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All You Need to Know about React Native & Flutter Apps

All You Need to Know about React Native & Flutter ...

React Native is an open-source framework which allows developers to build cross-platform mobile applications using JavaScript. Developed by Facebook, the framework enables one to design a mobile application by using the same design principles used to design a web application with ReactJs framework. It lets the developer build mobile application UI by compiling several components. Prior to React native, other options like Cordova, ionic were available to build a hybrid application.

What is Cross-Platform Development?

Cross-platform mobile development is the creation of software applications that are in sync with several mobile operating systems. Initially, the complexity of developing mobile apps was exacerbated by the trouble of building out a backend that worked across multiple platforms. Although it was slow and costly, it was often easier to build native applications for each mobile operating system (OS). The problem? The code built for one operating system could not be repurposed for another OS.

Benefits of Cross-Platform Development

Some of the advantages of developing Cross-Platform apps are:

Codes can be reused

Rather than write new codes for every platform, developers can reuse the same code across all platforms. This also helps reduce repetitive tasks, thus removing unnecessary work. However, it is not a new concept; it has been used in software development for several years now and reusing codes have had a number of benefits.

Controls expense

Contrary to the past when companies had to spend massively on various tools and technologies, cross-platform development now helps organizations invest only once for app development. No longer do they need to spend on creating apps for every individual platform separately. As for app developers, the same team, or unit, can be used to work on different platforms.

Faster development time

Once a single script is deployed, app development becomes much swifter. On the contrary, improved development speed leads to the product hitting the market sooner than earlier. Time can be spent on coming up with codes for a brand-new application, which is a win-win situation for developers, marketers and consumers.

Easier Execution

There are several technologies, nowadays, like PhoneGap and Appcelerator, offering a cross-platform solution that allows developers to make changes easily. For example, when a tool like Appcelerator is used, codes can simply be written in HTML5 and changed for different platforms. Simply put, it’s all about the application of resources you already know about and converting them for different platforms.

This not only makes development of apps faster, but it also becomes easier to sync updates across all mobile devices.

Consistency and Uniformity

Using cross platform app development guarantees that the overall look of the app can be maintained across all platforms since the same set of codes are being applied. Customers find an app cumbersome and ineffective if they need to use different practices for accessing the same app across different mobile phones. They would rather use one that looks and feels the same on both devices.

One of the major goals of a mobile app developer is to acquire as many customers as possible or aim for a targeted market and fully engage the customers.

It is not a tough prospect when most of the targeted audience is using the same platform. It is then easy to select which platform to develop the app on. But when the objective is to target a massive audience who could be using iPhone, Android, Windows Phone and others, the app would have to be made separately for the diverse platforms.

This is where cross platform mobile app development is beneficial. As with all things technological, it may be hard to execute, but the advantages do generally provide a better view for app development.

What is React Native?

First released by Facebook in 2015, React Native, or RN, is a widely used JavaScript-based mobile app framework that lets you create natively-rendered mobile applications for iOS and Android.

In just a few years, React Native has become one of the leading solutions used for mobile development. The app development is used to run some of the world’s foremost mobile apps, including Instagram, Facebook, and Skype.

What is Flutter?

Flutter was introduced by Google in 2015, but today the buzz around it has grown stronger. Flutter is a cross-platform tool designed for building Android and iOS apps from a single code base by using a contemporary, responsive framework.

In a very short span of time, Flutter has managed to gain traction among developers. Today, app stores are graced by a slew of Flutter apps, including the Alibaba app with 50 million users. In addition, Flutter is not only growing at a rapid pace, but it also offers swifter development than React Native. What’s more, Flutter is free and open source, and it’s based on Dart, a relatively new but fast, goal-oriented programming language. Plus, it provides its own widgets — which are fast, catchy, and customizable —and drawn from its own high-performance rendering engine.

10 Amazing Apps Built Using Flutter Framework

  1. Google Ads (Utility)
  2. Alibaba (eCommerce)
  3. Reflectly (Lifestyle)
  4. Birch Finance (Finance)
  5. Hamilton Musical (Entertainment)
  6. Coach Yourself (Health and Fitness)
  7. Hookle (Social)
  8. Watermaniac (Health & Fitness)
  9. Cryptograph (Finance)
  10. SG BusTracker (Maps & Navigation)

Saima Naz

Apr 16, 2021

Page Speed Optimization: Trends & Standards

Page Speed Optimization: Trends & Standards

Page speed optimization is the key factor that determines success for modern online businesses. Poor website performance ruins a company’s goodwill and undermines its reputation when the agony of waiting for slow web pages to load forces visitors to opt for alternatives.

What is Page Speed?

Page speed is the length of time it takes to show all the content on a certain page or the span of time it takes for a browser to collect a web server’s first. Every page component, i.e., its HTML code, CSS that styles page elements, several JavaScript files, pictures, videos and other multimedia and so much more, impacts the page speed.

Thanks to the differences in technology, page speed is gauged distinctly on desktop and mobile devices, with users finding the experience exciting.

Page Speed vs. Site Speed

From their nomenclatures, page speed and site speed look quite similar, but in fact they are quite different from each other. Site speed is the average of numerous model pages on a website, while page speed explains how long an individual will wait to begin using a specific page.

Why Page Speed is Important

For users, page speed is immensely important as swifter pages are more well-organized and provide a much better on-page user experience. According to a survey, if a page takes longer than 4 seconds to load, over a half of users will look the other way.

