How to apply & withdraw money from Skrill in Pakistan?

How to apply & withdraw money from Skrill in Pakistan?

By Unknown   10:21   No comments:

 

How to Apply & withdraw money Using Skrill in Pakistan?Its Easy & Simple

There are few steps to follow:

Skrill is formally known as Moneybookers. Just like Payoneer and Paypal it is the most reliable and faster payment transaction method. It allows the users send and receive payments around the globe with the help of an online deposit account (also called e-wallet). In your personal e-wallet you can transfer or receive skrill to skrill amounts, which is by all means better than sending or receiving cheque, money order or wire transfers. we’ll be sharing every step on this page in order to make you understand about the procedure to use Skrill in Pakistan for your online payments and transactions.

A little about Skrill Moneybookers:

The owner of moneybookers is Skrill Limited, a registered United Kingdom company of Money Service Business. The Financial Conduct Authority is responsible to manage, regulate the processing and licensing of Skrill around the globe. With Skrill, you can send and receive amounts around the globe in more than 40 different currencies. Isn’t it amazing to operate and transact with our clients or freelance contractors around the globe in their own currencies? Yes, it definitely is, Skrill is a well supportive and quicker mode of payment, it takes only a minute to send and receive amounts using this medium.

Applying at Skrill:

Applying for a Skrill account is quite easy. You just have to follow these simple tips to ensure that your account gets activated and verified in a shorter time frame.

Step#1:

First you have to sign-up for an account with correct username, personal details, home address, contact number and other information inserted:

• Register Here for a Skrill account

Step#2:

Once the singing-up process is completed, you would be taken by the system to your personal Skrill dashboard. Here let me tell you that you cannot send or receive any amount until you have verified the account.

Step#3:

The verification process consists of three simple ways; first they would verify your contact number by calling you or sending a verification code, which you have to insert back to the website, secondly you would have to attach either a credit card or bank account for verification, while the third process is they would send a letter with secret code to your home address.

Note: After creating an account, you must first verify your email to further edit your account.

Step#4:

Once you receive the letter at home, unfold it and insert the hidden code back to the site’s verification box. In case bank verification is needed, they would either ask you to send the scanned bank statement or another reference code which is likely to be accompanied with your first withdrawal.

Step#5:

The time all these verification processes are completed, your Skrill is ready to be used for further transfers. You are no free to receive or send the amounts to your companions or business colleagues around the globe.

Withdraw Money from Skrill to Pakistan:

It is quite easy to withdraw amounts from Skrill to any Pakistani bank. You just have to keep in mind the following simple tips.

Step#1:

First you have to attach your bank (Standard Chartered and Faysal bank preferred) by inserting Swift Code and bank name’s correct spelling in the My Account > My Profile > List of Bank Accounts > Bank section.

Step#2:

Once you have inserted this information, your bank would get attached with your profile. Keep in mind that the spelling on your bank account and Skrill should be same otherwise no payment would be transacted by them to your bank due to security reasons.

Step#3:

When someone has sent you amount into Skrill and funds are available then you can withdraw the amount by going to withdrawal option available in your dashboard.

Step#4:

Skrill usually charges from $3 to $20 for every withdrawal depending upon how much amount you are going to withdraw.

Step#5:

Once you have verified your date of birth to the company, they would send your money within three to five working days. This balance would be available in your bank statement and now its time for you to enjoy your Skrill withdrawals.

• How to Receive a Wire Transfer In Pakistan
•  How to Send & Receive Money Through Western Union

  

 

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How to Send Money Through Western Union

How to Send Money Through Western Union

By Unknown   04:35   No comments:

Send and Receive Money Service

Whether our customers are in the U.S., Africa or another part of the globe, they can send and receive money through our Western Union, Orlandi Valuta and Vigo Agent locations. And do it with ease. We're nearly everywhere — from big cities to remote villages.

In many countries, we provide other options to send money, such as online or by phone using a credit or debit card.
And when it comes to receiving money, we offer customers options depending on the receiver's location. This includes the customer's:

• Home
• Bank account
• Prepaid card
• Wallet account tied to a mobile phone (a mobile "wallet")

More about our money transfer service:

In Person

At one of our many Agent locations around the world, customers receive the expertise and knowledge of our personable Agent clerks.
Once the completed forms and applicable funds are provided to the Agent clerk, the transaction is made and the money is available within minutes for the receiver to pick up at a convenient Agent Location.
In the U.S. customers can pay with cash or a debit card (at participating locations). We are continually developing other customized money-transfer solutions within other regions.

