Microservices Anti-Patterns

Dallas Monson Agile, Articles, Consulting, Microservices 1 Comment

Microservices? Yeah, youโ€™re doing it wrong.

Microservices is a silver bullet, magic pill, instant fix, and can’t-go-wrong solution to all of softwareโ€™s problems. In fact, as soon you implement even the basics of microservices all of your dreams come true; you will triple productivity, reach your ideal weight, land your dream job, win the lottery 10 times, and be able to fly, clearly.

While this sounds like a lot of hyperbole wrapped up in some BS, if you have been listening to anything around microservices recently you will most likely have heard something not too far from this exaggerated sentiment – especially if it is coming from sales folks.

As a result of this, you or someone you know will likely have been charged by management to implement a solution in microservices or refactor an existing application to take advantage of microservices to ensure that you get all the magic. With so much overinflation of the truth out there, chances are you may have also implemented a microservices antipattern. These antipatterns are actually more common in the wild than fully functional microservices architectures.

Overview
In this post we will cover the most common antipatterns that I have witnessed in the wild:

Break the Piggy Bank
Everything Micro (Except for the Data)
We are Agile! a.k.a. The Frankenstein

Each one of these results from a common misconception. We will do our best to define these patterns and their symptoms. After each, we will also show a way out of the mess so that you can recover and begin to move towards a better implementation. Letโ€™s get started!

Create your own web bots in .NET with CEFSharp!

Matt Cunningham .NET, Articles, Automation, JavaScript, Programming, Tutorial 8 Comments

Have you ever wanted to create an automated way to load, manipulate, and then act upon a web page?

Using CEFSharp (and some strategic JavaScript), you can create headless (no GUI) interfaces of Chromeโ€™s parent browser, Chromium, and then instruct them to do pretty much anything a web browser can do.

This is a tutorial about using CEFSharp to accomplish some basic web functions with simple examples. Weโ€™ll create three automated bots that can simulate user web interaction and programmatically react to browser events using CEF and the CEFSharp library. You can follow along by copying the code provided or by downloading…

Creating A Blockchain In JavaScript

Vince Pendergrass Articles, Blockchain, Development Technologies & Tools, JavaScript Leave a Comment

Blockchain is all the buzz now. And for good reason! A distributed public ledger that is extremely secure through encryption?! Imagine the millions of applicable use cases. A blockchain can be created and maintained using any modern language.

For the purpose of this blog, let’s dive into a blockchain written in JavaScript. Hopefully, this doesn’t just serve as a simple code example but also gives a very basic understanding of how a blockchain actually works.

Do keep in mind this will be very simplist…

Keyhole Labs Announces “Byzantine Tools” For Blockchain

Keyhole Software Articles, Blockchain, Company News, Hyperledger, Keyhole Leave a Comment

The Keyhole Labs team has announcedย the release of Byzantine Tools, a series of blockchain open source projects to enhance Hyperledger blockchain networks.

Keyhole Labs is a group within Keyhole dedicated to creating open source solutions that help software developers in their craft. Byzantine Tools is an extension of our Keyhole Labs open source initiatives with a more specific focus on blockchain technology.

Current Byzantine Tool offerings include Byzantine Browser, Byzantine Config, and Byzantine Flu which can be accessed…

The Jury is Still Out: Blockchain in Healthcare

Zach Gardner Articles, Blockchain, Healthcare, Hyperledger, Opinion 1 Comment

Blockchain has gotten the software world buzzing about its potential applications in different business areas. With the US spending 17.9% of its GDP on healthcare in 2017 per CMS, many companies are considering how to enter into a market that has such potential for growth as well as the potential to positively affect patient’s lives.

Keyhole Software stays ahead of the curve by investigating new trends in software so that when clients come to us asking for advice we can provide an informed opinion. We do not want our clients to be guinea pigs, and we help provide guidance so that the solution they choose is the best one regardless of the trends of the day.

Blockchain is something we feel could be a good fit for the right use case, which we’ve elaborated on in our Blockchain Case Study. It is, at the end of the day, just a tool, and should only be used when it is beneficial to do so. Healthcare is an incredibly complex industry, so it is important to understand what Blockchain is, what it is not, and what needs to be considered before using the technology.

The purpose of this blog post is to think through how Blockchain can be applied to healthcare software applications. This blog post does not dive into the technical implementation of Blockchain, only its application in healthcare. A technical deep dive into Blockchain can be found in our Blockchain White Paper.