Speed is equally important for mobile users as well. The same survey showed that 75% of users reported visiting a website that didn’t load fast enough. Conversion rate is also greatly impacted by page speed. For example, a top American retailer Walmart observed a three percent rise with every second of increased page speed.

More significantly, page speed is also vital for search engine optimization (SEO).

In 2010, Google announced that page speed would be included as one of the ranking features for their search index. And a few years ago, the company announced they will give page speed even more attention, integrating mobile site speed to rank sites on its “mobile-first” pages, or pages that personalize rankings for mobile sites. The search engine behemoth also expanded the standing of the user experience by introducing Page Experience to its ranking signals.

Page experience gestures aim to assess web pages by the quality of their user experience for real people. Simply put, they expand Google’s recent on-page standards with features that impact the individual’s experience while using the content. In fact, page speed is one of the most important factors that influence it.

Page Speed Metrics

Page speed is a complex phenomenon. Therefore, to overcome any issues associated with it, it is important to comprehend how it is measured.

There are numerous metrics that impact or are relevant to page speed:

Load time: It describes how long it takes for a whole page to show in a browser’s window. It’s worth noting that for that to occur, all file and script must be loaded and all HTTP requests have to be satisfied.

Page size: It describes the overall size of all features — including code elements, scripts, images, and other files — a page comprises.

Time to First Byte (TTFB): It measures the time between a browser requesting the page and the first byte of the information is returned by the server.

Round Trip Time (RTT): It describes the time it takes for the complete request for information: from the moment the browser makes the request, to the time it takes to reach the server, and how long it takes for the response to return to the browser.

Factors that Slow Pages Down

With these convincing figures, you surely want to ensure your site is loading swiftly. Here are some of the factors that might decelerate your site’s speed.

Primarily, a heavy image page, particularly on sites with receptive or high DPI images, can load sluggishly. Enhancing images can make your website more lightweight; so can allocating them through a content delivery network (CDN) to render those files from location closer to where the user is.

Another problem happens if your web page has a number of large files that must be downloaded. Rendering too many JavaScript scripts might decelerate a page as well. A JavaScript compression or minimization tool reduces your download size. Another grave problem is rendering scripts too early or too late. Often, webmasters design their pages to be expended only after the whole content has been loaded.

Evaluating Page Speed

You may not be aware how users are dealing with your website if you don’t evaluate page speed. Google’s PageSpeed Insights allows you to see your pages’ load speed score, as well as giving you the aforementioned reasons that your page may not be loading as fast as it could be.

Nevertheless, the averages provided by these Google tools do not constantly paint a complete picture. A swift look provides valuable insights as you make the changes that Google’s PageSpeed insights suggests. You can do pre and post analysis and also correlate the changes to see if that led to a rise in traffic and conversion on your site.

However, one thing is crystal-clear: optimizing your page speed is essential for the future. And your entire focus should be on improving the speed of your web page.

Saima Naz

Apr 2, 2021

Everything you should know about ReactJS

Everything you should know about ReactJS

“Backend is the most fundamental part of an application.”

We all have heard that multiple times.

As an app developer, your main focus is the backend of the web application and you make sure that it works efficiently to support the overall application. Yes, the backend is the spine of the web app but we also know that if your application is not pleasing to the eye, you may face difficulty in selling it to the audience.

Application development is a half-done job with a poor front-end. After all, what is seen is sold. A strong visual appeal can uplift the game of your application to the next level.

To accomplish this task, you can make use of a library called ReactJS. What is ReactJS? How can it be smartly used to elevate the overall persona of your newly-developed application?

What is ReactJS?

Fundamentally, ReactJS is an open-source JavaScript library to construct flexible and dynamic user interfaces. This component-based front-end library builds the view layer of your mobile or web application.

ReactJS is considered as one of the flexible libraries as it allows the developer to use it according to their own convenience and requirement. You can develop a little part of a new feature of your app, alter the entire look, or the whole user interface of your application.

It entails the use of a few additional libraries that match the changes you would like to make in any application.

The simple use of ReactJS has helped it gain much popularity and highlights it as the shining future of the web development domain. Big enterprises such as Uber, Facebook, Airbnb, PayPal, and more use React JS for their user interface.

How does ReactJS function?

ReactJS was introduced by Facebook when a team of developers from the franchise comprehended that the Document Object Model (DOM) is confined to a programming interface for XML and HTML documents only. They realized that it only explains the documents of a logical structure and their accessibility of manipulation.

ReactJS introduces virtual DOM which it implements in JavaScript as a tree representation. Hence, when it requires to write or read to the DOM, the virtual representation is used which is a systematic and effective way to upgrade the browser’s DOM.

Contrasting to browser DOM components, React components are plain objects and are cheap to make. React DOM takes care of repairing the DOM to coordinate with the React elements. The reason for this is often that JavaScript is exceptionally quick and it is a sensible decision to maintain a DOM tree in it that accelerates its basic manipulations. Although ReactJS was conceived to be utilized within the browser, its genius design has enabled it to be used within the server with Node.js.

What Are the Advantages of ReactJS?

1.     The Data Flow

ReactJS obeys unidirectional data flow. During the designing process, developers take parent component to nest child component within. But, with the flow of data being unidirectional, the debugging becomes simple and the errors can be easily spotted and rectified.

