When you are preparing your application for release, an efficient initial strategy is to integrate a single payment service. But as your application's market reach grows, so does the necessity for flexible and diverse payment options. Having a diverse payment system is crucial to avoid vendor lock-in, to leverage local payment methods, and to maintain control over costs.
That’s why it is important to have a scalable infrastructure that will allow you to accommodate those needs — especially nowadays, when integrating with payment services has become more accessible than ever.
Set theory is a branch of mathematics that uses rules to construct sets. In 1901, Bertrand Russell explored the generality and over-permissiveness of the rules in set theory to arrive at a famous contradiction: the well-known Russell's paradox. The echoes of Russell's Paradox resonate beyond mathematics in fields like software systems, where rules are usually used to design such systems. When the rules that we use to build our systems are naive or over-permissive, we open the door for edge cases that may be hard to deal with. After all, to deal with Russell's paradox, mathematicians had to rethink the foundations of set theory and develop more restrictive and rigorous axiomatic systems, like Zermelo-Fraenkel's set theory.
Russell's Paradox Explained
The rule that created all the problems was the following: A set can be made of anything that we can think of. This is formally known as unrestricted composition. To make things easier for Russell in finding an interesting edge case, there was a rule that stated that sets can contain themselves.
Data de-identification is a necessary exercise healthcare institutions and organizations dealing with personally identifiable information must implement. With the help of data de-identification software, it has become easier to mask personal data that can put an individual at risk.
De-identifying data makes it easier to share and reuse with third parties for various purposes, including research, census, sampling, etc. It is also necessary under the HIPAA law to mask personally identifying data, and other frameworks including GDPR, CCPA, and CPRA instruct the same.
Welcome back to this series where we have been learning how to build web applications with AI.
So far in this series, we’ve created a working app that uses AI to determine who would win in a fight between two user-provided opponents and generates text responses and images. It’s working, but we’ve been following the happy path.
The reality of the startup is that engineering teams are often at a crossroads when it comes to choosing the foundational architecture for their software applications. This decision, seemingly technical at its core, extends far beyond the area of coding, straight into the strategic planning that can make or break the early stages of a startup. At the heart of this decision lies a crucial question: should these teams lay the groundwork with a microservice architecture, known for its distributed and decentralized nature, or opt for a monolithic design, where the entire application is unified and interdependent?
The allure of a microservice architecture is understandable in today's tech state of affairs, where scalability, flexibility, and independence are highly valued. The appeal of building a system that's inherently designed to grow and adapt as the startup evolves is undeniable. Microservices promise a distributed architecture where each service runs its unique process and communicates through a well-defined, lightweight mechanism. This approach offers many advantages, particularly in enabling teams to update and deploy individual components without disrupting the entire system.
SIEM stands for Security Information and Event Management. SIEM platforms offer centralized management of security operations, making it easier for organizations to monitor, manage, and secure their IT infrastructure. SIEM platforms streamline incident response processes, allowing security teams to respond quickly and effectively to security incidents. SIEM solutions help organizations achieve and maintain compliance with industry regulations and standards by providing centralized logging and reporting capabilities. SIEM systems enable early detection of security threats and suspicious activities by analyzing vast amounts of log data in real time.
Key Components in SIEM
Log Collection: SEIM systems collect and aggregate log data from Various sources across an organization’s network, including servers, endpoints, firewalls, applications, and other devices.
Normalization: The collected logs are normalized into a common format, allowing for easier analysis and correlation of security events.
Correlation Engine: SIEM systems analyze and correlate the collected data to identify patterns, anomalies, and potential security incidents. This helps in detecting threats and attacks in real time.
Alerting and Notification: SIEM platforms generate alerts and notifications when suspicious activities or security incidents are detected. Security analysts can then investigate and respond to these alerts promptly.
Incident Response: SIEM systems facilitate incident response by providing investigation, forensics, and remediation tools. They offer capabilities for tracking and documenting security incidents from detection to resolution.
Compliance Reporting: SIEM solutions help organizations meet regulatory compliance requirements by providing reporting and audit trail capabilities. They generate reports that demonstrate adherence to security policies and regulations.
