Mois : mars 2016

.NET is now cross-platform

Microsoft is building a new version of .NET, called .NET Core, which is open-source and which will allow us to write cross-platform code (Windows, multiple distributions of Linux and OS X). The goal is to run .NET Core in as many places as possible. In fact, the code is portable and it can be run on different supported platforms: .NET Framework, Mono, Xamarin,  Windows 8, Windows Phone, Universal Windows Platform (UWP). There is a list of multiple implementations based on .NET Standards and it can be found on github.

The design and the architecture of .NET core are modular and its component are all separate entities. This way the developers can choose the libraries and the dependencies that are needed.

We can write code for .NET Core on:

  • cross-platform ASP.NET Web apps using ASP.NET Core 1.0. Until February it was called ASP.NET 5
  • cross-platform console apps
  • cross-platform libraries and frameworks
  • UWP apps (apps that target the family of Windows 10 devices)

.NET has now 2 flavors: NET Core and .NET Framework

First of all, .NET Core is not a subset of .NET Framework. It is a different stack. We will still be able to use the same languages: C#, F#, Visual Basic but we should see .NET Core and .NET Framework as two different stacks that coincide and co-evolve. .NET Core was created so that .NET could be open source and cross-platform.

A big difference between .NET Framework and .NET Core is the way how they are serviced and where they live. As we know, .NET Framework is a Windows component serviced through OS updated while .NET Core is composed of Nuget packages and it can be serviced per-application and through a package manager.

The .NET Framework will continue to be the stack to use when writing application ranging from console applications, rich client (WPF) applications to scalabe web applications.

Apprendre le français #3 – Marcel Proust

Enfant à la santé fragile, Marcel Proust aura toute sa vie des difficultés respiratoires graves causées par l’asthme. Lors de ses nombreux voyages à la campagne sa mère devient la personne la plus proche de lui et il developpe une passion pour la lecture.

Le livre qui va lui changer le cours de la vie, « Norman conquest of England », le transporte dans le passé. À ce moment-là, il decide de devenir un écrivain qui va essayer d’éclairer les lois de la nature humaine.

Persécuté par l’idée qu’il ne va pas vivre longtemps il commence à lire beaucoup. Malgré sa tendance naturelle être seul il est incroyablement sociable. Il fréquente des sallons aristocratiques où il rencontre des artistes et des écrivains. Il est fasciné par ce monde dont il s’inspire pour ses futurs personnages. Il veut écrire seulement ce qui est réel, ce qu’il a expérimenté. Sinon, l’écriture est sans vie, d’après lui.

Il profite de sa fortune qui lui permet de ne pas avoir un emploi et il publie son premier roman mais qui n’est pas très bien reçu et qui ne se vend pas bien. Il est catalogué comme un écrivain superficiel. Il decide de répondre aux critiques en écrivant un roman plus complexe mais avec le temps il abandonne  ce projet. Il se sent démoralisé.

Pressé par sa famille pour choisir un métier, persécuté par l’idée qu’il va bientôt mourir, il decide d’apprendre l’anglais et de traduire les oeuvres de Ruskin. Après quelques années de travail intense il les publie, il reçoit de bonnes critiques et il définit son style.

Après la mort de ses parents, sa santé se détériore davantage. Il commence l’écriture de sa grande ouvre, « À la recherche du temps perdu », qui aura sept tomes. Le roman est une réflexion sur le temps et sa relativité, mais aussi une analyse de la société aristocratique et bourgeoise. L’amour et la jalousie sont aussi présentés. C’est la vie de Marcel Proust dans ce roman, des histoires collectées pendant des années.

Avec chaque tome les lecteurs ont l’impression de vivre vraiment dans le monde cré par l’écrivain. C’est un effet magique, c’est l’effet qui l’avait senti et qu’il a voulu transmettre aux lecteurs.

 

Notes #3 – Career, developers, git

5 Essential Pieces of Career Advice No One Ever Told You

In my opinion the most important of all: Your boss matters more than your company. Having the right mentor is the real key. The second important advice is don’t use data to pick a job, just do what you enjoy doing and be great at it. Also, the technical skills will only get you so far. You will have to learn how to navigate the world of office politics.

What distracts developers

The survey surprised me: « unplanned worked », 24.9% of the votes and « only » 22.7% of votes, social media. Chatty coworkers, meetings, forums and reading/writing emails are other reasons.