2.    The Performance

The virtual DOM in ReactJS makes the applications comparatively faster. Moreover, Virtual DOM makes the updating easy. How? By comparing the previous states and updating the features of the Real DOM that require alterations, the updates are simple because the entire application does not have to be updated anymore.

3.    Easy Learning

From the beginners’ point of view, ReactJS can be easily learned because it is the amalgamation of JavaScript and HTML concepts. If a learner spends the right amount of time with multiple tools and frameworks, he or she can learn the ropes of ReactJS’s library with some added advantages.

4.    Web and Mobile Applications

There has been a misconception that ReactJS is only restricted to application development, which is certainly false.

The framework for ReactJS called React Native that is originated from the ReactJS itself which is extensively used for the development of the amazing visuals of mobile applications. This property makes ReactJS a dual-platform library.

5.     The Diversity

The diversity of ReactJS makes it easily accessible for other frameworks such as Vue, jQuery, Angular, and Backbone, as it is not a framework itself.

6.    The Components

Components make or break the application as they pose to be the pillar React application. Mostly, one application is made up of various components. ReactJS components can be reused in the entire application that smartly decreases the development time of an application. These components encompass strong logics that assists in reusability.

What are the requirements to learn ReactJS?

For people with a keen interest in ReactJS, there are a few prerequisites that will pave the way for quick learning such as

  1. HTML
  2. Handful knowledge of JavaScript and ES6
  3. CSS
  4. Basic understanding of Node and NPM
  5. Elementary programming concepts such as arrays, classes, functions, objects, etc.

 Conclusion

A course for the learning of ReactJS can take you a long way. With the help of some basic understanding, you can make the most of this rapidly growing library. Learn it today and take the visual magic of your application one step ahead.

Saima Naz

Mar 25, 2021

A Complete Overview of Rust Programming Language

A Complete Overview of Rust Programming Language

Rust programing language, since its launch more than a decade ago, has managed to carve a niche for itself across a wide community of developers, attaining the top slot among the most sought-after programming languages.

The key to Rust’s success: its ability to have control over low-level details, as it can be used to craft game engines, websites, tools, file and operating systems, and more. Simply put, the language, being very simple, swift, and light, bears considerable resemblance to C++, and is more focused performance and security. Rust was created by Graydon Hoare for Mozilla.

Concepts of Rust

Ownership

Ownership is Rust’s most amazing feature, and it allows the language to make memory safety guarantees. In Rust, memory is managed through a structure of ownership with a set of guidelines that the compiler reviews at compile time. Owned data is only automatically removed when the retained variable no longer holds the data. This can occur when the owner variable goes out of scope and is wrecked; and the owner variable is set to another value, which makes the real data inaccessible.

Borrowing

As the name suggests, borrowing allows another variable to momentarily borrow the data in your variable and gives it back when it’s done. Several resources are too costly in terms of time or memory be copied for every reassignment. In these situations, the language offers the option to borrow.

Lifetimes

The Rust compiler uses lifetimes to keep track of the length of validity of references. The borrow checker is primarily responsible for checking references. In many situations, the borrow checker can deduce the precise lifetimes and handle everything on its own. But it often needs your help to appreciate it. If Lifetime does not do its work properly, several invalid references can be seen during runtime.

Why Use Rust?

There are multiple reasons why top developers make the most of Rust programming language, some of which are as follows.

Performance

Rust is super-fast and memory-efficient: with no runtime or garbage collector, the language can run performance-critical amenities, run on embedded devices, and easily gel in with other languages.

Reliability

Rust’s rich type system and ownership model ensure memory-safety and thread-safety, allowing you to remove several classes of viruses at compile-time.

Productivity

Rust has amazing documentation, a welcoming compiler with beneficial error messages, and first-rate tooling — an integrated package manager and build tool, smart multi-editor support with auto-completion and type inspections, an auto-formatter, and more.

Rust can build powerful web apps

Rust is unquestionably the best choice for developing web apps that offer performance that wouldn’t have been possible using JavaScript, the long-lasting scripting language of the web. Besides, Rust can be compiled into Web Assembly, a promising new domain to bring near-native application performance to the web. In fact, Rust has become the go-to language for writing code that compiles to Web Assembly. The language is also likely to soon rival well-known web-development languages for its unique features.

Rust is great for building distributed online services

For networked services, Rust’s trifling footmark and capacity to ensure memory safety across multiple threads make it a superb choice for services that scale across distributed systems online. Drawing data from different online services should also shortly be easier, with Rust due to enforce support for the async/await commands, which will make it much easier to write asynchronous code that doesn’t hang while waiting for data to be delivered.

Stack Overflow

Rust has been Stack Overflow’s most loved language for four consecutive years; no wonder, many who began working on it fell in love with it. Nevertheless, the nearly 97% of survey respondents who haven’t used the language may question its credibility. But these skeptics will be pleasantly surprised to learn that Rust enjoys a leading edge over other languages with just a handful of minor demerits.

Why you should learn Rust

Rust is a contemporary programming language that is essentially aimed at solving a slew of issues which C/C++ programmers generally face. Here are a couple of reasons why you should learn Rust.

The Package Manager

Rust is one of the few languages to come with a built-in package manager called Cargo. Compared to other package manager, working with Cargo is an exciting experience. Reason?  It uses the TOML syntax, which is quite expressive and user-friendly.