Problem Statement
In Data Engineering, the data/log collection is a challenging task for high-volume sources. For example, in big organizations, the Linux logs may be around 10 billion, and firewall logs may be around five billion per day. Volume spikes in log collection result from sudden increases in data, impacting the data ingestion process, impacting the platform at the storage level, and networking.
In terms of new technology, the world is at a turning point. These days, the Internet of Things, machine learning, and artificial intelligence combine to transform industries worldwide. The arrival of Industry 4.0 is significantly enhancing the efficiency of all corporate procedures. Production, marketing, security, and worker safety are all changing.
Many industries require handling hazardous chemicals, gasses, and machinery. Here's where AI can be quite helpful. With AI solutions, workplace safety may be increased, accidents can be avoided, and injuries can be avoided. Read this article to find out more about how AI contributes to a safe workplace.
I have been actively involved in assisting various customers with their data migration and data modernization initiatives over the past few years. Reflecting on the challenges they faced and the valuable lessons learned, I believe sharing insights that can benefit the broader community is essential.
In the current landscape, many organizations are transitioning from managing on-premises big data enterprise warehouses such as Oracle, SQL, or Hadoop to cloud solutions like Snowflake, Synapse, or Databricks. This shift is driven by factors such as improved efficiency, cost reduction, scalability, and enhanced user experiences. However, the process of migrating an entire data ecosystem from on-premises to the cloud presents numerous challenges and unforeseen scenarios. A robust data strategy is crucial, taking into account the existing systems, the nature of produced data, usage patterns, and specific requirements across various departments and user segments. Here, I outline key recommendations and considerations that should form a part of your comprehensive data strategy:
Generative AI (GenAI) enables advanced AI use cases and innovation but also changes how the enterprise architecture looks. Large Language Models (LLM), vector databases, and retrieval augmentation generation (RAG) require new data integration patterns and data engineering best practices. Data streaming with Apache Kafka and Apache Flink is key to ingesting and curating incoming data sets in real-time at scale, connecting various databases and analytics platforms, and decoupling independent business units and data products. This blog post explores possible architectures, examples, and trade-offs between event streaming and traditional request-response APIs and databases.
Use Cases for Apache Kafka and GenAI
Generative AI (GenAI) is the next-generation AI engine for natural language processing (NLP), image generation, code optimization, and other tasks. It helps many projects in the real world for service desk automation, customer conversation with a chatbot, content moderation in social networks, and many other use cases.
Open banking offers users a way to have easier access to their own bank account information, like via third-party applications. This is achieved by allowing third-party financial service providers access to the financial data of a bank's customers through the use of APIs, which enable secure communication between the different parties involved.
Some notable examples of banks and financial institutions that are leveraging open banking to offer enhanced services, increased transparency, and a more personalized banking experience for their customers:
MyScale(opens new window) has introduced the EmbedText function(opens new window)in the latest version of the integrated SQL vector database. This powerful feature brings together the efficiency of SQL querying and state-of-the-art AI-driven text embedding technology so that you can use familiar SQL syntax to do precise text matching and efficient semantic similarity computing.
With full integration of Jina Embeddings v2(opens new window)models, MyScale EmbedText allows users to harness the capabilities of Jina AI within MyScale for processing text with an input length of up to 8K using the standard SQL syntax, which makes it possible to understand and process much longer texts than ever before. Whether processing complex multilingual data or creating advanced AI applications, developers can instantly take advantage of Jina AI's top embedding models through MyScale at every point in the development process.
Imagine stepping into an entertainment venue where the building itself is part of the show. This is no longer just a fantasy, thanks to The Sphere. This architectural masterpiece merges cutting-edge technology with groundbreaking design to create a fully immersive experience. Let’s take a closer look. A New Era in Entertainment Architecture Traditionally, entertainment venues […]
What will you make of the extra day that February has in store for us this year? Call an old friend, explore a new place, or get stuff done you have put off for so long maybe? Whatever you might have planned this month, our new collection of desktop wallpapers is bound to cater for a little inspiration spark along the way.
Created by artists and designers from across the globe, the wallpapers in this post come in versions with and without a calendar for February 2024 and can be downloaded for free — a monthly tradition that has been going on here at Smashing Magazine for more than twelve years already.
