Parts of Google Earth open sourced to Github (GEE)...

... And as such could be incorporated in your products:


https://maps-apis.googleblog.com/2017/01/open-sourcing-google-earth-enterprise.html
Quoting:
"Open-sourcing GEE allows our customer community to continue to improve and evolve the project in perpetuity. Note that the Google Earth Enterprise Client, Google Maps JavaScript® API V3 and Google Earth API will not be open sourced. The Enterprise Client will continue to be made available and updated. However, since GEE Fusion and GEE Server are being open-sourced, the imagery and terrain quadtree implementations used in these products will allow third-party developers to build viewers that can consume GEE Server Databases."

Virtual Panel: What's Next for .NET?

The oppinion of reputed personalities (listed below) in the .Net framework:

• Virtual Panel: What's Next for .NET?

Quoting:

"Key Takeaways: .NET is positioning itself for cross-platform development with .NET Core while .NET Standard 2.0 brings in the missing pieces

Streamlining the cross-platform tooling and educating the community to eliminate confusion is the next step to drive .NET Core and .NET Standard adoption.

Roslyn has a major impact on .NET, enabling new features to be delivered much faster. Roslyn also enables developers outside Microsoft to use to build their own tools based on its public APIs.

The .NET community is now warmed up to open source and increasingly contributing on compilers and system libraries.

A lot happened in the last year in the .NET ecosystem. Things are moving fast on several fronts: Xamarin, UWP, .NET Core, .NET native, F#, open source, etc.

Putting aside the details, the bigger picture is difficult to grasp. There is movement in all aspects: cross-platform, cloud, mobile, web apps and universal apps. Developers wonder where all this is going to lead and what will be required to get there.

The panelists:

• Richard Lander - Principal Program Manager Lead on the .NET Team at Microsoft
• Phillip Carter - Program Manager on the .NET team at Microsoft
• Phil Haack - Engineering Director at GitHub
• Miguel de Icaza - Distinguished Engineer at Microsoft"

How to become a mobile developer

An interesting effort on summing up what is needed to know to become a mobile [app] developer for the 2 mobile platforms that dominate the market (iOS and Android - more than 99% of market share):
https://www.techgig.com/tech-news/editors-pick/How-To-Become-A-Mobile-App-Developer-89083?mailer_id=2891&utm_source=TG_batch&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=digest_news_2017-01-29&etoken=cGZzaWx2YUBnbWFpbC5jb20=&activity_name=MjIxMzY5&dt=&auto_login=lKaUjJKbhWOnk7@@OkG6EkpNlR0eASYJcXXFUV1dlR0eASYJWWHhWWlpXXVN3&src_type=autoLogin

Review: The big 4 Java IDEs compared | InfoWorld

Always not without polemic, here is a review of the 4 main Java IDEs around (requires registering):
Eclipse, NetBeans, JDeveloper, and IntelliJ IDEA:

• Review: The big 4 Java IDEs compared | InfoWorld

What .NET Developers ought to know to start in 2017 - Scott Hanselman

An excellent sum-up of what will be trending in 2017 in the .Net enterprise framework (packed with links for further information on each topic):

• What .NET Developers ought to know to start in 2017 - Scott Hanselman

The Fun Dept.: It's a functional programming thing - XKCD

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/sad.png
Source: XKCD

Reuse: Statistical Data Processing

When in need of statistical data analysis, we will need to implement or reuse system components into our system.
Microsoft has been making available the (free until a certain point) open-source R statistical programming language (and servers):
http://www.infoworld.com/article/3156544/big-data/microsofts-r-tools-bring-data-science-to-the-masses.html


Quoting (the article focus on a new MS acquisition but provides us with an overview of the R programming language and the Development environment to support developers and Data Scientists):


"One of Microsoft’s more interesting recent acquisitions was Revolution Analytics, a company that built tools for working with big data problems using the open source statistical programming language R. Mixing an open source model with commercial tools, Revolution Analytics offered a range of tools supporting academic and personal use, alongside software that took advantage of massive amounts of data–including Hadoop. Under Microsoft’s stewardship, the now-renamed R Server has become a bridge between on-premises and cloud data.
Two years on, Microsoft has announced a set of major updates to its R tools. The R programming language has become an important part of its data strategy, with support in Azure and SQL Server—and, more important, in its Azure Machine Learning service, where it can be used to preprocess data before delivering it to a machine learning pipeline. It’s also one of Microsoft’s key cross-platform server products, with versions for both Red Hat Linux and Suse Linux." 

TOOLS: Modeling with Sparx Systems EA (Reloaded)

Talking of using EA for modeling? Strategic Modeling? Business Modeling?
Take a look at these free PDFs from the tool maker:

• http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/downloads/quick/strategic_modeling_with_enterprise_architect.pdf
• http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/resources/user-guides/guidebooks/business-modeling-techniques.pdf

Startups: Sharing plane trips is now a reality - Skyuber

Reloaded: Software-based startups are the most beautiful ones (my personal oppinion).
You "just" need software engineering skills, a good team and one ideia:
Skyuber is yet another startup made by portuguese people and already operating globally:

• https://www.skyuber.com/ 

Startups: Outplanr. Turn to-dos into work days (Beta)

Software-based startups are the most beautiful ones (my personal oppinion). You "just" need software engineering skills, a good team and one ideia:
Outplanr is yet another startup with portuguese people:

1. https://www.outplanr.com/index.html
2. Outplanr. A plataforma que quer ajudar a evitar horas extra no trabalho – Observador (in PT guys, sorry for that)

SW Construction: AlchemyAPI ("API as a Service" example)

API as a Service are interesting things (services) to be integrated in external information systems, and that typically that are paid per use. One example is AlchemyAPI: AlchemyAPI - Wikipedia

PS. A white paper on Alchemy API with which I have been spammed (not spam but almost). Note: Requires registering:

The Rise of PhD APIs: How AlchemyAPI Is Contributing To The Next Phase Of The API Economy
APIs are no longer just a development tool. In this white paper from ProgrammableWeb, you can learn more about the rise of PhD APIs and how they harbor game-changing potential for organizations and business models.

The FUN Dept.: Which programming languages have the happiest (and angriest) commenters?

Oh yeah! The eternal war between sexes and the programming languages discussion:
Which programming languages have the happiest (and angriest) commenters?

PS: Everyone knows Fortran is the best (widely used) programming language, right?

The FUN Dept.: About passwords, password policies and related stuff

The "good old times" (not) where 123 or Benfica would be good enough for a password everywhere you needed a password are indeed over for good. Here are some Dilbert strips password-related (the strips are not properly "new", just look at the dates):

• This reminds me of the temporary password Rui C has provided me with yesterday: Dilbert Comic Strip on 2012-07-01 | Dilbert by Scott Adams
• This is about new password policies, increasingly demanding (not like that one): http://dilbert.com/strip/2004-12-05
• And this is what all passwords are: several asterisks? http://dilbert.com/strip/2001-09-06

And a list of relevant (portuguese) bloggers is...

And a list of relevant (portuguese technology) bloggers is... here:  

https://weblogs.asp.net/ricardoperes/sites-portugueses-sobre-desenvolvimento-de-software

PS: Provided by my good friend R. Peres.