Today's Tech Digest - Apr 27, 2020

Has ‘digital transformation’ become a meaningless buzzword?

It isn’t easy to discuss digital transformation as a concept without taking the current coronavirus pandemic into account, and some companies may say that the process has been undertaken just to continue operating in the current climate. However, the process could be upset by a lack of focus or thought towards long-term objectives when the term ‘digital transformation’ is brought up, which may have contributed to its buzzword status. ... “Terms like digital transformation shouldn’t just be ‘terms’ – they should map out how a business can move from physical everything to digital everything, where it makes sense, from strategy to implementation to long-term goals. This is particularly vital in unprecedented times like these. “Those who weather the storm the best will be those who can adapt to remote working and dynamic supply and demand planning, both of which need a digital presence. It means carrying on, quickly, with every employee working from home, and also having a cloud copy of your physical operations, or a digital twin, to make sensible decisions remotely in an ever-changing situation.

The Two Worlds of Employment in the Age of Automation

The long and the short of it is that for developers, sysadmins, SREs and all the other people working in information technology, the recent economic downturn is but a blip in the daily news feed. For those manning a cash register, taking a ticket at the local cineplex, cutting hair or driving for a rideshare service, it’s a life-altering event. Or, to put it terms of Lang’s film, those of us who live in the clouds are doing well, and for those on the ground, it’s a different story. Now, consider this: What if all the people who are presently laid off from their jobs find out there are no jobs to go back to? What if the economic recovery is slower than anticipated or society gets so accustomed to doing without that consumption doesn’t resume? Is such a scenario possible? Yes. Is it probable? Dunno. Will those of us in IT who work remotely all over the planet, from the comfort of our wired office, suffer? I doubt it. But, as for the rest, what then? ... Those of us in DevOps have made valuable contributions to the world. We’ve done dramatically more good than harm. We’ve also been well compensated.

Connect people across the entire organization through communities in Microsoft Teams

With a global health crisis compelling so many of us to work remotely, it’s more important than ever for leaders and communications to connect people across teams and organizations. Last November at Ignite, we unveiled the new Yammer, with a beautiful new design that powers community, knowledge-sharing, and employee engagement. The new Yammer includes a fully interactive Yammer app called “Communities” that brings your communities and conversations directly into Microsoft Teams. Put simply, it’s Yammer—in Teams. Starting today, this app is available in the Microsoft app store. Here, I’ll go over how your team can use it for company-wide communication, knowledge-sharing, and employee engagement, as well as how to install it and where to find it. By offering the full Yammer experience right inside Teams, we want to help you keep everyone at your organization engaged, informed, and moving forward. Let’s get into it. ... Leaders can use live events in Yammer to broadcast company-wide, town hall–style meetings with video, interactive conversation, and Q&A sessions to share vision, drive culture, and engage employees.

UTPP - Another Unit Test Framework

UnitTest++ was based on these requirements and fulfills most of them. However, I found a problem: the implementation is not very tight with WAY too many objects and unfinished methods for my taste. Instead of choosing another framework, I decided to re-implement UnitTest++ and that's how UTPP (Unit Test Plus Plus) came into existence. It borrows the API from UnitTest++ but the implementation is all new. ... When performing a test, you need certain objects and values to be in a known state before the beginning of the test. This is called a fixture. In UTPP, any object with a default constructor can be used as a fixture. Your tests will be derived from that object and the state of the object is defined by the fixture constructor. ... Although there is no shortage of unit test frameworks, if you spend a bit of time with UTPP, you might begin to like it.

Are you asking enough from your design leaders?

Not that we’re saying design leadership should usurp the chief strategist’s role—only that design has a unique role to play in strategy. Lyft’s most recent app redesign, for example, introduced more than a few new tabs: it contributed to the company’s new strategic direction. The app had previously highlighted car rides. However, the company learned that its riders were interested in multiple forms of transportation. The redesign brought new options such as choosing a bus route, grabbing a scooter, or even renting a car into an equal view under the same app. The user and market insights gleaned through this redesign process helped fuel Lyft’s strategic shift from a provider of rides to a portal enabling people to move through cities in multimodal fashion. Design was not the only party contributing to this strategic shift, but as Katie M. Dill, vice president of design at Lyft, makes clear, “It’s not design versus the business, it’s about what we can do together.

Read more here ...