Online

The computer is part of your everyday life. That's why Western Union makes the online option available for you to send money worldwide 24/7. Plus, customers can easily check the status of their online transfer.

By Phone

Customers in the United States and the United Kingdom can call a toll-free number to send money and pay with a credit or debit card. Our friendly Agents are available 24/7 to help. The Receiver can pick up the money as cash or as a prepaid card at participating Agent Locations.
Sending money by phone is recommended if time is of the essence.

By Mobile Phone

Mobile phones are now essential around the world. They're also a key element of our business strategy — offering customers choices and convenience.
Our mobile money transfer service offers customers the opportunity to send money to a mobile phone anytime or to receive money in a mobile wallet.

Other Money-Transfer Options

We offer a variety of ways for our customers to send or receive money depending on whether they're making a transfer in person, online or by phone. This includes Money in Minutes, Next Day, Three Day and Home Delivery. Money also can be sent to a bank account or loaded to a stored-value or prepaid card.
Business customers also can use our international money transfer service. We deliver payments in more than 140 currencies. Customers can create an international account for free and make payments with our Online FX service.

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What is the difference between procedural and object oriented programming?

What is the difference between procedural and object oriented programming?

By Unknown   03:04   1 comment:

Object oriented programming makes the assumption that everything can be grouped into objects, and that the object is the ultimate abstraction. Everything is modularized around objects, and operations (methods) on objects.

This is problematic, because not everything is an object. There are operations that have to be performed that are the result of an interaction between objects and the operation isn't specific to any of the objects involved, so the operation itself doesn't belong in any of those abstractions. And if it has no specific data representation itself, then where does it belong? Yes, you can define a class that has just methods and no data, but then your fundamental, axiomatic principle has broken down: you now have something that really isn't an object.

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A Comparative Overview of C#

A Comparative Overview of C#

By Unknown   22:29   1 comment:

This article focuses on the new ways of programming C# offers, and how it intends to improve upon its two closest neighbors, Java and C++. C# improves on C++ in a similar way to Java in many respects, so I'm not going to be re-explaining things like the benefits of a single-rooted object hierarchy. This article begins with a brief summary of the similarities between C# and Java, and then goes into exploring the new C# features. You can convert PDF to word if necessary to get a printable view of the article.

Background

In June 2000, Microsoft announced both the .NET platform and a new programming language called C#. C# is a strongly-typed object-oriented language designed to give the optimum blend of simplicity, expressiveness, and performance. The .NET platform is centered around a Common Language Runtime (similar to a JVM) and a set of libraries which can be exploited by a wide variety of languages which are able to work together by all compiling to an intermediate language (IL). C# and .NET are a little symbiotic: some features of C# are there to work well with .NET, and some features of .NET are there to work well with C# (though .NET aims to work well with many languages). Projects created with C# and .NET are usually compatible with most web hosting providers. This article is mostly concerned with C#, but sometimes it is useful to discuss .NET too. The C# language was built with the hindsight of many languages, but most notably Java and C++. It was co-authored by Anders Hejlsberg (who is famous for the design of the Delphi language), and Scott Wiltamuth.

1. C# and Java

Below is a list of features C# and Java share, which are intended to improve on C++. These features are not the focus of this article, but it is very important to be aware of the similarities.

