Peter Wayner

Author Archives: Peter Wayner

3 places edge-computing challenges can lurk

How much computing power should we put at the edge of the network?In the past when networks weren’t supposed to be very smart, it wasn’t even a question. The answer was none. But now that it’s possible to bring often substantial amounts of computational equipment right to the very edge of the network, the right answer isn’t always so easy.The arguments in favor are simple. When packets travel shorter distances, response time is faster. With compute, storage and networking deployed at the edge, network lags and latencies don’t slow down each trip between users and resources, and users and applications get better response times.At the same time, because more work is done at the edge, the need will drop for bandwidth between remote sites back and central data centers or the cloud: Less bandwidth, lower cost.To read this article in full, please click here

3 places edge-computing challenges can lurk

How much computing power should we put at the edge of the network?In the past when networks weren’t supposed to be very smart, it wasn’t even a question. The answer was none. But now that it’s possible to bring often substantial amounts of computational equipment right to the very edge of the network, the right answer isn’t always so easy.The arguments in favor are simple. When packets travel shorter distances, response time is faster. With compute, storage and networking deployed at the edge, network lags and latencies don’t slow down each trip between users and resources, and users and applications get better response times.At the same time, because more work is done at the edge, the need will drop for bandwidth between remote sites back and central data centers or the cloud: Less bandwidth, lower cost.To read this article in full, please click here

21 hot programming trends—and 21 going cold

Programmers love to sneer at the world of fashion where trends blow through like breezes. Skirt lengths rise and fall, pigments come and go, ties get fatter, then thinner. But in the world of technology, rigor, science, math, and precision rule over fad.That's not to say programming is a profession devoid of trends. The difference is that programming trends are driven by greater efficiency, increased customization, and ease of use. The new technologies that deliver one or more of these eclipse the previous generation. It's a meritocracy, not a whimsy-ocracy.[ Find out how to get ahead with our career development guide for developers. | Keep up with hot topics in programming with InfoWorld's App Dev Report newsletter. ] What follows is a list of what's hot and what's not among today's programmers. Not everyone will agree with what's A-listed, what's D-listed, and what's been left out. That's what makes programming an endlessly fascinating profession: rapid change, passionate debate, sudden comebacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Python vs. R: The battle for data scientist mind share

The boss’s boss looks out across the server farm and sees data—petabytes and petabytes of data. That leads to one conclusion: There must be a signal in that noise. There must be intelligent life in that numerical world—a strategy to monetize all those hard disks filling up with numbers.That job falls on your desk, and you must now find a way to poke around the digital rat’s nest and find a gem to hand the boss.[ Download the InfoWorld megaguide: The best Python frameworks and IDEs. | Learn to crunch big data with R. | Keep up with hot topics in programming with InfoWorld’s App Dev Report newsletter. ] How? If you’re a developer, there are two major contenders: R and Python. There are plenty of other solutions that help crunch data, and they live under rubrics like business intelligence or data visualization, but they are often full-service solutions. If they do what you want, you should choose them. But if you want something different, well, writing your own code is the only solution. Full-service tools do a good job when the data is cleaned, buffed, and ready, but they tend to hiccup and even throw up when Continue reading

9 lies programmers tell themselves

Programmers have pride with good reason. No one else has the power to reach into a database and change reality. The more the world relies on computers to define how the world works, the more powerful coders become.Alas, pride goeth before the fall. The power we share is very real, but it’s far from absolute and it’s often hollow. In fact, it may always be hollow because there is no perfect piece of code. Sometimes we cross our fingers and set limits because computers make mistakes. Computers too can be fallible, which we all know from too much firsthand experience.[ Find out how to get ahead with our career development guide for developers. | The art of programming is changing rapidly. We help you navigate what’s hot in programming and what’s going cold. | Keep up with hot topics in programming with InfoWorld’s App Dev Report newsletter. ] Of course, many problems stem from assumptions we programmers make that simply aren’t correct. They’re usually sort of true some of the time, but that’s not the same as being true all of the time. As Mark Twain supposedly said, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into Continue reading

13 reasons not to use Chrome

OK, we’re kidding a bit. Chrome is great. Google did a wonderful job with it—and continues improving it every day. The marketplace recognizes this, and many surveys show Chrome is the most popular browser by far.It’s not hard to see why. Chrome is stable, in part because its architects made a smart decision to put each web page in a separate process. It has excellent HTML5 standards support, loads of extensions, synchronization across computers, and tight integration with Google’s cloud services. All of these reasons and more make Chrome the popular choice.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cloud made easy: Get started with Digital Ocean