 

 

Plus, it obviates the need for setting up any build scripts. Cargo automatically deals with compiling and linking binaries for your libraries and program. No configuration is required for production or development and there’s no need to worry about targeting specific platforms. It simply works. Also, you can still have them even if there’s no need to build scripts. Custom build scripts are regularly used when linking against C/C++ libraries, and take into account as much customization as needed.

The Compiler

While the Rust compiler is not essentially the swiftest one, it is certainly still very well designed and has a number of features that many other compilers lack. Initially, it features great color coding which makes the productivity very easy to read.

 

 

The compiler is very thorough and provides considerable context to the source of your error. The compiler not only tells you about the error and where to find it, but it also gives the code straight in the terminal. It underlines the specific parts of a line that are erroneous. There are also exhaustive clarifications of why your code is wrong, and most remarkably, it can even tell you how to fix it. Note that in the above image, the compiler asks to add the mut keyword in front of window. If the compiler is unable to provide a direct fix for your code, it will still provide a command to give a more thorough clarification — typically in the form of Rust –explain {error_code}.

Conclusion

Over the last few years, Rust has seen a remarkable rise and we are finally beginning to see it intrude into large organizations and significant projects. Most conspicuously, WASM has first-class support for Rust. The language has also been selected as the most treasured language for two years in succession.

Microsoft behemoth Microsoft has also been very vociferous about their embracing of Rust.

Approximately, 70% of the security issues that the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) allocates a CVE to are memory safety issues. By and large, despite being a relatively new language, Rust is in a very good position and is on track to become the number one programming language of the world.

Saima Naz

Mar 24, 2021

Wearable Apps: An Overview of a New App Ecosystem

Wearable Apps: An Overview of a New App Ecosystem

You must have heard someone mention wearable technology, but do you know what exactly it means?

What is wearable technology?

Wearable technology is a general term for a group of devices — including fitness trackers and smartwatches — that you can wear all day. These gadgets can actually connect with devices, such as computers and smartphones, which means they are able to do a number of amazing things.

Types of wearables

  • Smartwatches
  • Fitness trackers
  • Sport watches
  • Head-mounted displays
  • VR
  • AR/smart glasses
  • Hearables
  • Consumer health

4 ways wearable technology can improve our life

  1. Wearable Technology Keeps Us Fit

It goes without saying that wearable technology seeks to improve users’ lives in more ways than one. Millions of people around the world are taking advantage of the technology to stay fit and in good shape. One of today’s top health-driven wearable gadgets is the FitBit Flex. The bracelet comes with numerous monitoring features to help you create objectives and improve your fitness. This device helps you track your activity levels, your sleep cycle, and your food intake while checking your progress and setting objectives. The gadget keeps a watch on your physical activity by tracking your steps, calories burned, or the distance you travel during a day.

  1. Enterprise Situational Awareness

Situational awareness (SA) is the process of gathering information from across your organization, creating it into usable intelligence, and spreading it efficiently so your employees comprehend how to make good decisions to keep your organization, its assets, and its employees safe and secure.

These technologies are likely to revolutionize disaster recovery and emergency response by letting emergency services access more information while vigorously conducting their critical tasks. Providing key information can provide critical information for decision-makers. During an incident that requires portrayal of the incident command system approach; many of the decisions are made based on face-to-face or radio-based reports. Information from wearables could decrease imprecisions caused by inappropriately communicated information and provide precise situational awareness.

The Growth of Wearable Devices

 The Growth of Wearable Devices

Although wearable technology and devices may seem like a new trend, in reality they have been around for quite some time.

Tech giants IBM and Olympus are considered to be the trailblazers in the realm of wearable technology. As far back as 1999, the companies released the PC Eye-Trek, which essentially bears a number of similarities with Google Glass, a wearable computer designed by the search engine behemoth to include an optical, head-mounted display. Developed to mimic much of the same functionality that is expected of a traditional computer, Google Glass also falls into a category called augmented reality because it is intended to provide people information about the world around them as they travel through their daily lives.

Samsung, another technology giant, also came up with the Samsung Galaxy Gear around eight years ago, which epitomized another daring step forward for the format. The Galaxy Gear is designed to replicate and occasionally complement the functionality of a conventional smartphone.

Challenges in Wearable Devices

Challenges in Wearable Devices

There are a number of problems relating to wearable devices that need to be dealt with for such devices to become mainstream, including:

  • Power management
  • Technological reliance created by augmented reality and automatic processing
  • Advances in software architecture to compensate for the challenges of navigating on such small-screen interfaces
  • Adequate security from threat actors with the potential to control the data stores on the device

But with safety and other risks addressed, the hands-free and location-reliant processes of wearable computing devices could result in a number of applications. For instance, the devices could provide new capabilities for those requiring high-tech agility and connectivity in the field, such as emergency workers, search-and-rescue teams, warehouse staffs or anyone on the move. The systems also make it possible to track people, such as nurses carrying out rounds or emergency workers in the field.

Every new technology has an outline and detection phases in its life cycle, including wearable devices. A new catalyst that will forward the life cycle of wearable devices is the overview of 5G, that will provide more bandwidth and open the gates for many choices like real-time monitoring of health and several apps working simultaneously.

There will be times when customers will question the objective and use of such devices, and some people will discard them altogether. But the potential of wearable devices is too much to overlook, and one can ignore their benefits to one’s own detriment. If previous experience with the commonplace importance of smartphones is any sign, then the future of wearable devices is just as positive.

