Photo by  Mateusz Dach  from  Pexels Emails are ubiquitous in our daily lives. We use emails to communicate with our friends, families, learn about new products, get offers and promotions, etc. Consequently as a marketer email marketing plays a pivotal role in acquiring new customers and nurturing existing customers.  However I personally have experienced a proliferation of emails during the pandemic. During the chronic lockdowns with the physical stores and restaurants being closed many small businesses have revamped their digital presence often adding email marketing to their repertoire of tools to reach their customers and prospects. I have seen my local shops setting up targeted websites (thanks to companies like Wix, Shopify, etc.) and often allowing visitors to subscribe to their newsletters. Email marketing solutions like Mailchimp and Campaign monitor have allowed these small businesses to quickly add email to their marketing channel with an easy pay a...

Low-code development platforms are dominating many conversations lately. Many believe that low-code development platforms will account for millions of USD in revenue in the next five (5) years. An article by Forbes highlights that “ it will account for more than 65% of application development activity by 2024 ”. Some believe it will be the answer to all their development needs. Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko from Pexels  But low-code is not a new concept. The difference now is that its audience has amplified. For developers (or even advanced users) who have been in the Microsoft  ecosystem for a while have already experienced the assembly of software solutions with little effort using tools such as Microsoft Excel, Access, Visual Studio (assembling forms) and others. Putting Microsoft aside, and prior to this “low-code revolution” which has reached high altitude in the last couple of years, there have been many online veterans which allow a user to assemble simple to mediu...

When you are thinking of “orchestrating your digital transformation” you need to have, as part of your repertoire, the DevOps practice, and when it is done properly, your delivery cycle will become a “well played symphony”. Photo by Tom Fisk from Pexels First: What is DevOps? DevOps, as defined in Scaled Agile framework, “DevOps is a mindset, a culture, and a set of technical practices. It provides communication, integration, automation, and close cooperation among all the people needed to plan, develop, test, deploy, release, and maintain a Solution.” DevOps is the combination of development and operations. Since its inception it has provided a collaborative approach supporting work distribution where multiple groups work together for the delivery. Photo by logicwork   The DevOps cycle consist of six (6) phases which combine with Agile frameworks, contributes to exploration, continuous integration, continuous deployment and release on demand. The phases are: Plan, Build, Cont...

 The pandemic has changed how companies operate and deliver their services to their consumers. It is undeniable that companies that had experimentation as part of their “corporate DNA” reported better growth during the pandemic.  Photo by Chris Peeters from Pexels   Let’s face it, the change created by the pandemic is here to stay. Therefore, this need of “relentless improvement” will continue to apply to this present. The combination of the safety measures and the vaccination rollouts has given us the opportunity to regain some normality, or what many are calling the “new normal”. This defines how we are operating now, and will form the base of how we will operate in the coming future. The ones that were quicker to adapt during this era of crisis had a competitive advantage over others that were more conservative in nature. It is not surprising that a Google survey ( Note : we will reference this survey throughout this article) highlights that “ organizations at diff...

Photo by Kammeran Gonzalez-Keola from Pexels Since the COVID lockdown started over a year ago I have seen many restaurants in my neighborhood go through transformations - many became available in the top three delivery service: Ubereats, Doordash and Skipthedishes while the rest transformed to support pick up service and patio dining. However, among all of them, one of my favorite Indian restaurants impressed me the most.  The restaurant initially became available via the delivery services just after the lockdown in early 2020. I first ordered from the restaurant via Ubereats. In the delivery the restaurant included a pamphlet encouraging me to order from them directly on their website with an initial enticing offer. I ordered immediately after a few days from their website. I was guided to create an account and subscribe to their newsletter in the process.  The delivery for the order was on time and the food as always was delicious and of high quality. In a few days I re...

 Today is a day dedicated to our home (our planet).  Photo by Akil Mazumder from Pexels Today is a reminder of caring and protecting the environment, to care about our future. We invite you to follow the conversation at earthday ORG >

Introduction Containers are great for DevOps, and as a development environment in general. Photo by Pixabay from Pexels  In this article I want to take the opportunity to share with you the following: A brief overview of the two popular containers: Docker, Docker Swarm and Kubernetes Differences between Docker Swarm and Kubernetes Example of Docker and Kubernetes to provide you a hands-on experience A container is a runtime environment. It will allow you to separate the applications from the infrastructure. This decoupling allows you to deliver the applications at a faster pace. With containers, you can have the applications, and the dependencies, in one self-contained package. That package can be easily shared with other developers in the team irrespective of the OS they are using. This will get the developers setup faster and ready to contribute to the software being developed/maintained/supported. Diagram 1   Similar to the benefits to the development process, containers...