As a little bonus goodie, we also added some February favorites from our wallpapers archives to the collection. So maybe you’ll spot one of your almost-forgotten favorites in here, too? Thank you to everyone who challenged their creative skills and shared their artwork with us this month! Happy February!
You can click on every image to see a larger preview,
We respect and carefully consider the ideas and motivation behind each and every artist’s work. This is why we give all artists the full freedom to explore their creativity and express emotions and experience through their works. This is also why the themes of the wallpapers weren’t anyhow influenced by us but rather designed from scratch by the artists themselves.
Submit a wallpaper! Did you know that you could get featured in our next wallpapers post, too? We are always looking for creative talent.
Love Myself
“Happy Valentine’s Day to the most beautiful woman I know.” — Designed by Design Studio from India.
“February, known as the month of love, is celebrated globally as it hosts Valentine’s Day on the 14th, a day dedicated to expressing affection and appreciation. It symbolizes a time for couples to strengthen their bonds and for individuals to celebrate various forms of love in their lives.” — Designed by Hitesh Puri from Delhi, India.
“Let your imagination take flight with vibrant colors, dynamic shapes, and the joy of design. Embrace the sky-high inspiration!” — Designed by PopArt Studio from Serbia.
“The shortest month of the year is not so short and gives us one more day to share, enjoy, and discover. We have been to Antarctica and we are going to almost the opposite extreme, Norway, to navigate through its fjords and discover unique spaces. And there, where the only company is a moose that has come down to drink, we remember Sophie and her particular way of seeing the world: ‘To children, the world and everything in it is new, something that gives rise to astonishment. It is not like that for adults. Most adults accept the world as a matter of course.’ Sophie’s World - Jostein Gaarder” — Designed by Veronica Valenzuela from Spain.
“These geometrical shapes make me think about a lizard skin. Be patient Mr Lizard, spring has not arrived yet.” — Designed by Philippe Brouard from France.
“I wanted to draw some very cozy place, both realistic and cartoonish, filled with little details. A space with a slightly unreal atmosphere that some great shops or cafes have. A mix of plants, books, bottles, and shelves seemed like a perfect fit. I must admit it took longer to draw than most of my other pictures! But it was totally worth it. Watch the making-of.” — Designed by Vlad Gerasimov from Georgia.
“Forget Lady and the Tramp and their spaghetti kiss, ’cause Snowflake and Cloudy are enjoying their bliss. The cold and chilly February weather made our kitties knit themselves a sweater. Knitting and playing, the kitties tangled in the yarn and fell in love in your neighbor’s barn.” — Designed by PopArt Studio from Serbia.
“Although I love winter (mostly because of the fun winter sports), there are other great activities ahead. February, the last winter month, this year is even one day longer. But I don’t mind. Thanks, winter, and see you next year!” — Designed by Igor Izhik from Canada.
“I was doodling pictures of my cat one day and decided I could turn it into a fun wallpaper — because a cold, winter night in February is the perfect time for staying in and cuddling with your cat, your significant other, or both!” — Designed by Angelia DiAntonio from Ohio, USA.
“February is the month of love par excellence, but also a different month. Perhaps because it is shorter than the rest or because it is the one that makes way for spring, but we consider it a special month. It is a perfect month to make plans because we have already finished the post-Christmas crunch and we notice that spring and summer are coming closer. That is why I like to imagine that maybe in another place someone is also making plans to travel to unknown lands.” — Designed by Verónica Valenzuela from Spain.
“Our designers decided not to overuse the topic of Valentine’s Day and used its basic attributes and a pure pastel blue color scheme for the wallpaper instead. — Designed by MasterBundles from Ukraine.
“A leap year means we have one more day to cherish! Maybe use it to visit an old friend, or go somewhere new, but use it well! And the most important: have some fun!” — Designed by Printsome.com from the United Kingdom.
“We’re celebrating Valentine’s Day with our February wallpaper. Whatever Valentine’s Day means to you, we’re on board. Love, relationships, or the best of friends, it’s something to be celebrated!” — Designed by Focus from the United Kingdom.
“I live in Madison, WI, which is famous for its breweries. Wisconsin even named their baseball team “The Brewers.” If you like beer, brats, and lots of cheese, it’s the place for you!” — Designed by Danny Gugger from the United States.