When the boss wants a prototype as soon as possible or a client needs something tomorrow, the cloud is the best place to turn. You can have a fully configured machine serving data in minutes.One of the most developer-friendly options is DigitalOcean, a cloud that offers fast machines at reasonable prices, delivering them in seconds. It doesn’t offer the fancier features that the major cloud providers do—at this writing—but it does package raw machines in a way that’s a breeze to deploy. If you’re a developer with an idea that needs a home, DigitalOcean’s machines are blank slates ready to go.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

PHP vs. Node.js: An epic battle for developer mind share

It’s a classic Hollywood plot: the battle between two old friends who went separate ways. Often the friction begins when one pal sparks an interest in what had always been the other pal’s unspoken domain. In the programming language version of this movie, it’s the introduction of Node.js that turns the buddy flick into a grudge match: PHP and JavaScript, two partners who once ruled the internet together but now duke it out for the mind share of developers.In the old days, the partnership was simple. JavaScript handled little details on the browser, while PHP managed all the server-side tasks between port 80 and MySQL. It was a happy union that continues to support many crucial parts of the internet. Between WordPress, Drupal, and Facebook, people can hardly go a minute on the web without running into PHP.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

10 new AWS cloud services you never expected

In the beginning, life in the cloud was simple. Type in your credit card number and—voilà—you had root on a machine you didn’t have to unpack, plug in, or bolt into a rack.That has changed drastically. The cloud has grown so complex and multifunctional that it’s hard to jam all the activity into one word, even a word as protean and unstructured as “cloud.” There are still root logins on machines to rent, but there are also services for slicing, dicing, and storing your data. Programmers don’t need to write and install as much as subscribe and configure.[ Download the public cloud megaguide PDF: Amazon, Microsoft, Google, IBM, and Joyent compared. | Stay up on the cloud with InfoWorld’s Cloud Computing Report newsletter. ] Here, Amazon has led the way. That’s not to say there isn’t competition. Microsoft, Google, IBM, Rackspace, and Joyent are all churning out brilliant solutions and clever software packages for the cloud, but no company has done more to create feature-rich bundles of services for the cloud than Amazon. Now Amazon Web Services is zooming ahead with a collection of new products that blow apart the idea of the cloud as a blank Continue reading

Review: DigitalOcean keeps the cloud simple

The cloud is a big place, and it’s getting bigger as everyone moves more and more computation out of their server rooms into the large datacenters. Amazon is the dominant force in the cloud, but it is far from the only choice. When the market grows this big, niches can develop. DigitalOcean is a company that has found a fertile niche by branding itself as the developer’s choice.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

11 predictions for the future of programming

The only thing that flies faster than time is the progress of technology. Once after lunch, a chip-designing friend excused himself quickly with the deft explanation that Moore’s Law meant that he had to make his chip set 0.67 percent faster each week, even while on vacation. If he didn’t, the chips wouldn’t double in speed every two years.Now that 2017 is here, it’s time to take stock of the technological changes ahead, if only to help you know where to place your bets in building programming skills for the future.[ Give yourself a technology career advantage with InfoWorld's Deep Dive technology reports and Computerworld's career trends reports. GET A 15% DISCOUNT through Jan. 15, 2017: Use code 8TIISZ4Z. | Keep up with hot topics in programming with InfoWorld's App Dev Report newsletter. ] From the increasing security headache of the internet of things to machine learning everywhere, the future of programming keeps getting harder to predict.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Should you go with Google’s Go?

2016 was full of surprises, but in the world of programming, among the biggest was the breakthrough of Go. Once a tiny niche tool, Go has officially joined the ranks of real programming languages, evidenced by its meteoric rise up the Tiobe index, a complex amalgam of search rankings and programmer preferences. Still a ways behind stalwarts like Java, C, and Python, Go hit 16th in October 2016, up 49 spots from a year prior. That’s a big change that’s caught the eye of programmers and project managers alike.Go’s jump is likely due in large part to Docker, a package management system for deploying code that is taking over stacks everywhere. The fact that one of the hottest dev technologies in years is written in Go in a positive sign for the language’s viability. A better one may be the fact that Docker is quite solid and very successful. That’s bound to win over converts by showing that the language can support real infrastructure.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 chronic browser bugs plaguing the web