• Compiles into machine-independent language-independent code which runs in a managed execution environment.
• Garbage Collection coupled with the elimination of pointers (in C# restricted use is permitted within code marked unsafe)
• Powerful reflection capabilities
• No header files, all code scoped to packages or assemblies, no problems declaring one class before another with circular dependencies
• Classes all descend from object and must be allocated on the heap with new keyword
• Thread support by putting a lock on objects when entering code marked as locked/synchronized
• Interfaces, with multiple-inheritance of interfaces, single inheritance of implementations
• Inner classes
• No concept of inheriting a class with a specified access level
• No global functions or constants, everything belongs to a class
• Arrays and strings with lengths built-in and bounds checking
• The '.' operator is always used, no more ->, :: operators
• null and boolean/bool are keywords
• All values are initialized before use
• Can't use integers to govern if statements
• Try Blocks can have a finally clause

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The top 20 programming languages: the GitHut and Tiobe rankings

The top 20 programming languages: the GitHut and Tiobe rankings

By Unknown   23:42   No comments:

Githut lists its ranking according to the following characteristics: active repositories, the number of pushes and the pushes per repository, as well as the new forks per repository, the open issues per repository and the new watcher per repository.

GitHut’s top 20 ranking currently looks like this:

1. JavaScript
2. Java
3. Python
4. Ruby
5. CSS
6. PHP
7. C++
8. C
9. Shell
10. C#
11. Objective-C
12. R
13. VimL
14. Go
15. Perl
16. CoffeeScript
17. TeX
18. Scala
19. Haskell
20. Emacs Lisp

If we compare it with the programming community index, Tiobe (who published the following ranking in its September issue) the results are quite different.

1. C
2. Java
3. Objective-C
4. C++
5. C#
6. Basic
7. PHP
8. Python
9. JavaScript
10. Transact-SQL
11. Visual Basic .NET
12. Perl
13. Ruby
14. Visual Basic
15. Delphi/Objective Pascal
16. F#
17. Pascal
18. Swift
19. MATLAB
20. PL/SQL

While Java still remains a strong player in both rankings, it is interesting to note that since this time last year, Java has slipped off the number one spot on Tiobe’s list.

You can see noticeable differences between the two lists, especially in relation to the relativity of rankings. Tiobe compiles search engine inquiries with the number of developers, courses and providers for evaluation. GitHut has the advantage of not relying on such vague criteria and it can use verifiable data of official APIs. But what relationship does GitHub data have to the worldwide distribution of programming languages?

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20 Website Design Requirements Every RFP Response Should Include

By Unknown   10:50   1 comment:

20 Website Design Requirements Every RFP Response Should Include

I’ve recently been talking a lot about website design requirements, proposals, and contracts. I’ve done so because I know a successful website design launch is more than software code, text, and images.
Website design success is a direct result of a structured process and solid documentation.
Executing a successful website design project begins and ends with a solid documentation. This documentation can be a proposal, contract, or statement of work. The name of the document is less important than the details contained within the document.
Whether you’re a small business or a large enterprise, documentation is the key ingredient to executing a website project that is on-task, on-time, and on-budget.
The more you document in the sales process, the more smoothly the process will go for everyone involved.
In a prior blog post I discussed the creation of a website RFP. Now that the creation of an RFP document is complete, I’d like to talk about reviewing and evaluating RFP responses.

Evaluating RFP Responses

Reviewing RFP responses sounds easy right? Well in all honesty, it sounds easier than it actually is in practice.
If the project team solicited quotes from a large number design agencies, the task of reviewing website design proposals can feel overwhelming. Ok not just feel – it can be overwhelming.
The greater the number of RFP injuries, the larger the response pool and variations within those proposals. Hopefully a short list of website developers was made prior to sending out the RFP, which will keep the number of proposals limited and make the review process a bit easier.
As websites proposals arrive, it is important to ask yourself some basic questions to get started. These include:

• Was the RFP response provided within the allowed timeframe?
• Was the RFP response presented in a professional manner?
• Is the RFP response well written?
• Does the RFP response address all website design requirements?
• Is the website proposal within the project’s budget constraints?
• Does the website proposal provide within the project’s timeline?

The above questions are high level questions design to help eliminate any design firm who is clearly not a fit. A late, unprofessional, or incomplete RFP response should be a red flag about potential developers. A RFP response that is priced at twice your budget, or a third of your budget, should also be a concern.
Now that you’ve received your responses and you’ve removed out any red flag vendors, it is time to thoroughly review each RFP response to compare responses in a more apples to apples manner.