Future of Wearable Technology

The world has certainly enjoyed improved technological advancement which has enhanced our quality of life. Major fields of endeavor such as the healthcare and transportation sectors, and even the Fintech industry, continue to grow phenomenally, with the future looking bright and promising. One mainly striking innovation which is slowly becoming omnipresent is wearable technology, leading to the enhanced demand for wearable app developers.

The usage of wearable technology has seen a stellar rise in the last two decades. There’s no doubt that smart watches, VR and AR technology, smart jackets and a wide variety of other gadgets have become an indispensable part of our lives. And this can be gauged from colossal investment being made in the wearable technology market.

Detail Overview of Wearable Apps:

Saima Naz

Mar 12, 2021

Data Visualization: Power BI Trends & Practices

Data Visualization: Power BI Trends & Practices

Business intelligence plays a leading role in the strategic planning of organizations and is used for numerous reasons, including gauging performance improvement toward business objectives, carrying out quantitative examination, reporting and data allocation, and recognizing customer insights. To this end, organizations gather data from internal IT systems and outside sources, prepare it for evaluation, run queries against the data and generate data visualizations, BI dashboards and reports to make the analytics results on hand to business users for effective decision-making and strategic planning.

How Business Intelligence Works

BI is used as a basis for strategic decision-making removing as much of the conjecture and speculative guesses from the decision-making process as possible. Organizations collect the essential data, examine it, and ascertain which actions to take to meet their objectives.

On the technical front, raw data is gathered from the business’s activity; data is processed and then stored in data storerooms; and once it’s stored, the scrutiny process to answer business questions begins. BI applications help organizations to bring all these diverse sources into a single integrated view providing real-time reporting, dashboards, and analysis.

Benefits of Business Intelligence

BI is more than just software; it’s a rounded enterprise to use data in everyday operations. Here are some of the fundamental benefits of business intelligence.

Quicker analysis, intuitive dashboards

Business intelligence platforms are developed to do strong data processing in the cloud or on your company’s servers. These tools draw data from several sources into a data storeroom, and then examines the data consistent with user queries, drag-and-drop reports, and dashboards. BI helped Lenovo raise reporting proficiency by 95% across many departments.

Improved organizational competence

BI offers leaders the capacity to access data and attain a rounded view of their processes, and the ability to benchmark results against the bigger organization. With an all-inclusive view of the organization, leaders can detect areas of opportunity. Pharmaceutical company Pfizer uses BI platforms to join forces among subdivisions and developed models to enhance patient diagnosis and quicker, better ways to execute clinical trials.

Data-driven business decisions

Having precise data and quicker reporting ability make for better business decisions. MillerCoors modified mobile dashboards for their sales team so they can view real-time data and sales predictions before going into meetings with potential customers. They can speak of customers’ or prospects’ needs assuredly and know the data is current. Leaders no longer have to wait days or weeks for reports and cope with the risk of data that may be obsolete.

Improved customer experience

Customer experience and satisfaction can be directly affected by business intelligence. Verizon installed BI systems across many departments, producing upwards of 1,500 dashboards for workers. These dashboards drew data from processes and text data from customer support chat sessions. Using this data, the American telecommunications giant managed to recognize opportunities to improve customer service and decrease support calls by 44%.

Increased competitive advantage

Companies can be more viable when they know the market and their performance within the market. Rosenblatt Securities, an institutional brokerage firm, evaluated data from scores of sources and managed to see the best possible time to enter and exit the market and position themselves purposefully. With BI, businesses can keep up with changes in the industry, monitor periodic changes in the market, and forestall customer needs.

Improved employee satisfaction

IT departments and specialists barely take time out to respond to business user requests. Departments that previously had no access to their own data without communicating experts or IT can now jump into data analysis with little training. BI is intended to be scalable, providing data solutions to departments that need it and for employees who require data. Brown-Forman, one of the largest American-owned spirits and wine companies, scaled American interactive data visualization software company Tableau to 1,000 global users, and discovered that it fit well within their current data set-up.

Trusted and governed data

BI systems increase data organization and examination. In conventional data analysis, different departments’ data is siloed and users have to access numerous databases to reply their reporting queries. Departments across a company can access the same data at one time. Award-winning marketing agency Tinuiti centralized over 100 data sources using BI technology, saving their customers hundreds of hours of analysis time.

trusted-and-governed-data

 

The Challenge

 

Case study: Heathrow International Airport

Being one of the busiest airports, Heathrow International Airport manages over passengers 0.2m every day, which is a Herculean undertaking. The situation can be exacerbated by stormy weather, delayed and canceled flights, shifts in jet streams, etc, disrupting the airport’s smooth functioning. Given these issues, the airport needed a Central Management System that would use the huge amounts of data being produced by operational systems at the airport and convert it into useful visual insights.

Heathrow has deployed Microsoft Azure technology to gather data from back-end operational systems such as check-in counters, baggage tracking systems, flight schedules, weather tracking systems, cargo tracking and many more.

Power BI converts the rudimentary operational data into useful visuals showing different statuses and figures of the airport systems.

This data is about flight movements, security queues, passenger transfers, and immigration queues. Eventually, Power BI uses data from these Azure services for analysis and construal. Then, the ground staff use this information to appropriately run and manage passengers. Nearly 75,000 airport employees have information on their fingertips thanks to Power BI.

Key Business Intelligence Trends

Here’s a list of some key business intelligence trends.