“In times of never-greater hype around the future of technological advancements, we go back to another tech revolution of the past. February 9th marks the day of Apollo 14’s landing on the moon, the third in NASA’s crewed space program. Our February calendar design aims to connect the tech endeavors of the present and past and serve as a reminder that innovation should always be used for a good cause.” — Designed by PopArt Studio from Serbia.
“Danube is Europe’s second largest river, connecting ten different countries. In these cold days, when ice paralyzes rivers and closes waterways, a small but brave icebreaker called Greben (Serbian word for ‘reef’) seems stronger than winter. It cuts through the ice on Đerdap gorge (Iron Gate) — the longest and biggest gorge in Europe — thus helping the production of electricity in the power plant. This is our way to give thanks to Greben!” — Designed by PopArt Studio from Serbia.
Do you want to use WordPress in your browser for testing purposes?
Meet WordPress Playground, a platform where you can try out open-source WordPress.org in a browser without purchasing a hosting plan first. You can also use it to test plugins and themes without affecting your live WordPress website.
In this article, we will explain what WordPress Playground is and how to use it.
What Is WordPress Playground and How Does It Work?
It’s like an online sandbox where you can do all sorts of WordPress development without affecting your real website.
All you need to do is go to the WordPress Playground website to open it. Then, you can use WordPress as you normally would: install new plugins, try out new themes, add new pages, and so on.
If you refresh the WordPress Playground page, all the customizations will disappear. However, you can also download your WordPress instance and upload it again to WordPress Playground.
How Does WordPress Playground Work?
WordPress Playground runs on some cool technologies that let you use WordPress without the usual web server and database setup:
WebAssembly binary (Wasm): It lets you run PHP code directly in your web browser, making WordPress work without a traditional server. It also makes the platform compatible with all browsers, from Chrome and Edge to Firefox and Safari.
SQLite database: Instead of MySQL, WordPress Playground uses a lighter file-based database system called SQLite, which runs right in your browser.
Service Worker and Worker Threads APIs: These web tools help handle requests and run background JavaScript scripts, making it possible for WordPress Playground to run PHP apps smoothly in your browser.
These technologies also enable developers to integrate WordPress Playground with node.js, Visual Studio Code, and a CLI tool called wp-now.
With these tools, developers can also use WordPress Playground on a development platform for testing or staging purposes.
What Are the Limitations of WordPress Playground?
Despite its benefits, WordPress Playground has several limitations, like:
No direct access to the theme and plugin directory–You will have to install themes and plugins by manually downloading and uploading them. That said, a network access beta feature aims to solve this problem.
Customizations in WordPress Playground are temporary – If you decide not to save the changes in the browser, you will have to be careful not to accidentally refresh the page to avoid losing your progress.
iFrame issues are common – If you embed a WordPress Playground instance on your web page, you may expect some problems, from accidental refreshes to iFrame not working.
It’s a relatively new feature – Not everything will work properly, so you can expect some hiccups here and there as you explore the environment.
All that being said, the Playground is a relatively new WordPress project. So you can expect the team to release new features and bug fixes to improve the user experience.
Now that you know what WordPress Playground is, let’s see how you can use it. You can use the quick links below to navigate through our tutorial:
Once you are on the website, wait a few moments for the Playground to set up. Then, you will see the front end of the website using a default WordPress theme.
If you are using WordPress Playground for testing, then you may want to configure the environment to reflect the WordPress software for your actual website.
To do this, click the menu that says ‘PHP 8.0 WP 6.4 – Storage: None.’
The first setting you have to configure is the storage type. There are three options.
‘None’ means all changes will be lost on page refresh. Meanwhile, ‘Browser’ means changes will be stored in the browser but disappear if you close the browser tab or clear your cache.
You can also save the changes on your computer by selecting ‘Device.’ This option will let you select a folder in your computer to store your WordPress Playground files, similar to creating a localhost WordPress site.
The next thing you want to configure is the PHP version.
Below that, you can optionally enable the ‘Load extensions: libxml, openssl, mbstring, iconv, gd’ and ‘Network access (e.g., for browsing plugins)’ settings.
The first setting will load those specific PHP extensions (libxml, openssl, mbstring, iconv, and gd) to enhance your WordPress Playground. But they are not necessary.