Website Design Requirements to Look for in Each RFP Response

An RFP response can be of various lengths. So I won’t focus on volume of text or the number of pages. What matters is the content and the solution presented.
When reviewing RFP responses, make sure each response covers some core elements of any website project. These website design requirements include, but are not limited to, the following details:

1. Project Plan – This should include a high-level list of project tasks. While this won’t be as detailed as the actual project plan itself, there should be enough details for you to understand the flow of discovery, design, development, and build.
2. Project Management Tools – The design agency should list their project management toolset. This will vary by firm, as there are lots of great options available. The important thing is to verify there is a structure to the project management process and that tasks, owners, and dates will be well documented.
3. Team Members – Different design agencies will have different structures for their teams. The larger the agency, the larger the project team. It is important for you, the buyer, to know who will work on your team and to what capacity of work they will provide. You don’t need full resumes of each player, but you should know who’ll you be working with in the coming months.
4. Content Management System and Baseline Technology – If your website RFP did not specify a desired CMS solution, this will be an important element of your proposal. Make sure your RFP responses list out the CMS of choice and any additional technology that will be used in coding and deploying your new websites. Take special note to anything proprietary. A proprietary CMS package should be a red flag, as it locks you into that developer for the life of the website.
5. Deliverables – A deliverables list is important because it validates what is going to be delivered at the point of go-live. This could include number of design templates, volume of content migration, plugins utilized, etc.
6. Functionality List – The functionality list is very important if the website is more than a simple brochure website. The more complex the website build, them more detailed this list of functionality should be.
7. Content Migration – If your website project will include content migration, remember to document how much content will be migrated over to the new website. This could include pages, posts, products, events, users, attachments, and so on. Not defining the nature of the content migration and the volume of content will cause scope creep and additional costs for you or the design agency.
8. Image Usage – It is important to understand ownership and assignment of the images used within the website design project. Who is responsible for image selection, purchase, editing, and placement? This will vary by project so clearly define this early on in the process.
9. SEO – Don’t forget about SEO! This includes keyword research, keyword to page mapping, on-page optimization, meta definition, and 301 redirects. If you rely on organic SEO, protect this traffic source during your redesign. The easiest way to do this it to make sure this topic is front and center during the project scoping and proposal process.
10. Mobile Responsiveness – Mobile responsiveness should be part of any modern day website project. The only exception to this rule is large websites who have a separate mobile websites or apps. If you do not have a separate mobile website, make sure your proposal includes language for managing display adapted to phones and tablets.
11. Exclusions – While I do not list exclusions in every proposal, I do list them anytime the client and I discussed an item that is not going into the website project. This helps protect me later in the process, but also clarifies our deliverables for the client.
12. Third-Party Integration and/or APIs – Mid-market and enterprise companies generally have a multitude of systems and software packages within the organization. These systems need to communicate with the new website by pulling, pushing, or syncing data. If integration or APIs need to be used, make sure the proposal defines the third-party system, data points, data transfer, and responsible party.
13. Milestones – Milestones can help ensure the project team hits goal at each stage of the website design process before moving to the next step in the process.  Typical milestones include discovery, information architecture, graphic design, theme coding, content migration, beta launch and/or testing, and go-live.
14. Schedule – Each website proposal response should include a schedule that corresponds to project milestones. This will help you understand how much time is allocated to each milestone and if the overall project will align to your own timetable.
15. Delays – Project delays can be a result of both the client and the developer. It is important to understand how these delays will be handled and how they will alter the overall project budget and timeline.
16. Payment Terms– Smaller website projects will tend to have a 50% payment to start and 50% payment at completion. Larger website projects will have smaller payments based on milestones or set timing. Make sure this is clearly defined within the proposal.
17. Expenses – Expenses could include travel, domain fees, hosting fees, plugin licenses, and/or stock images. Make sure the RFP response details out the items anticipated and the party responsible for payment.
18. User Training – If your users will be new to the CMS, you might want to establish some guidelines for written training documentation, online training tools, and/or interactive training sessions. Make sure the training methodology matches that of your user base.
19. Warranty Period – A website warranty covers the correction of software bugs within the website. It is typically established for a set period of days and stated within the proposal or contract. Such a warranty would cover coding by your website developer, but not third-party plugins or extensions.
20. Ongoing Maintenance – Maintenance is often confused with warranty periods, but they are very different. A maintenance agreement is paid for on a monthly or annual basis and it would be used to provide developer updates to the software over time. For WordPress websites this would include the update of the WordPress core software and any plugins installed on the website. Maintenance can also include security, monitoring, backups, reporting, and one-on-one assistance when needed.
21. As Needed Post-Live Support – Not every company will want or need a maintenance agreement. In lieu of a maintenance retainer, some companies will opt for on-demand post-live support. This is generally billed on an hourly basis and managed through a ticket or support system.

