Web-based companies live or die by the ability to scale their infrastructure to accommodate increasing demand. This book is a hands-on and practical guide to planning for such growth, with many techniques and considerations to help you plan, deploy, and manage web application infrastructure.The Art of Capacity Planning is written by the manager of data operations for the world-famous photo-sharing site Flickr.com, now owned by Yahoo! John Allspaw combines personal anecdotes from many phases of Flickr's growth with insights from his colleagues in many other industries to give you solid guidelines for measuring your growth, predicting trends, and making cost-effective preparations. Topics include:Evaluating tools for measurement and deployment Capacity analysis and prediction for storage, database, and application servers Designing architectures to easily add and measure capacity Handling sudden spikes Predicting exponential and explosive growth How cloud services such as EC2 can fit into a capacity strategy In this book, Allspaw draws on years of valuable experience, starting from the days when Flickr was relatively small and had to deal with the typical growth pains and cost/performance trade-offs of a typical company with a Web presence. The advice he offers in The Art of Capacity Planning will not only help you prepare for explosive growth, it will save you tons of grief.

    Setting up and maintaining a Linux server requires understanding not only the hardware, but the ins and outs of the Linux operating system along with its supporting cast of utilities as well as layers of applications software. There's basic documentation online but there's a lot beyond the basics you have to know, and this only comes from people with hands-on, real-world experience. This kind of "know how" is what we sought to capture in Linux Server Hacks.Linux Server Hacks is a collection of 100 industrial-strength hacks, providing tips and tools that solve practical problems for Linux system administrators. Every hack can be read in just a few minutes but will save hours of searching for the right answer. Some of the hacks are subtle, many of them are non-obvious, and all of them demonstrate the power and flexibility of a Linux system. You'll find hacks devoted to tuning the Linux kernel to make your system run more efficiently, as well as using CVS or RCS to track the revision to system files. You'll learn alternative ways to do backups, how to use system monitoring tools to track system performance and a variety of secure networking solutions. Linux Server Hacks also helps you manage large-scale Web installations running Apache, MySQL, and other open source tools that are typically part of a Linux system.O'Reilly's new Hacks Series proudly reclaims the term "hacking" for the good guys. Hackers use their ingenuity to solve interesting problems. Rob Flickenger is an experienced system administrator, having managed the systems for O'Reilly Network for several years. (He's also into community wireless networking and he's written a book on that subject for O'Reilly.) Rob has also collected the best ideas and tools from a number of other highly skilled contributors.Written for users who already understand the basics, Linux Server Hacks is built upon the expertise of people who really know what they're doing.

    From creating new data-driven products through to increasing operational efficiency, big data has the potential to makeyour organization both more competitive and more innovative.As this emerging field transitions from the bleeding edge to enterprise infrastructure, it's vital to understand not only the technologies involved, but the organizational and cultural demands of being data-driven.Written by O'Reilly Radar's experts on big data, this anthology describes:- The broad industry changes heralded by the big data era- What big data is, what it means to your business, and how to start solving data problems- The software that makes up the Hadoop big data stack, and the major enterprise vendors' Hadoop solutions- The landscape of NoSQL databases and their relative merits- How visualization plays an important part in data work

    And they did it without fanfare or recognition from their employer. Hiltzik's Dealers of Lightning provides a fascinating look at technohistory that sets the record straight. In Dealers of Lightning, Hiltzik describes the forces and faces behind the revolution that the Xerox PARC team single-handedly spawned. The Xerox PARC group was composed solely of top technical minds. The decision was made at Xerox headquarters to give the team complete freedom from deadlines and directives, in hopes of fostering a true creative environment. It worked — perhaps too well. The team responded with a steady output of amazing technology, including the first version of the Internet, the first personal computer, user-friendly word-processing programs, and pop-up menus. Xerox, far from ready for the explosion of innovation, failed to utilize the technology dreamed up by the group. Out of all the dazzling inventions born at Xerox PARC, only a handful were developed and marketed by Xerox. However, one of these inventions, the laser printer, proved successful enough to earn billions for the company, therefore justifying its investment in the research center. Most oftheteam's creations would go on to be developed and perfected by other companies, such as IBM, Apple, and Microsoft. Drawing from interviews with the engineers, executives, and scientists involved in the Xerox PARC, Dealers of Lightning chronicles an amazing era of egos, ideas, and inventions at the dawn of the computer age.