Web browsers are amazing. If it weren’t for browsers, we wouldn’t be able to connect nearly as well with users and customers by pouring our data and documents into their desktops, tablets, and phones. Alas, all of the wonderful content delivered by the web browser makes us that much more frustrated when the rendering isn’t as elegant or bug-free as we would like.When it comes to developing websites, we’re as much at the mercy of browsers as we are in debt to them. Any glitch on any platform jumps out, especially when it crashes our users’ machines. And with design as such a premium for standing out or fitting in, any fat line or misapplied touch of color destroys the aesthetic experience we’ve labored to create. Even the tiniest mistake, like adding an extra pixel to the width of a line or misaligning a table by a bit, can result in a frustrating user experience, not to mention the cost of discovering, vetting, and working around it.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The power of lazy programming

Whoever said working hard is a virtue never met a programmer. Yes, ditch diggers who work hard generate longer ditches than those who daydream, and farmers who lean into the plough plant more food than those who stare off into the sky. But programming isn’t the same. There is no linear relationship between sweat on the brow and satisfied users.Sometimes it helps if programmers pull all-nighters, but more often than not it’s better for programmers to be smart -- and lazy. Coders who ignore those “work hard, stay humble” inspirational wall signs often produce remarkable results, all because they are trying to avoid having to work too hard. The true geniuses find ways to do the absolute minimum by offloading their chores to the computer. After all, getting the computer to do the work is the real job of computer programmers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 bad programming ideas that work

Anyone who has listened to a teenager, sports commentator, or corporate management knows the connection between words and meaning can be fluid. A new dance craze can be both “cool” and “hot” at the same time. A star player’s “sick moves” don’t necessarily require any medical attention. And if a company is going to “reorganize,” it’s not good for anyone, except perhaps the shareholders -- even then it’s not always clear.The computer world has always offered respite from this madness. No one stores “one” in a bit when they mean “zero.” No one types if x = 0 when they really want to say if x != 0. Logic is a bedrock that offers stability in a world filled with chaos and doublespeak.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 programming languages we love to hate — but can’t live without

The well-meaning advice to not carry a grudge certainly didn’t come from anyone who’s wrestled with a computer for a living. Toil for anytime with the infernal logic of a programming language and you’ll know the horrors of the inky void where the worst bugs dwell.Sure, everyone loves a computer language when they first encounter it. And why wouldn’t we, with all those “hello world” examples that show how powerful the language can be in three lines of code. Programming languages are defined to be implicitly logical, but that doesn’t mean they spread logic everywhere they go. A pleasant barkeep may make the lives of everyone at the bar happier. A brave firefighter radiates bravery. But the logical mechanisms of programming languages often breed illogic, confusion, and doubt.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

13 fabulous frameworks for Node.js

13 fabulous Node.js frameworksNode.js may be several years old now, but it's still in the spring of its life. The options are multiplying, as everyone experiments with new and better ways to deliver information from the platform. These efforts translate into dozens of frameworks for Node.js enthusiasts and newbies to explore, and new growth everywhere.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cloud review: Amazon, Microsoft, Google, IBM, and Joyent

The message from the cloud has always been simple: Surrender your cares, IT managers, and we’ll handle everything. Forget about skinning your knuckles installing servers, double-checking diesel backups, or fretting about 1,000 or 10,000 things that could go wrong. Give us a credit card number and your data. We’ll do the rest.There are options for the teams doing data analytics. Microsoft offers a number of big data crunching services that are integrated with the Azure cloud. Once you upload your data, the algorithms are ready to go. You push a few buttons and fancy graphs and deep insights pour out. Similarly, you can tap the power of Watson and predictive analytics tools on IBM’s Bluemix. Amazon offers a narrower set of machine learning capabilities, tailored to developers and business analysts. Google’s machine learning service was recently made available in a limited preview.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

5 more timeless lessons of programming ‘graybeards’

The HR departments and hiring managers in Silicon Valley have a challenge. They can’t ask an applicant’s age because their companies have lost brutal discrimination lawsuits over the years. Instead, they develop little tricks like tossing in an oblique reference to “The Brady Bunch” (“Marcia, Marcia, Marcia!”) and seeing if the candidate gets the joke. Candidates who chuckle are deemed a poor cultural fit and are tossed aside.Alas, the computer industry has a strange, cultish fascination with new technologies, new paradigms, and of course, new programmers. It’s more fascination than reality because old tech never truly dies. Old inventions like the mainframe may stop getting headlines, but they run and run. As I write this, Dice shows more than five times as many jobs postings for the keyword "Cobol" (522) than "OCaml," "Erlang," and "Haskell" combined (11, 52, and 27, respectively).To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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