Next Steps in the Website RFP Process

After you’ve reviewed your RFP responses and narrowed down on your chosen supplier, the next step should be focused on negotiating contracts and final details.
While web is full of advice on contract negotiations, don’t get caught up in the process minutia. It’s important to remember this task is the last step before entering into a long partnership with the chosen website developer.
The negotiations should concentrate on resolving any open questions or issues, which will in turn provide a solid basis to begin the design and execution process. Go into contract negotiations focused on resolving any open issues and clarifying any points of confusion.
If the project team has done a solid job with project scoping and they selected the right website developer, the negotiations should be no more than a signature. If the team has selected the wrong design agency, the task may prove enough to force the team to return to the number two firm.

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Buying a Website is Like Buying a Car, But Worse

By Unknown   10:45   1 comment:

Buying a Website is Like Buying a Car, But Worse

You walk into a car dealership with high hopes of purchasing a new vehicle. The dealership you picked is an amazing store that comes highly recommended and sells everything from economical Ford and GM cars, trucks, and minivans to luxury brands like Jaguar, Infiniti, and Ferrari. Everything under one roof! What could be better?
As you walk through the door, you approach the salesperson and ask him or her to provide you a quick quote on a new vehicle. It’s a realistic request right? No not really.
It’s hard for the dealership personnel to provide an estimate, because there is so much information they don’t know about you, your needs, and your wants. You could be a minivan driving soccer mom or an adrenaline junkie who needs speed. But honestly, at this point the salesperson doesn’t know who or what you are and therefore cannot begin to ascertain what you might need or want.

Buying Criteria

To illustrate my point, let’s consider some basic criteria for purchasing a new vehicle. We’ll explore these in the form of questions so as you read them and pretend you are the buyer.

• How many people does the vehicle need to transport?
• Will you require additional space for sports gear or animals?
• What type of climate will you drive the vehicle in?
• What features are important to you?
• What type of vehicle do you find attractive?
• Is there a particular body style you like?
• Do you have a color preference?
• Do you have a brand preference?
• How important are safety ratings?
• Is gas performance an important part of your decision?
• Will you lease or buy?
• How’s your credit rating?
• Do you require new or are you seeking a used vehicle?
• How soon do you need the new car?
• What is your budget?
• How long do you plan on owning this vehicle?
• How many miles do you plan on driving each month?

Right now you’re probably asking yourself why on earth does there have to be so many questions. The more the dealership knows about you the buyer, the more it can steer you into the right purchase.
If the dealership doesn’t know about your needs or wants, it cannot successfully guide you into making the right purchase decision.
Still think I’m over the top? Let’s review the question about climate. It matters and in some areas of the country it matters a whole lot. If you are in Florida you might need tinted windows due to the extreme heat. If you in Michigan and forced to live through long winters, you’ll require a heated steering wheel and four-wheel drive. Trust me – I cannot survive a Northern Michigan winter without my heated seats, a heated steering wheel, and four-wheel drive to get me through a foot of snow.
I give this example, because I run into the same situation daily when I receive inquiries from people who are buying a website.
I receive requests from well intentioned people asking me to provide a quick estimate on redesigning their website. In making this request, they many times fail to provide details because they simply don’t know what to offer. And that’s entirely ok if the person buying a website understands I’m going to ask a lot of questions so I can help guide them through the buying process and provide them a digital solution that meets their buying criteria.

Common Mistakes

Now let’s look at some common mistakes made by consumers when they’re in the car buying process. Mistakes are easy in this process, because buying a car is something you only do every five or so years. Well, unless you are my husband, and you can magically find a reason to turn in your truck for a new one every other year.
But I digress. Most people stumble on one or more of these common mistakes.

