be used for fraud detection. What Is Customer 360? Customer 360 is like creating a complete picture of a customer by pulling together all the data you have about them — think of it as a "comprehensive profile." Imagine a bank with data from accounts, transactions, and customer service calls. Instead of having different/diverse data of the same customer, Customer 360 links them to say, “ This data in various ways belongs to customer John Doe.” It helps businesses understand customers better, personalize services, and figure out customer data patterns.

Mastering Advanced Aggregations in Spark SQL

Aggregated on: 2025-05-15 11:13:41

In data analytics, efficiently aggregating large datasets is a basic need. For example, when working with retail inventory data, tracking products shipped to stores each month, the standard GROUP BY clause in SQL can handle basic aggregations. However, it falls short when you need multiple levels of aggregation in a single query. This is where Spark SQL’s advanced GROUP BY extensions, GROUPING SETS, ROLLUP, and CUBE, come into the picture to compute multiple groupings efficiently.

Cosmos DB Disaster Recovery: Multi-Region Write Pitfalls and How to Evade Them

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 22:28:40

Introduction Azure Cosmos DB is an excellent global distributed, multi-model database service for high availability, low-latency access, and straightforward scalability. One of its most prominent characteristics is multi-region writes, whereby your applications write to the nearest regional replica, which greatly boosts performance and resilience. But here's the catch: enabling multi-region writes also introduces new challenges, especially when you're architecting for disaster recovery (DR). Without careful planning, you can end up with data conflicts, unplanned downtime, or even data loss.

Developers Beware: Slopsquatting and Vibe Coding Can Increase Risk of AI-Powered Attacks

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 21:43:41

Security researchers and developers are raising alarms over “slopsquatting,” a new form of supply chain attack that leverages AI-generated misinformation commonly known as hallucinations. As developers increasingly rely on coding tools like GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT, and DeepSeek, attackers are exploiting AI’s tendency to invent software packages, tricking users into downloading malicious content. What is Slopsquatting? The term slopsquatting was originally coined by Seth Larson, a developer with the Python Software Foundation, and later popularized by tech security researcher Andrew Nesbitt. It refers to cases where attackers register software packages that don’t actually exist, but are mistakenly suggested by AI tools; once live, these fake packages can contain harmful code.

FIPS 140-3: The Security Standard That Protects Our Federal Data

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 21:28:40

FIPS (Federal Information Processing Standards) [1] defines a set of public security standards developed by NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) [2] that govern the security requirements for cryptographic modules used in government systems. FIPS 140-3 is the latest federal security standard, which includes state-of-the-art protection for deployment environments, such as the cloud, where the system could potentially be physically accessed by untrusted parties. Why is this important (or even relevant) for common (non-federal) workloads? Different security frameworks cater to specific domains or regions, focusing on safeguarding sensitive individual data used in those domains (e.g., name, age, and medical history in the healthcare domain or name, credit, loan, and tax records in the financial domain).

Why Database Migrations Take Months and How to Speed Them Up

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 20:28:40

Today, where information is unequivocally the cornerstone of everything and a core competitive advantage, our databases often hold our data hostage. It's 2025, yet it's not uncommon for a database migration project to span many months, even when the migration is considered like-for-like (e.g., between MongoDB and Cosmos DB with MongoDB API). These long projects take everyone's attention, create uncertainty, and slow down developer productivity.

MySQL to PostgreSQL Database Migration: A Practical Case Study

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 19:13:40

Migrating a MySQL database to PostgreSQL is a complex process that involves schema conversion, data transfer, query optimization, and performance tuning. In this case study, we document a real-world migration of e-commerce platform's database from MySQL 8.0 to PostgreSQL 15. The study includes performance benchmarks before and after migration. Project Overview Industry E-commerce Database Size ~120 GB Number of Tables 200+ Queries per Second (QPS) ~350 Replication Setup MySQL Master-Slave is switched to PostgreSQL Streaming Replication Primary Use Case OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) Goal Improve read-heavy performance, complex query execution and JSON processing Pre-Migration Performance Benchmarks Before migration, we collected key performance metrics on MySQL 8.0 using sysbench and EXPLAIN ANALYZE.

