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Making KPI Dashboards with PowerBI

 While this is the free tier, I cannot share or collaborate with others, nor can I publish content to other people's workspaces, but they will not stop me from screenshooting and recording these self-taught adventures,so! I'm doing this because I idly searched "Mattel careers" and "Information Technology", and seeing a bulletpoint saying the following: Analytical and reporting skills such as creating dashboards and establishing KPIs such as experience with PowerBI, Cognos, Tableau, and Google Data Lake/AWS is preferred And thought "Well, I've used Tableau, and I've heard about PowerBI,  even if its in-demandness is questionable , so how similar is it? And can I write about it?"  First, PowerBI (PIB) does have a downloadable, local version, but apparently Windows-only. I could download the .exe but I couldn't run it / drag it to applications on my MacBook.  Not a problem, we'll use the online SaaS version, and a dataset found here,

Securing Terraform and You Part 2 -- Trivy by AquaSecurity

9/20: The open source version of Terraform is now  OpenTofu    Part one is over here . This comes as the 3rd tool in a long line of tools I am using to make Terraform (OpenTofu) code consistent. I went back to the Styra Academy courses for OPA Policy Writing. I am a very "Just show me the general idea, and I can probably figure it out", and I am reasonable enough to say that it didn't work this time, and I had to take the slow road. Good start; Trivy told us where it installed; trivy info installed /usr/local/bin/trivy /Users/morganza/Library/Caches/trivy the homebrew package had an outdated version, so I had to install v. 0.40.0 myself and link it to the previously installed 0.18.0 I believe -- See the GitHub discussion here . We are now back to rego, but fortunately, Trivy works as intended when you run it locally with the following command; trivy conf --policy . --namespaces morganza . There was an odd combination of YAML with a bit of rego involved for tfsec -- can

Lambdas

 A Lambda is an anonymous function. Places like AWS have services set up entirely just to host these simple functions that don't require a ton of code or backend. To run the Python here, I go back to Google Colaboratory; Check out my Lambda book here   Ex. 1   g =  lambda  x:  3 *x +  2 g( 3 )     Simple.  Ex. 2   full_name =  lambda  fn, ln: fn.strip().title() +  " "  + ln.strip().title() full_name( "   Ember" ,  "Serros" )     Notice the spaces in front of the first name (' Ember')      Ex. 3     def   func ( x , y ):    """Does things"""   func2 =  lambda  x: x + y+ 3 print (func( 2 , 7 ))   Using def seems to be hit or miss. This returns None, which technically is correct,  but I'm expecting a number (12). It's missing a return statement;   return  func2(x) +  3       Ex. 4   def   func ( x , y ):   funct2 =  lambda  x: x+y+ 5    return  funct2(x) +  6 print (func( 3 , 78 ))   Works just fine.      E

Omni 2 12 Megapixel HN-8899

  If there's an official website for Omni -- Not the hotel chain -- and this camera has a specs page, I'm not finding it. I did, however, find a person looking for a copy of the manual in 2011. I got you!  Wonder if they folded or if someone bought them out. Now, with 12 MP, we're not running the gamut on high-resolution photos here, but let's look at some context. Even when I sold phones in 2013, the Samsung Galaxy S4 had 13 MP for the rear camera. Why weren't leaps and bounds happening here?  That's a story for another author. The Omni 2 has a very plastic case. While I can't bend it greatly, I can still bend it, lending to a cheap feel.  There's a very chunky USB port that I recognize. I have another digital camera that's older than this and doesn't look nearly as outdated that also uses the cable. The slidey switch right above it (there's a blue line right beneath it) -- It may have originally been another focus feature, as there are ico

Securing Terraform and You Part 1 -- rego, Tfsec, and Terrascan

9/20: The open source version of Terraform is now  OpenTofu     Sometimes, I write articles even when things don't work. It's about showing a learning process.  Using IaC means consistency, and one thing you don't want to do is have 5 open S3 buckets on AWS that anyone on the internet can reach.  That's where tools such as Terrascan and Tfsec come in, where we can make our own policies and rules to be checked against our code before we init.  As this was contract work, I can't show you the exact code used, but I can tell you that this blog post by Cesar Rodriguez of Cloud Security Musings was quite helpful, as well as this one by Chris Ayers . The issue is using Rego; I found a cool VS Code Extension; Terrascan Rego Editor , as well as several courses on Styra Academy; Policy Authoring and Policy Essentials . The big issue was figuring out how to tell Terrascan to follow a certain policy; I made it, put it in a directory, and ran the program while in that directory

Business Bonus: Netflix Livestream Turns Into A Learning Opportunity

 Good on Netflix for being more like cable television, from adding ads , to attempting to livestream in 2023.  I am not familiar with Netflix's "Love Is Blind" show, but on 4/16, Netflix had intended to livestream a reunion at 8/7c, and it was hotly anticipated. To their credit, they did it successfully earlier this year, after a comedian's stint at the Hippodrome Theater in March, where there was apparently a waiting room for viewers while technical checks were run. When it did not start on time, tweets began to flow in confusion -- and jokes. Netflix tried to play along and soothe impatient fans: Love is ... late #LoveIsBlindLIVE will be on in 15 minutes! — Netflix (@netflix) April 17, 2023 Even (the last existing) Blockbuster took to the stage to fire shots: Remember renting vhs’ from us. You could start it on time no problem… This is what we get. — Blockbuster (@blockbuster) April 17, 2023 Apparently, the internet at the venue had issues :   That's Vanes

Watch Me Upgrade: FitBit Inspire 3 Review

There's no need to buy new technology just for the sake of having new technology, in my opinion. I will use things until they wear out to the ground. I held onto my LG phone a year after they stopped manufacturing phones entirely. I still use a laptop from 2019 that I got refurbished from Best Buy despite it literally having pieces falling off of it. And I do have other computers that I use (Thank you, you know who you are) but technically, that laptop still works so why not use it for personal stuff? Two, count 'em, two FitBits. This (Yellow one) is the Fitbit Inspire 3. I have the Fitbit Versa 2 (Blue one) from 2018 or so, which means it was probably made in 2017 and just sat on the shelf. I was a bit due for a wearable technology upgrade. It took a lot of thought to spend the 99$ to buy this watch, when my old one was, while failing, still doing the basics. I don't like to throw things out if they can still be used.  Maybe I'll put it on my dog. This recent FitBit w