  • Artificial intelligence
  • Data security
  • Data discovery/visualization
  • SaaS BI
  • Predictive and prescriptive analytics tools
  • Real-time data and analytics
  • Collaborative business intelligence
  • Mobile BI
  • Data automation
  • Embedded analytics

Four Pillars of Power BI

The four strong pillars of Power BI include:

  • Power query
  • Data model
  • Power BI desktop
  • Power BI service

Top reasons to use Power BI for business analytics

  • It’s easy to connect your data together
  • It’s powerful and efficient
  • It enables more cutting-edge analytics with familiar Excel features
  • It brings together data governance and security
  • It has the ability to customize Power BI app navigation

Advanced Dashboard

advanced-dashboard

Detailed Overview of Power BI Trends & Practices

Saima Naz

Mar 9, 2021

A Comprehensive Overview of Power Apps and Best Practices

A Comprehensive Overview of Power Apps and Best Practic...

In today’s technology-driven world, modern businesses rely on data than on anything else. From entering their time for payroll, seeking guidance on current processes, and evaluating data to make decisions, users interact with data virtually on a daily basis.

 

Microsoft Power Platform Fundamentals

No wonder, users can be empowered to gain insights from and interact with data while automating those tedious tasks that appear to be onerous. Power Platform allows your company to create solutions while enabling you to unite tailored technology to help everyone, from top executives to the ordinary employees, drive the business with data. Power Platform consists of four key products: Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI and Power Virtual Agents.

 

Power Apps provides a rapid low code development environment for building custom apps for business needs. It has services, connectors, and a scalable data service and app platform (Common Data Service) to allow simple integration and interaction with existing data. Power Apps enables the creation of web and mobile applications that run on all devices.

 

An Outline of Common Data Service (CDS)

Like a database, Common Data Service, or CDS, is a data storage service, which can be used to store data in the form of tables known as Entities. CDS is a service that is used largely in the Power Apps portal, but it is also accessible through other Power Platform services and Microsoft Dynamics. It would be easy to think of the CDS as just a relational database, but it truly is comprised of three components: entities, logic, and security.

 

Entities

Whenever a new environment is created, a new example of CDS is made along with a pre-defined set of entities. This standard data plan is called the Common Data Model (CDM) and the entities created inside the initial instance of CDS are called the core entities. The Common Data Model can be understood to be the base language of the platform and lets applications communicate seamlessly and easily.

 

Logic

Not only is the CDS an interactive database with a pre-defined data set, but it also accompanies some integral logic that users are familiar with, allowing data to be authenticated in real time in line with certain requirements. They also can help an end user understand by showing messages advising them on what should be done before saving a record. Logic almost always means another crucial element of the Power Platform: Power Automate. This allows us to automate several different types of processes across the entire Power Platform and beyond.

 

Security

Users will be acquainted with the notion of security roles and business units. The CDS follows this security model, which implies that security is easily configured out of the box, letting us us lock down fields and record sharing, just as it occurs in Dynamics.

 

Power Apps: An Overview No-Code Development Platforms Software

A no-code platform is a development platform that exploits a visual development setting to lay layperson users craft apps, through systems such as drag-and-drop, adding application elements to create a whole application. Developers as well as non-technical people can use these tools to practice quick application development with modified workflows and functionality. A number of these products are geared toward large businesses that need to swiftly design business processes and workflow applications at a massive scale. The tools provide templates for workflow, element libraries, and interface customization to produce full-fledged applications sans any coding.

 

Types of Power Apps

 

1. Canvas Apps

Canvas-based apps have existed since Power Apps first emerged nearly 2 years ago. Canvas apps can immensely help you connect to a majority of the data sources that are included in your O365 license. What’s more, these apps are amazing for putting scores of data sources together into one app; for crafting a completely custom UI; for delivering a user-friendly, and mobile-first application for your users.

 

2. Model-driven Apps

In Power Apps, model-driven apps are grounded on fundamental data, i.e., the data stored in Common Data Service (CDS). With model-driven apps, you need not worry about selecting the app size. And the best part is that it is responsive, which implies that it works on mobile or tablet quite easily. These apps are built on a data-first approach; therefore, they are far stiffer in design than canvas apps, with a majority of other user interface mechanisms being premade and pre-selected; however, there is still room to edit discrete components.

 

3. Portals

Portals help build externally facing website through smart no-code solutions. Power Apps interface enables you to create an unidentified or genuine website that lets users interact with data held in CDS. Portals let companies create websites which can be shared with external users external either incognito or through the login provider of their choice, including LinkedIn. Enterprise login providers can also be integrated using various industry standard protocols like SAML2, OpenId Connect and WS-Fed.

 

4. Power Apps Features and Benefits

Some of the features of Power Apps include:

  • App creation, running and sharing
  • Drag and drop functionality
  • Integration with other Microsoft products
  • Common Data Service (CDS)
  • Custom APIs
  • Collaboration support
  • Connected to the cloud

Benefits of Power Apps

Power Apps is the go-to thing for its user-friendly functionalities and its capacity to integrate data. Here are some key benefits that Power Apps offers your business.

 

1. Speed

In a fast-paced tech environment where each minute counts, getting the apps at the right time is very important. One of the major advantages of Power Apps is how swiftly you can develop a valuable, working app. Power Apps takes out numerous time-consuming elements from the normal development process and swaps them with an innate drag-and-drop interface. This results in Power Apps developing a new app faster than ever.