• Not knowing what they want or need
• Not asking what is included in the vehicle
• Not asking about financing and interest rates
• Shopping at only one dealership
• Looking at only one brand or manufacturer
• Shopping based solely on a monthly payment
• Not taking a test drive
• Getting caught up in empty promises
• Forgetting to ask for recommendations from friends or family
• Forgetting to check the dealership’s online reviews
• Forgetting that the right salesperson will help guide you into a solid decision based on your unique need and wants (if they are reputable)
• Forgetting about insurance (in website design we call this ongoing maintenance)

Walking into a dealership unprepared, is like buying a website without first documenting your needs.
If I ask a car dealership to simply look at me and give me an estimate on a new vehicle, it would be impossible. Purchase costs could run from $20,000 to $200,000. Buying a website is no different. The costs and criteria can vary just as much.
Just like the dealership, a digital agency needs to know what is important to the buyer, their requirements, goals, and esthetically preferences before it can begin to provide suggestions and budgets.

How Much Does it Cost to Build a Website?

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of being a guest on the Rainmaker.fm podcast calledTechnology Translated which is hosted by Scott Ellis. Scott’s topic for this episode was How Much Does it Cost to Build a Website?
I’ll warn you in advance that the discussion went far beyond pricing. In this 30-minute episode Scott and I chat about the following items:

• How does one answer the question “How much does it cost to build a website?”
• What are the considerations that clients most often overlook when considering the price of developing a website?
• How can one differentiate between the broad range of bids to rebuild your website?
• What key things should an individual who is buying a website look for when choosing a vendor?
• What key things should a website developer look for when choosing clients?
• How does Web Savvy Marketing price their website design projects?
• Should a website buyer establish a budget and share it with the agencies they are interviewing?
• What recommendations should website buyers have in mind before engaging in a search for a solution provider?

Listen to the podcast How Much Does it Cost to Build a Website? on the Rainmaker.fm network.

An Overview of My Podcast Q & A

If you don’t want to listen to the the entire thirty minute podcast, you can skim through my answers below.
How does one answer the question “How much does it cost to build a website?”
I don’t quickly answer it and that’s because I simply can’t.
Instead, I try and educate people on why that question is impossible to answer without further information.
It’s like me going into a car dealership that offers everything from a Ford Focus to a Mercedes Benz for sale. If I ask the dealership to simply look at me and give me an estimate on a new vehicle, it would be impossible. Costs could run from $20k to $200k.
A pricing out a new website is no different.
A web developer needs to know what is important to the person buying the website. This includes their functional requirements, their project goals, and their esthetically preferences. No agency can truly being to provide solutions and budgets, without first digging into the project requirements.
And if they do throw a price at you, consider it a red flag.
What are the considerations that clients most often overlook when considering the price of developing a website?
I think there are a number of them and they include core project elements such as:

• Project goals
• Features and functionality
• Design requirements
• Content creation
• Content migration
• Search engine optimization
• Target demographic
• Competition
• Website personas
• Call to actions

The best website buying process will include complete documentation of the project before a theme is selected or a custom website is quoted.
If you document the known project requirements before you get emotionally attached to a theme or designer, you’ll have a controlled and methodical process that is geared towards success and not immediate gratification.
How can one differentiate between the broad range of bids to rebuild a website?
I encourage them to make sure all vendors are quoting to the same deliverables so they have an apples-to-apples comparison available. Call it an website RFP or something else, the name doesn’t really matter. What is important is that there is a document that lists deliverables so that all potential solution providers quote to the same specifications.
This helps provide structure to the process of differentiating one proposal from another and it helps eliminate assumptions that may or may not be accurate.
What key things should a website buyer look for when choosing a vendor?
I consider honesty to be a major decision factor. This includes honesty within both present and current actions.
Reputation matters so anyone who is considering buying a website should make sure they review client testimonials, online reviews, industry comments, and community involvement.
All of those data points help showcase who is trustworthy and who could potentially take money and under deliver.
What key things should a website developer look for when choosing clients?

• Fit – Can we provide an excellent solution for them with our current level of expertise?
• Personality – Are we a fit emotionally? Can we communicate well?
• Technical Aptitude – Does the buyer have a basic understanding of technology and realistic expectations for existing scope and change requests.
• Budget – Can they afford us?
• Timeline – Can we deliver within their desired due date?
• Fun Factor – Is the project different? Will it be challenging?
• Long-term Success – Can we help make a difference and produce tangible results?