    With this practical book, you’ll learn how pointers provide the mechanism to dynamically manipulate memory, enhance support for data structures, and enable access to hardware. Author Richard Reese shows you how to use pointers with arrays, strings, structures, and functions, using memory models throughout the book.Difficult to master, pointers provide C with much flexibility and power—yet few resources are dedicated to this data type. This comprehensive book has the information you need, whether you’re a beginner or an experienced C or C++ programmer or developer.Get an introduction to pointers, including the declaration of different pointer typesLearn about dynamic memory allocation, de-allocation, and alternative memory management techniquesUse techniques for passing or returning data to and from functionsUnderstand the fundamental aspects of arrays as they relate to pointersExplore the basics of strings and how pointers are used to support themExamine why pointers can be the source of security problems, such as buffer overflowLearn several pointer techniques, such as the use of opaque pointers, bounded pointers and, the restrict keyword

    This book is aimed at the working Rails developer who is looking to grow and evolve Rails projects while keeping them flexible, maintainable, and robust. The focus is on pragmatic solutions which tread a “middle way” between the expedience of the Rails “golden path”, and rigid OO purity.

    Through the book’s many examples, you’ll quickly learn how OCaml stands out as a tool for writing fast, succinct, and readable systems code.Real World OCaml takes you through the concepts of the language at a brisk pace, and then helps you explore the tools and techniques that make OCaml an effective and practical tool. In the book’s third section, you’ll delve deep into the details of the compiler toolchain and OCaml’s simple and efficient runtime system.Learn the foundations of the language, such as higher-order functions, algebraic data types, and modulesExplore advanced features such as functors, first-class modules, and objectsLeverage Core, a comprehensive general-purpose standard library for OCamlDesign effective and reusable libraries, making the most of OCaml’s approach to abstraction and modularityTackle practical programming problems from command-line parsing to asynchronous network programmingExamine profiling and interactive debugging techniques with tools such as GNU gdb

    To grow professionally, you also need soft skills and effective learning techniques. Honing those skills is what this book is all about. Authors Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye have cataloged dozens of behavior patterns to help you perfect essential aspects of your craft. Compiled from years of research, many interviews, and feedback from O'Reilly's online forum, these patterns address difficult situations that programmers, administrators, and DBAs face every day. And it's not just about financial success. Apprenticeship Patterns also approaches software development as a means to personal fulfillment. Discover how this book can help you make the best of both your life and your career. Solutions to some common obstacles that this book explores in-depth include:Burned out at work? "Nurture Your Passion" by finding a pet project to rediscover the joy of problem solving.Feeling overwhelmed by new information? Re-explore familiar territory by building something you've built before, then use "Retreat into Competence" to move forward again.Stuck in your learning? Seek a team of experienced and talented developers with whom you can "Be the Worst" for a while. "Brilliant stuff! Reading this book was like being in a time machine that pulled me back to those key learning moments in my career as a professional software developer and, instead of having to learn best practices the hard way, I had a guru sitting on my shoulder guiding me every step towards master craftsmanship. I'll certainly be recommending this book to clients. I wish I had this book 14 years ago!" -Russ Miles, CEO, OpenCredo

    citizen recognized its ominous potential. Armed with clear evidence of computer espionage, he began a highly personal quest to expose a hidden network of spies that threatened national security. But would the authorities back him up? Cliff Stoll's dramatic firsthand account is "a computer-age detective story, instantly fascinating [and] astonishingly gripping" (Smithsonian). Cliff Stoll was an astronomer turned systems manager at Lawrence Berkeley Lab when a 75-cent accounting error alerted him to the presence of an unauthorized user on his system. The hacker's code name was "Hunter" -- a mysterious invader who managed to break into U.S. computer systems and steal sensitive military and security information. Stoll began a one-man hunt of his own: spying on the spy. It was a dangerous game of deception, broken codes, satellites, and missile bases -- a one-man sting operation that finally gained the attention of the CIA...and ultimately trapped an international spy ring fueled by cash, cocaine, and the KGB.

    Criminals succeed by exercising enormous creativity, and those defending against them must do the same.Beautiful Security explores this challenging subject with insightful essays and analysis on topics that include:The underground economy for personal information: how it works, the relationships among criminals, and some of the new ways they pounce on their prey How social networking, cloud computing, and other popular trends help or hurt our online security How metrics, requirements gathering, design, and law can take security to a higher level The real, little-publicized history of PGP This book includes contributions from:Peiter "Mudge" Zatko Jim Stickley Elizabeth Nichols Chenxi Wang Ed Bellis Ben Edelman Phil Zimmermann and Jon Callas Kathy Wang Mark Curphey John McManus James Routh Randy V. Sabett Anton Chuvakin Grant Geyer and Brian Dunphy Peter Wayner Michael Wood and Fernando Francisco All royalties will be donated to the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).