Git Commands and Best Practices Cheat Sheet – Print this git cheat sheet!

The Naïve Perspective and social intelligence

In the work environment the stakes are suddenly raised. People are no longer struggling for good grades or social approval, but for survival. Under such pressure, they reveal qualities of their characters that they normally try to conceal. They manipulate, compete, and think of themselves first. We are blindsided by this behavior and our emotion are churned up even more than before, locking us into the Naïve Perspective. The Naïve Perspective makes us feel sensitive and vulnerable. […]

Social intelligence is nothing more than the process of discarding the Naïve Perspective and approaching something more realistic. It involves focusing our attention outward instead of inward, honing the observational and empathic skills that we naturally possess. It means moving past our tendency to idealize and demonize people, and seeing and accepting them as they are. 

See people as they are: social intelligence, Mastery.

Internet of thing examples

In the modern world we live in today, we highly rely on our devices and the connectivity that it offers us.

Internet plays a great role in that connectivity ranging from work to play; we are all addicted to the multiple applications internet has to offer. Internet of things is a term that refers to things that are connected to the internet.

In the past decade the number of devices we used that were connected to the internet were 1 or at max two but now with the advent of more practical applications. We have smartphones, tablets, smart TV’s and even smart watches. It’s estimated that the number of devices that will be connected to the internet in 2020 would be around 50 Billion.

We all want to make the most informed and enlightened decisions based on the vast amount of information available on the internet and this translates to more demand for connectivity between machine and humans.

IoT has greatly influenced the following:

1. Automation.

2. Productivity.

3. Empowerment.

4. Intelligence.

Everything from factories to houses is now being automated with systems interacting with each other to better utilize resources.

The productivity aspect is huge. From Smart phones that have alarm clocks that sync with your calendar to make sure that you wake up at the right time to smart heaters that automatically adjust bathroom temperature to provide for the quickest most comfortable bath.

It is empowering humans to make the most important decisions and to leave trivial predictable decisions to the machines. It is helping us make the best use of our time.

With everything connected, it offers us a great deal of information that is organized and ready to be used, which is resulting in much more intelligent and informed decisions; From which food to pick up when doing grocery shopping to which exercise is best suited for our fitness goals.

Some of the Companies that have taken the initiative and have built IoT friendly products are:

Philip’s Hue

Philips

Phillips has created a smart bulb that allows consumers to choose any color for the bulb from any picture in there smart phone with all the bulbs connected it can adjust lighting to create any required setting.

Nest

Nest

Nest is a smart thermostat device that connects to the internet and uses your input to learn more about your habits.

This makes it intelligent enough to automatically adjust temperature in your house for when you arrive from work or at night or any other time based on you what it’s learned about your behavior.

Notes #2 – C#, Google robots

Which Works Faster- Null Coalescing Operator or GetValueOrDefault or Conditional Operator – A simple benchmark test to check which one is faster: Null Coalescing Operator ??, GetValueOrDefault method or Conditional Operator ?: The conclusion is that if you want to return a default value different than the default for the current nullable type the best choice is ??. If you want to return the default value the GetValueOrDefault is a little more faster.
Go and check the link, it is nice work, you would find great explanations and some charts generated by the benchmark results.

Why Google Wants to Sell Its Robots: Reality Is Hard
Software is far easier to develop and test than hardware. The robots need time to learn continuously and require fundamental research in a number of areas.

Notes #1- Code

Code is political
Is programming an universal medium? An esoteric programming language, LOLCODE, a language based upon the illustrious Donald TrumpTrumpScript, a programming for feminists, C+= (C Plus Equality), these new types of programming languages are used more and more to encourage social changes.

How Much Time Do You Waste While Coding?
Some useful steps to boost your productivity: prioritize your task, manage your distractions, take breaks, set time limits and focus on your goal. To test timeDoctor.

Installing and configuring Git on Windows

To install Git on Windows there is an easy installer you can download from git-for-windows.github.io/. After completing the installation and accepting all the default settings there should be a new application called Git Bash which will help you using Git.
After the installation some basic configurations are required like your name and your email. These are important because Git needs to know who is the author of your commits.
Start Git Bash and type the following commands:

git config --global user.name "Marius Istudor"

git config --global user.email "[email protected]"

You can run these commands any time you want but once you have run them they will stick around between updates.