The second setting is called ‘Network access.’ It’s a beta feature and will connect your WordPress Playground to the official plugin directory so that you can install WordPress themes and plugins right from the environment.
Finally, you can select a WordPress version for the Playground. You should pick the version you currently use for your WordPress blog or website.
WordPress also makes the ‘WordPress Nightly’ version available. This is the development version of WordPress that includes the latest changes made by the WordPress development team.
You can use this if you are a plugin or theme developer and want to test compatibility with the next WordPress update.
Once you are done configuring these settings, go ahead and click ‘Apply changes.’
And that’s all for the settings. Now, you can head to the admin area to start testing out the sandbox.
To open the admin area, hover over the site title menu and click ‘Dashboard.’ Or, you can also go to the Full Site Editor by clicking ‘Edit site.’
How to Install Themes and Plugins in WordPress Playground
There are two ways to install a WordPress plugin or theme in WordPress Playground. One is to go to a plugin or theme page on WordPress.org and click the ‘Download’ button.
This will save the plugin or theme’s zip file to your computer.
Then you can continue with the usual, manual WordPress installation for plugins and themes. You can read our guides for more instructions:
For plugins, simply go to the dashboard of the WordPress Playground and navigate to Plugins » Add New Plugin.
After that, click the ‘Upload Plugin’ button and select ‘Choose File’ to upload the plugin zip file you downloaded earlier. Finally, click ‘Install Now.’
As for themes, WordPress will have a default theme installed for you when you first use the Playground.
But if you want to use a new free WordPress theme, you can download it manually from the WordPress theme directory. Then, in the Playground, go to Appearance » Themes and click ‘Add New Theme.’
On the next screen, click the ‘Upload Theme’ button.
After that, choose the theme file you downloaded earlier and click ‘Install Now.’
If this process seems a bit tedious, don’t worry. WordPress has been working on a beta feature allowing Playground to connect with the plugin or theme directory. This should be enabled if you choose ‘Network access’ during the setup earlier.
This way, the Playground works just like any typical WordPress dashboard and you can install free themes and plugins without saving them first to your computer.
Another way to install themes and plugins in WordPress dashboard is by using WordPress Playground’s Query API. It works by requiring you to add some query parameters to the WordPress Playground URL.
So, for example, if you want to install and test AIOSEO’s free version in WordPress Playground, then you can go to AIOSEO’s WordPress.org page. After that, take note of the AIOSEO’s URL slug.
Now, on a new browser tab, type in WordPress Playground’s URL with AIOSEO’s slug, like so:
When you hit the ‘Enter’ key, WordPress Playground will automatically create a new environment with the AIOSEO plugin installed.
If you want to install the theme, then just replace the plugin parameter with theme, like so:
https://playground.wordpress.net/?theme=astra
You can even combine multiple query parameters if you want to install multiple plugins or themes on top of WordPress core. Just make sure to separate each parameter with the ampersand & sign.
Here’s what the URL will look like if you are installing the AIOSEO and MonsterInsights plugins as well as the Astra theme:
If you are a Chrome user, you can also install the Open in WordPress Playground extension. With this, whenever you go to a plugin or theme page on WordPress.org, you will see the ‘Playground’ button.
Clicking it will open a new WordPress Playground environment with the plugin or theme installed. It simplifies the query parameter method.
How to Export/Import a Site Made With WordPress Playground
Let’s say you’ve played around with WordPress Playground, added some new posts using the Gutenberg editor, and maybe even created an entire website. It would be a waste to just close the tab and lose all of your progress forever.
Luckily, you can export your site from WordPress Playground and save it to your computer. Whenever you open the Playground again, you can always upload that exported zip file to continue where you left off.
To do this, navigate to the top menu of the Playground and click the three-line menu in the top right corner. Then, click ‘Download as .zip.’
Your browser will then start downloading the file to your computer.
To upload the file to WordPress Playground, just open the Playground site and click the three-line menu again. After that, click ‘Restore from .zip.’
A popup will now ask you to choose a file that you exported earlier.
Once you’ve selected the file, just click ‘Import.’
If the file is valid, you will see a popup notifying you that the import was successful and the Playground will be refreshed with the new instance.
Just click ‘OK’ to close the popup.