    Topics covered include:Basic version control commands and conceptsIntroduction to Distributed Version Control Systems (DVCS)Advanced branching workflowsStrengths and weaknesses of DVCS vs. centralized toolsBest practicesHow distributed version control works under the hoodFeaturing these open source version control tools:Apache SubversionMercurialGitVeracity

    Tracy Kidder got a preview of this world in the late 1970s when he observed the engineers of Data General design and build a new 32-bit minicomputer in just one year. His thoughtful, prescient book, The Soul of a New Machine, tells stories of 35-year-old "veteran" engineers hiring recent college graduates and encouraging them to work harder and faster on complex and difficult projects, exploiting the youngsters' ignorance of normal scheduling processes while engendering a new kind of work ethic.These days, we are used to the "total commitment" philosophy of managing technical creation, but Kidder was surprised and even a little alarmed at the obsessions and compulsions he found. From in-house political struggles to workers being permitted to tease management to marathon 24-hour work sessions, The Soul of a New Machine explores concepts that already seem familiar, even old-hat, less than 20 years later. Kidder plainly admires his subjects; while he admits to hopeless confusion about their work, he finds their dedication heroic. The reader wonders, though, what will become of it all, now and in the future. —Rob Lightner

    Others have the knack of unerringly zeroing in on the root cause of a bug. Are they geniuses? Just lucky? No, they've learned the secrets of professional debugging. This book will equip you with the tools, techniques and approaches-proven in the crucible of professional software development-to ensure that you can tackle any bug with confidence. You'll learn how to handle every stage of the bug life-cycle, from constructing software that makes debugging easy, through detection, reproduction, diagnosis and rolling out your eventual fix. If you develop software, sooner or later you're going to discover that it doesn't always behave as you intended. Working out why it's misbehaving can be hard. Sometimes very hard. Debug It! is here to help! All bugs are different: there is no silver bullet. You've got to rely upon your intellect, intuition, detective skills and yes, even a little luck. But that doesn't mean that you're completely on your own-there is much you can learn from those who have gone before. This book distills decades of hard-won experience gained in the trenches of professional software development, giving you a head-start and arming you with the tools you need to get to the bottom of the problem, whatever you're faced with. Whether you're writing Java or assembly language, targeting servers or embedded micro-controllers, using agile or traditional approaches, the same basic bug-fixing principles apply. From constructing software that is easy to debug (and incidentally less likely to contain bugs in the first place), through handling bug reports to rolling out your ultimate fix, we'll cover the entire life-cycle of a bug. You'll learn about the empirical approach, which leverages your software's unique ability to show you what's really happening, the importance of finding a reliable and convenient means of reproducing a bug, and common pitfalls so you can avoid them. You'll see how to use commonly available tools to automatically detect problems before they're reported by customers and how to construct "transparent software" that provides access to critical information and internal state.

    In 1999, "Refactoring" revolutionized design by introducing an effective process for improving code. With the highly anticipated " Refactoring to Patterns ," Joshua Kerievsky has changed our approach to design by forever uniting patterns with the evolutionary process of refactoring.This book introduces the theory and practice of pattern-directed refactorings: sequences of low-level refactorings that allow designers to safely move designs to, towards, or away from pattern implementations. Using code from real-world projects, Kerievsky documents the thinking and steps underlying over two dozen pattern-based design transformations. Along the way he offers insights into pattern differences and how to implement patterns in the simplest possible ways.Coverage includes: A catalog of twenty-seven pattern-directed refactorings, featuring real-world code examples Descriptions of twelve design smells that indicate the need for this book s refactorings General information and new insights about patterns and refactoringDetailed implementation mechanics: how low-level refactorings are combined to implement high-level patterns Multiple ways to implement the same pattern and when to use each Practical ways to get started even if you have little experience with patterns or refactoring"Refactoring to Patterns" reflects three years of refinement and the insights of more than sixty software engineering thought leaders in the global patterns, refactoring, and agile development communities. Whether you re focused on legacy or greenfield development, this book will make you a better software designer by helping you learn how to make important design changes safely and effectively. "

    This one's a keeper." --Robert C. Martin "If you want to be an expert in the state of the art in TDD, you need to understand the ideas in this book."--Michael Feathers Test-Driven Development (TDD) is now an established technique for delivering better software faster. TDD is based on a simple idea: Write tests for your code before you write the code itself. However, this simple idea takes skill and judgment to do well. Now there's a practical guide to TDD that takes you beyond the basic concepts. Drawing on a decade of experience building real-world systems, two TDD pioneers show how to let tests guide your development and "grow" software that is coherent, reliable, and maintainable. Steve Freeman and Nat Pryce describe the processes they use, the design principles they strive to achieve, and some of the tools that help them get the job done. Through an extended worked example, you'll learn how TDD works at multiple levels, using tests to drive the features and the object-oriented structure of the code, and using Mock Objects to discover and then describe relationships between objects. Along the way, the book systematically addresses challenges that development teams encounter with TDD--from integrating TDD into your processes to testing your most difficult features. Coverage includes - Implementing TDD effectively: getting started, and maintaining your momentum throughout the project - Creating cleaner, more expressive, more sustainable code - Using tests to stay relentlessly focused on sustaining quality - Understanding how TDD, Mock Objects, and Object-Oriented Design come together in the context of a real software development project - Using Mock Objects to guide object-oriented designs - Succeeding where TDD is difficult: managing complex test data, and testing persistence and concurrency