The tool git config lets us changing the configuration variables that controls how Git looks and operates. You can check the settings using the following command:

git config --list

You can check the value of a parameter by typing git config :

git config user.name

You can find more commands by typing help:

git config --help

Apprendre le français #2 – Charles Darwin, suivez votre passion

Charles Darwin a toujours senti la présence de son père écrasante. Il était un homme riche et un docteur très connu qui a voulu toute sa vie que ses deux fils deviennent comme lui. Charles, le plus jeune, n’a jamais aimé aller à l’école pour étudier. Il n’était ni bon en latin et en grec ni en algèbre. Tout ce qu’il aimait vraiment était passer son temps dehors, chasser et collectionner des fleurs et des minéraux. Il aimait observer le comportement des oiseaux et prendre des notes sur les différences. À cause de cela son père lui a dit un jour qu’il ferait honte à sa famille et a décidé de l’envoyer à l’école de médecine à Edinburgh. Charles n’a pas pu y rester très longtemps et il a quitté l’école. À son retour, son père lui avait déjà trouvé un futur emploi dans une église mais le jeune fils devrait obtenir un diplôme d’une université prestigieuse. Charles s’inscrit à l’université de Cambridge et pendant ses études il se lie d’amitié avec le professeur Henslow. Charles obtiendra diplôme en 1831.

Charles decide de retourner chez lui pour prendre son poste mais le professeur Henslow lui propose un emploi comme naturalist sur un bateau qui partira quelques années pour observer différents littoraux. Il serait en charge de la collection des plantes et des minéraux. Il ne serait pas payé. Au début, il décline l’offre mais quelques jours plus tard il change d’avis. Avec l’aide de son oncle il convainc son père de le laisser partir. Avant d’embarquer il écrit: ma deuxième vie va commencer et aujourd’hui ce sera comme un anniversaire pour le reste de ma vie.

Quelques jours après l’embarquement Charles commence à regretter: le bateau était trop petit et il avait toujours le mal de mer. En plus, le capitaine du bateau était un fanatique religieux. Pour se calmer, Charles commence à observer la vie sur le bateau.

Quelques mois plus tard ils arrivent au Brésil et Charles est fasciné par la variété de la végétation et de la vie sauvage. À ce moment-là il comprend pourquoi il s’est embarqué dans cette aventure. Il commence un travail herculéen mais qui lui fait plaisir.

What is Internet of Things?

Internet of Things, at its core, is an inter-connected network of devices that collaborate and communicate among themselves and exchange valuable information with each other. This network usually uses internet to link with other devices and can function independently on its own, without external assistance or help. Not only these devices communicate or share information but also make important decisions based on the knowledge that has been shared. In layman’s terms, Internet of Things makes machine to machine (M2M) communication possible i.e. different machines will be able to communicate with each other and performs actions without interference of humans.

The range of devices that are incorporated in IoT include household appliances like coffee maker, television, air-conditioner to industrial machines or cars or any gadget you can think of. IoT is highly scalable, ranging from a smart home where all the devices are connected to each other and thereby efficiently manage energy needs of the home, to smart traffic signal grid that automatically manages or controls traffic of a complete city on its own.

Is the fuss surrounding IoT justified and how does this impact you?

IoT will supposedly change our lives in next few years. According to analyst firm “Garter”, more than 26 billion devices around the world will be connected to form a colossal web of inter-linked sensors/devices that will influence and manage significant part of our lives. Though still in its early stage, the financial opportunity offered by IoT to industrial sector is believed to cross $2 trillion by 2020.

IoT has the potential to transform economies and growth of nations and companies by boosting revenues, fueling innovation and making the system more efficient. The areas or sector that will drive the growth of IoT include smart grids, healthcare industry, automotive sector, security and surveillance or home automation, according to Frost & Sullivan.

Despite so much optimism regarding success of IoT, privacy and security are the biggest challenges that pose a threat to success of IoT. Lot of issues need to be tackled including security i.e. with billions of devices exchanging data, it becomes extremely significant to make sure that the information is secure.

Of all the technology mega trends that are gaining momentum, IoT definitely deserves top position. All the leading technology companies are embracing IoT and pouring in billions of dollars into research and development of IoT to make sure that they are the leader in trillion dollar economic opportunity offered by this technology.

The future for IoT looks promising but deciding whether IoT is a ground-breaking innovation or just marketing gimmick is extremely difficult at this moment. For now the best we can do is educate ourselves about the Internet of Things and its potential impacts, so we are not left behind if IoT juggernaut takes tech world by storm in near future.