Understanding IEEE 802.11(Wi-Fi) Encryption and Authentication: Write Your Own Custom Packet Sniffer

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 18:43:40

Introduction As of 2023, it’s estimated that 42 billion cumulative Wi-Fi enabled devices have been shipped (Wi-Fi® by the Numbers: Technology Momentum in 2023, n.d.). Every new device adds to the increasing wireless attack surface, and it's important for anyone working in the security software industry to have a basic understanding of how wireless networks encrypt traffic and authenticate users. In this article, we’ll go through the 4 currently supported and ratified security standards for Wi-Fi networks. We’ll also look at the IEEE 802.11 packet and header structure. Then we will look at a C program to write your custom packet sniffer linking with libpcap. We will also look at a real-life packet capture using Wireshark GUI. Outline: Common encryption and auth supported by IEEE 802.11 standards <- Theoretical Foundation IEEE 802.11 mac header, frame types, Information elements <- Theoretical Foundation Custom C program linked with libpcap to sniff packets <- Practical Application Wireshark based sniffing of nearby APs <- Practical Application Common Encryption and Authentication Methods Supported by the Standards WEP (1997), WPA (2003), WPA2(2004), WPA3 (2018) are the 4 officially ratified IEEE 802.11 security standards by the Wi-Fi Alliance. WPA4 is expected to be rolled out with Wi-Fi 7 but no standard has been formally ratified.

Unlocking AI Coding Assistants: Generate Unit Tests

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 17:28:40

In this part of this series, you will try to create unit tests for a Spring Boot application using an AI coding assistant. The goal is not merely to create working unit tests, but to create qualitative unit tests. Enjoy! Introduction You will try to generate unit tests for a basic Spring Boot application with the help of an AI coding assistant. The responses are evaluated, and different techniques are applied, which can be used to improve the responses when necessary. This blog is part of a series; the previous parts can be read here:

How To Develop a Truly Performant Mobile Application in 2025: A Case for Android

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 16:28:40

To develop a high-performance mobile application, you need functional code—and a responsive, intuitive user experience. As a mobile developer who has spent years working with Android, I’ve learned that performance optimization is both art and science. Balancing technical precision with user-centric design has become a key principle in my career. Performance is Key Today's users expect quick responses and seamless UIs as the standard, not the exception. Delays of even a few seconds often leads users to stop using the application altogether. I still remember, early on in my career, how milliseconds of latency hurt user engagement. That understanding formed my belief that performance optimization is not about technical metrics but rather about creating an experience that’s "invisible." This looks as if an app just works, without the user realizing the complexity underneath.

Beyond Code Coverage: A Risk-Driven Revolution in Software Testing With Machine Learning

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 15:28:40

Modern systems require more than high code coverage because they are complex and interconnected. Through machine learning development, companies can create advanced tools that link risk-based planning methods to enhance their software testing outcomes. With the focus on the possibility of failure and its effects, risk-based testing provides both improved efficiency and better effectiveness. RBT selects its execution focus on core features and often modified code and components known for producing defects.

A Simple, Convenience Package for the Azure Cosmos DB Go SDK

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 14:28:40

When using the Go SDK for the Azure Cosmos DB NoSQL API, I often find myself writing boilerplate code for various operations. This includes database/container operations, querying, and more. The cosmosdb-go-sdk-helper (I know, not a great name!) is a package with convenience functions for some of these tasks. In this blog post, I will go over the packages in the repository with examples on how (and when) you can use them. It's early days for this project, but I hope to keep adding to it gradually.