 

2. Easier App Creation

Coding can be a challenging undertaking for a non-programmer with such elements as APIs, libraries, functions, and objects. Power Apps makes this task easier by dealing with a majority of coding by dragging and dropping. Power Apps handles all of the normal overhead that goes into creating a mobile app that either runs in a browser or a local desktop app. Power Apps obviates the need to learn about the pros and cons of frameworks or libraries.

 

3. Integration with Microsoft Tools

One of the key benefits of the Power Apps is that being a Microsoft solution, it is fully capable of integrating with other Microsoft tools. This suggests that developers can leverage data from Microsoft apps such as Dynamics 365, SharePoint, Excel as well as other third-party services. There is a slew of connectors available for Power Apps, which means that there is scope to connect impeccably with other platforms.

 

4. Low cost

Although Power Apps is available within many Microsoft 365 subscriptions, it’s also highly affordable as a standalone app. From a price range between $10 per app per month and $40 per user per month, it delivers a cheaper solution to outsourcing app development.

 

Case study: Heathrow Airport

Here’s a real-world case of how a large infrastructure, Heathrow Airport, or London Airport, has used the Power Apps to drastically enhance their business operations.

Being a key international airport situated in London, United Kingdom, Heathrow is one of the world’s busiest airports. Given the traffic congestion and other complexities involving flight operations at the airport, there was an urgent need to streamline systems there. And the first step towards that objective was to digitize the airport’s processes. To this end, Heathrow Airport adopted Microsoft Office 365 for all its employees, which was later built upon with the introduction of Power Apps.

With the help of Power Apps, Heathrow Airport created an official process for creating and executing apps for employees to use. These apps could help employees build their own apps as well as utilize features from other internal apps to avoid a duplication of effort.

 

Outcome

The implementation of Power Apps paid dividends to the airport in terms of:

  • Massive drop in use of paperwork; a whopping 75,000 pages of legacy paper were easily eliminated
  • Reduced time of data entry; as many as 1,000 hours were saved
  • Huge cut in costs incurred in work effort

Saima Naz

Mar 1, 2021

An Overview of Current Agile Trends & Practices

An Overview of Current Agile Trends & Practices

Of late, Agile has proved to be more than just a catchword in the IT industry.

 

At the start of another year of thrilling events, the arena of Agile Development continues to grow as organizations continue to discover more exciting ways of planning and implementing work. Technology and virtual communications approaches have grown phenomenally and are here to stay, while our capacity to maintain human connection continues to prove difficult even in the best of circumstances. Agile believes in communication and putting the whole team in once place to get the task done in order to avoid information silos.

 

Agile ensures teams’ autonomy even in a Pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic saw a major shift in the work ethic across all industries, including software. The concept of working from home, which was earlier not encouraged, was adopted, but it also suffered from serious communication issues.

 

At its heart, Agile suggests that the teams must be self-sufficient and be able to communicate to avoid information and communication gaps. Therefore, based on the pandemic and the need to increase output while maintaining the needed distance, the concept of Cross Functional Teams was introduced.

 

The cross functional teams include people from different functional domains of a project or a product life and put them together to conduct all phases of program from start to finish. In this structure each member of the team uses their expertise of respective domains to achieve a common goal.

 

The year 2020 gave us a chance to evaluate how many of these predictions of Agile trends were accurate. Here is our list of top 4 trends for PMOs in 2021:

 

  • Rise of Agile Governance
  • Rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI)
  • Digital Transformation Skills
  • Remote Working & Resilience

 

Inevitably, that stress has been laid on digital transformation and alternate ways of working across traditional, remote, and hybrid models, just like much of 2020 was the year of digitization for PMOs. In an environment that is volatile and constantly changing, PMOs continue to encounter many challenges, one of which is adjusting to changes as it strives to support agile changes in their own exclusive ways. So, let us explore a little deeper into each of these trends and learn what they might offer in 2021.

 

How Machine Learning Helps User-Experience (Infographic)

 

 

 

#1 – Rise of Agile Governance

Agile has swiftly sneaked out from the world of software development into virtually all product and service industries. And PMOs are trying to find ways in which they can retain monitoring and control of how projects are managed. Agile (uppercase A) works as a delivery framework while agile (lowercase a) refers to the executive culture framework and mindset. Regardless of whether (A)agile is a criterion for PMOs, upright behavior in process and attitude will enable positive continual change.

 

Many Agile transitioning organizations would contend that this is already the case for PMOs, whereby perceptibility, transparency, authority, and supervision are often left behind. To ensure good governance, several features of the business must be taken into account, such as adaptability and embracing frequent change.

 

“Agile makes you quick but to be agile you have to be fit. It’s just two letters away from “fragile”, so it’s best to get fit before you get nimble,” said Ms Mamoona, Agile & PMO expert at a global IT company.

 

 #2 – Rise of Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence has seen an enormous in the last few years; in fact, calling this technology our time’s industrial revolution won’t be off the mark. AI has revolutionized the way we think, design, work and produce. AI is already widespread and getting a tougher position by the day as we see the speedy rise and influence it has on many industries worldwide. Just look at your phone – it identifies your face to unlock your screen, search. More astonishingly, it is able to detect algorithms that help you to navigate online, with as simple as autocorrect allowing you to type emails quicker than ever.