How does Web Savvy Marketing price their website design projects?

• Design – How many custom design templates are needed to make the project a success?
• Functionality – How much development time will be needed to create custom post types, plugins, templates, etc?
• Size – How large is the website in regards to content migration?

• 
  
• SEO – Are we providing SEO consulting as part of our quotation?
• Risk – Does the project present any risk that we need to consider?

Should the company who is buying the website establish a budget and share it with the agencies they are interviewing?
Transparency in the sales process is important for both the buyer and the seller. The more both parties know about each other, the easier it will be to qualify each other in or out.
As your potential solution provider I do not want to scope out and present a solution that is $40,000 if you have only set aside a budget of $400. I want to have an idea of your budget so I can scope and present a solution you can afford and one you’ll be happy with long-term.
What recommendations should website buyers have in mind before engaging in a search for a solution provider?
Document what you need before you start interviewing agencies. Make sure your requirements list is fluid and add to this list as you speak to vendors and learn more about what can be provided.
Over communicate with potential vendors. No agency will ever tell you that you’ve over communicated in the sales process. The more we know about you and your website design project, the better we can set expectations and make sure we are presenting a solution that meets your needs and paves a path for success.
Remember that this is a business decision and not one that should be taken lightly. Make a logical decision based on a number of factors.
Don’t just go with your sister’s son-in-law because he once opened a WordPress.com account and blogged about his cat. We developers run into this all the time. In the end, you waste months of time with your sister’s son-in-law and you’ll be no farther ahead then you were when you started. I promise! There is a huge difference between creating a free cat blog and developing an enterprise  website.

Are You Considering Buying a Website in the Near Future?

If so I’d be happy to chat with you, but remember, I’m going to ask a lot of questions about you, your project goals, and your requirements.
It’s my way of protecting you, your time, and your money. And it’s also my way of preventing you from encountering buyer’s remorse.

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20 Ways To Earn Online

20 Ways To Earn Online

By Unknown   10:29   1 comment:

Ways to earn money online
I have been in this industry for the last 5+ years. I had my highs and lows, dealt with scammers, went through some minor losses and sometimes I had amazing experiences working online. I am sharing a list of ways that can be useful if you want to earn money online from home. I have tried most of these ways or have seen my buddies making profits out of them. For Pakistani students, these can prove to be very beneficial if they want to make part-time or full-time careers out of them along with their studies. I have sequenced them from basic level to professional level online jobs.