Intro to RAG: Foundations of Retrieval Augmented Generation, Part 1

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 13:13:40

Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) may sound complex, but it accurately represents the process of the system. RAG is a method that enhances the capabilities of large language models (LLMs) by integrating them with external knowledge sources. Each term represents a piece of the puzzle:

Performing and Managing Incremental Backups Using pg_basebackup in PostgreSQL 17

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 12:13:40

With the release of PostgreSQL 17, the introduction of incremental backups using the trusted pg_basebackup tool marks a significant leap forward in database backup and restoration processes. Traditionally, database backups often involved taking periodic full backups, which, while comprehensive, are time-consuming and storage-intensive. Incremental backups offer a smarter alternative by capturing and storing only the changes made since the last backup, dramatically reducing both backup size and the time required to create backups.

Ethical AI in Agile

Aggregated on: 2025-05-14 11:43:40

TL; DR: Ethical AI in Agile Agile teams face ethical challenges. However, there is a path to Ethical AI in Agile by establishing four pragmatic guardrails: Data Privacy (information classification), Human Value Preservation (defining AI vs. human roles), Output Validation (verification protocols), and Transparent Attribution (contribution tracking). This lightweight framework integrates with existing practices, protecting sensitive data and human expertise while enabling teams to confidently realize AI benefits without creating separate bureaucratic processes.

A Deep Dive Into Firmware Over the Air for IoT Devices

Aggregated on: 2025-05-13 22:58:40

An Overview of IoT Devices and FOTA IoT devices are a combination of hardware and software which are programmed to collect and transmit the data over to the internet, other networks, or a variety of applications. There are various categories of IoT devices such as sensors, actuators, machines, gateways, and more. These IoT devices can be used independently, or can be attached to any other devices such as appliances, doors, industrial machinery, medical equipment, and other important assets. In today’s fast-paced environment, these devices offer the capability to provide all important sensory information without any manual intervention to their users via integrations with mobile apps or analytical platforms. These sensors solve various real-world problems such as asset tracking, infrastructure management, condition-based monitoring, industrial automation, and more. Companies that offer IoT solutions have to deploy and manage a large number of IoT devices in globally-dispersed locations. To make sure that all the devices are working and transmitting the telemetry data as expected without any failure, it is very important to monitor these devices and keep them updated with the latest version of their firmware or software. These new versions of the firmware may contain bug fixes, patches for security vulnerabilities, or new functionalities throughout the device’s lifecycle. Since IoT devices are low powered, low memory constrained devices, and deployed at distributed locations, it is crucial to do firmware upgrades over the air (FOTA) for these devices. FOTA happens remotely, and users do not need to be physically available at the same location. FOTA is an essential process for any IoT solution offerings as it enables IoT devices to provide uninterrupted flow of data to the users.

Agentic AI for Automated Application Security and Vulnerability Management

Aggregated on: 2025-05-13 21:43:40

It was not so long ago that I was having a much closer look at how AI is becoming embedded in our everyday developer work. I have watched more intelligent code suggestions, automated testing routines, and those ubiquitous chatbots become a normal part of the everyday toolkit. They are useful, naturally, but at their core, they are still fundamentally reactive, they still wait for you to inquire of them before taking action. What has really blown me away recently is the emergence of agentic AI. It is completely different, it does not just sit around and wait to be told what to do, but instead it takes charge itself. It can decide what should be done, strategize the steps, and even adjust if something unexpected happens. It's sort of like having a colleague who is always planning ahead, as opposed to merely carrying out orders.

Ensuring Configuration Consistency Across Global Data Centers

Aggregated on: 2025-05-13 20:28:40

Abstract Today, nearly every large company operates several data centers distributed across the globe. Each of these data centers hosts a variety of infrastructure services such as MySQL, Redis, Hive, and message queues. For scalability and adherence to the DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself) principle in system design, it's crucial that the same codebase is used across all regions. However, engineers responsible for writing and maintaining this code are often spread across different geographies. As a result, teams may not always be aligned on system configurations—even within the same region. This misalignment leads to discrepancies in configuration across data centers.