Import/Export WordPress Playground to GitHub
If you have a GitHub account, you can also export and import your site from WordPress Playground. GitHub is a great platform that allows you to track changes to your website, back up your files, and collaborate with other users.
To export a site from WordPress Playground to GitHub, click the three-line menu and select ‘Export Pull Request to GitHub.’
In the next popup, you will see that WordPress encourages saving your website to your computer as a backup. Once you do that, you can tick the ‘I exported my Playground as zip’ box.
Then, click the ‘Connect to your GitHub account’ button.
Next, you must confirm that you are authorizing WordPress Playground to access your repositories.
Just click ‘Authorize adamziel’ to continue.
At this stage, go ahead and select what type of files you are exporting: plugins, themes, or wp-content directory. If you want to export plugins, themes, media files, widgets, menus, and fonts, then select the last option.
You will also need to specify the GitHub repository’s URL to which you’d like to export the site. Then, click the ‘Next step’ button.
Once you’ve done that, you need to choose whether you are creating a new pull request or updating an existing one. For demonstration purposes, we will choose the first option.
After that, enter the path in the repository where the changes should be committed.
You will also need to insert a commit message to specify what changes have been made using the WordPress Playground.
With all that done, click ‘Create Pull Request.’
If the export is successful, WordPress will show a popup with a link to the new pull request.
Just click the link to see it in action.
Now, if you want to import a site from GitHub into WordPress Playground, just click the three-line menu again.
Then, select ‘Import from GitHub.’
If you are opening a completely new WordPress Playground environment, then you might need to do the whole GitHub Playground authorization process again.
After that, just click the GitHub repository URL you’d like to import from. WordPress provides some examples if you are unsure.
Next, you have to specify what files you are importing: themes, plugins, or the entire wp-content directory.
You may also insert the path of the repository that you are importing from. Once done, simply click ‘Import.’
If the import works, you will see a success message popup, confirming that the WordPress Playground will be refreshed with the new instance.
How to Embed WordPress Playground on Your Website
If you are writing a WordPress tutorial, then you will likely include screenshots from the WordPress dashboard to guide users through your instructions. However, sometimes screenshots just don’t accurately illustrate the actions you are describing.
This is where WordPress Playground can come in handy. You can embed it on your page or post, giving users a more interactive reading experience. They can follow along with your instructions using Playground.
First, you need to open the Gutenberg block editor for a page or post. Once there, click the ‘+’ add block button and select the Custom HTML block.
Now, go ahead and copy the code below, and paste it into the HTML block:
Here, the iFrame tag is wrapped in div tags to make the Playground embed follow the padding and margin of the container.
We also added the style attribute to set the iFrame’s width to 100% of its container, and the height to be 500 pixels tall.
Here’s what it looks like on the front end:
Frequently Asked Questions About WordPress Playground
Let’s cover some frequently asked questions about WordPress Playground.
Can you use WordPress in your browser?
Yes, WordPress Playground lets you use WordPress directly in your browser. You can build websites and try out themes and plugins before installing them on your live site.
Can I install custom themes and plugins in WordPress Playground?
Yes, you can install custom themes and plugins in WordPress Playground to see if they work in the admin area and are compatible with certain WordPress versions.
Can I upload a site made with WordPress Playground to my hosting account?
Technically, you can export your site from WordPress Playground and import it into your WordPress hosting account. However, since WordPress Playground uses the SQLite database, you may need to convert the database to MySQL for the site to run on a web server.
How do I run WordPress plugins and themes locally?
If you want to run WordPress plugins and themes in a local development environment, then you must create a local WordPress site first. You can read our tutorial on how to build a local WordPress site for step-by-step instructions.
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Vector embeddings are a powerful tool in artificial intelligence. They are mathematical (numerical) representations of words or phrases in a vector space. Usually processed by embedding models, these vector representations capture semantic relationships between words, allowing algorithms to understand the context and meaning of text. By analyzing the context in which a word appears, embeddings can capture its meaning and semantic relationships with other words.
Sample vector embeddings for a simple text.
The Role of Embeddings and Vector Stores/Databases in Modern Applications
Embeddings are crucial for modern applications like recommendation systems, search engines, and natural language processing. They help understand user preferences, match search queries with relevant documents, and improve the accuracy of language-related tasks.