 

When it comes to project management, the surge of AI reporting can simplify the delivery of performance indicators to empower decision-making processes. We have also observed that AI provides more targeted insights on how project managers are feeling through feedback provided in their status reports as an example. Artificial intelligence has turned to be a valuable tool to not only support PM but also in so many other exciting ways. For instance, using AI has already played such a vital part in the Financial Risk Management space for the Financial Services industry, which is mostly focused around payment services.  Nevertheless, talking about the advantages of AI and its valuable place within the PMO is at a promising stage and yet to be wholly realized.

 

There are risks to executing or building systems that are keener than we are. Will AI replace the human component in PMO and project delivery? Although we do not believe it will, we do think that AI can help accelerate the automation within PMOs and allow for focus to be placed in fields of more significance.

 

 #3 – Digital Transformation Skills

Digital transformation is an old field. The standard hypothesis is that people tend to assume digital transformation is an IT transformation enterprise only. Whether that is a structural change from non-digital-driven to digital-driven or maybe the spur to change your digital experience with better and more resourceful solutions. One of the most significant things to comprehend is that it is fundamentally business transformation, reinforced by investments in new technology—not a new technology on the lookout for opportunities.

 

In this day and age, consumer needs are continually developing, and businesses are keeping up with variable degrees of success. Delivery systems are adapting and being modified to match accelerated development across many industries. Shareholders and board members uphold more traditional needs within these unsettling settings. ROI and practical decision-making around calculated synergy, risk exposure, and asset utilization still need to be established. The key focus should be how you support organizations on their digital transformation trip and leveraging technology to improve current business methods, elevate culture, and the general user experience — all with the objective to meet changing market and business requirements.

 

#4 – Remote Working & Resilience

The Covid-19 pandemic has seen a large segment of the global workforce work from home. It hardly needs pointing out that the new work ethic has had a dramatic impact on team collaboration and output. There are no rules for how to do this effectively, and in true Agile fashion we are learning as we proceed. Remote working has rapidly begun to reshape the future of the workforce, combining changes and employee management that need transparent communication and engagement enterprises.

 

Conclusion

Being resilient to change is important to keep relevant and become resolute to thrive. 2020 has been the year of reconsidering internal processes to keep up with the quick pace expected for 2021. It is highly crucial that PMOs focus on how to drive value for their organizations and learn to adjust to procedures that will inspire internal progress from within the PMO itself.

Saima Naz

Feb 19, 2021

Different Industries that are Using Data Science and Analytics

Different Industries that are Using Data Science and An...

Now, these are some general trends in Data Science and Analytics that will be observed in 2021 and the coming years. However, there are many ways in which Data Science is changing the shape of different industries like marketing, finance, etc. Given enough time, Data Science might be a part of all the industries in the world, not just tech!

 

So let’s understand the role of this technology in different industries.

 

Marketing and Retail

Data Science already plays a huge role in marketing and retail. The most basic thing that almost every company uses is marketing and retail dashboards that visualize the data to see the hidden patterns and trends. Data Science and Machine Learning are also very useful for customer analysis wherein customer data is collected to understand the demographic of customers, the products that are popular with different types of customers, their likes and dislikes, and how to market a particular product to a section of customers.

 

Web and Social Media Analytics              


The internet and social media are a treasure trove of data! Google alone processes around 20 petabytes of data every day (That’s approximately 1 followed by 15 zeros) Companies can use the web and social media analytics to obtain data about their customers and feedback on their performance which can be used to improve their bottom line.
Sentiment analysis is a great example of this where companies can obtain their customer reviews from the internet or social media and to understanding the sentiment of the customers towards the company.

 

Supply Chain and Logistics          

Supply Chain and Logistics may sound boring but it is a critical aspect for companies. Can you imagine Amazon working if their system for transporting products from point A to point B crashed? No! Therefore, Data Science and Analytics is an extremely important part of the Supply Chain and Logistics that companies can use for Inventory Management, Procurement Analysis, Inventory Classification, etc. For example, data analytics algorithms can be used to understand the correlation between demand and supply for companies and create methods to increase sales by always ensuring in-demand items are available.

 

Finance and Risk Analytics

FinTech is a technology trend that is becoming more and more popular with time. It involved finance companies using cutting edge technology like Data Science and Artificial Intelligence to improve in areas like risk analytics, fraud detection, algorithmic trading, etc. Many big banks and finance companies use Data Science to analyze their large store of data to optimize their risk scoring models and decrease their risks. This data can include financial transactions, lending schemes, interest rates, customer interactions, customer trustworthiness, etc.

 

ALSO READ:
How Machine Learning Helps User-Experience (Infographic)

 

How to Leverage these Data Science and Analytics Trends in 2021?

As you have seen, there are various new Data Science and Analytics trends emerging in 2021. You can leverage them to learn more about Data Science and improve your career using the data science courses offered by Great Learning in collaboration with The University of Texas. These programs will teach you right from the basics of Data Science such as Python, Business Statistical, and Data Visualization to various techniques of Machine Learning such as Supervised and Unsupervised algorithms.

 

You will also get direct domain exposure by doing projects relating to Data Science in different industries like Marketing and Retail, Web and Social Media Analytics, Supply Chain and Logistics, and Finance and Risk Analytics. Some of these projects include Facebook Comments Prediction, Retail Sales Prediction, Insurance Data Visualization, etc.

Saima Naz

Jan 24, 2021