1. Earn through Data Entry: Data entry is considered to be among the biggest skills you can have to earn money online. It is also listed as the top most jobs available online in terms of projects volume. It’s all about typing and you may need some basic level English and computer skills to get the job done. Data entry jobs take a lot of your time. Some reliable sources can be Freelancer, Elance and Upwork (formerly Odesk).
2. Become a part of Market Research groups: Market research is like the bread and butter of an advertising agency in Pakistan. Contact some local or large companies or research agencies and become a part of the focused groups. You have no idea how much they value your opinions.
3. Fill out some survey forms: Similar to focused groups, survey research is another medium of earning money online by providing your opinions. Those surveys can be related to products/services or academic research forms.
4. Refer products/services and get paid: Earn money online via participating in referrals. Good income can be earned along with bonuses if you have a strong network of people and know someone who might fit the job perfectly.
5. Ever thought of selling photos: You don’t need to be the famous Tapu Javeri to do the job. Sometimes the most usual or unusual things miss a photo like coffee cups, road signs, etc. You can submit these images at various sites like Shutterstock or iStockPhoto.
6. Become a reviewer: Often we eat at a restaurant and say ‘Oh my, this was the most tasteless thing I ate’ or when using a smartphone you say stuff like ‘I love how the camera works’. There are a number of websites who actually pay you to review products. Some people may hire you to review their own products/services on several review sites. The most popular websites includes Amazon and eBay.
7. Become a travel agent: No, you won’t have to sit in an office to do that. You can reserve and sell tickets to customers from your home. I used to work for a travel & tours company who hire sales people and let them work from home. After all, you just have to sell the tickets online.
8. Arts and crafts: Love making jewellery from stones or crochet? Are you a crafty person? Or have some interest in making paintings? Either way, you can make stuff at home and sell them online via OLX, Facebook or the new boss in town Instagram.
9. Telemarketing: Are you good in sales and can communicate with people in US, Ireland or UK in their native language? Telemarketing can be the right job for you then. Reach out to companies looking for a resource like you and sell their products and services, be it a call or an online chat. Meet your monthly targets and earn the sales commission with basic pay. Earn up to PKR 50,000 to 1 lac a month. TRG Pakistan would be the perfect example to state here (one of the leading BPO companies in Pakistan for offshore outsourcing).
10. Blogging: First things first! What you are most passionate about? Never start a blog in which you might lose interest later. You need excellent English communication skills to start your own blog. It can be a news related blog, or a product/service review or celebrity blog. Post jobs, funny images/videos, write about latest trends or technology updates. The pitch point is that you are blogging about good ideas. Stay away from plagiarism. Take inspiration but don’t copy content from other sites. Use Google AdSense or InfoLinks to put up ads on your blog and start earning. Don’t rush and wait for 3-4 months till the volume of visitors increase to more than 1000 per day. Money starts coming in once you reach your target.
11. Freelancing: The best alternative to blogging is freelancing. Sites like Freelancer and Elance provide a number of job postings that you can choose from. From writing articles and academic reports to designing websites, optimizing keywords on search engines, coding and building mobile apps. In Pakistan, top websites like Rozee, BrightSpyre, Bayrozgar, Mustakbil, HerCareer are bringing employers and talent together to do what is needed.
12. Work for a Publishing house: Best option for housewives and females looking to flourish a career for them. News publishing houses like DAWN, Tribune, TheNews and TechJuice are always looking for talented writers who have a flare for creative writing. Build your profiles and apply today.
13. Academic Write ups: Do you know that students all over the world hire people to work on their assignments and thesis projects? Have you recently graduated or have done business administration? Why don’t you help these students out and earn money too? Some of these students are willing to pay PKR 10,000 per assignment. Polish your writing skills and get started.
14. Become an accounts consultant: We have a number of B.Com and MBA degree holders in Pakistan. And now a high volume of students in ACCA. Not everyone gets to work with best firms in Pakistan. So why not use those skills online and earn money from home. Advice managers how to manage their accounts, and keep the cash flow good. You can also be a consultant in some other field you are an expert in.
15. Video Tutorials: With Youtube banned in Pakistan, there are still other video channels you can use to upload your videos like DailyMotion or Tune.pk. Review smartphones, tablets, or laptops and make video tutorials. You can earn money from home via making some videos too.
16. Affiliate Marketing: Once you have a good blog ready, you can also join an affiliate network or affiliate partnership with someone (for instance, Amazon) and earn money whenever someone is redirected to a link and buys a product through your blog.
17. Design a website: If you are a designer by profession already or you can simply register for short courses to learn professional website designing. Either way you can create an opportunity to earn income from home. Both small and corporate level companies hire freelance designers to work on their logos and websites. And trust me, mostly freelancers come up with some brilliant and outstanding designs. Photoshop has become one of the most commonly used weapon of choice when it comes to web designing.
18. Web development: Universities are stressing towards offering advanced courses on web development. Using html, CSS and PHP, students and professionals can make ways to build a better future for them. Build a website from scratch and use programming languages like CSS, HTML and PHP and tools to earn you some good amount of cash.
19. SEO: The rate of having diploma in SEO is high in Pakistan and for the same reason companies don’t prefer hiring them. One of the reasons stated by my CEO recently was that they have weak English communication and vocabulary which puts a company at a very bad place. But then there are some experienced SEOs and SEMs who are doing a tremendous job in lifting up page ranks and providing quality results with targeted keywords on Google’s top searches. Content marketing and SEO go side by side. It’s a plus if you know both well. Social Media Marketing is another major part of SEO and content marketing.
20. Design a mobile app: Mobile app is like the ultimate accessory for any product or service now days. It’s one of the highly paid online jobs and if you are familiar with the process of designing and developing a creative and unique app. Well, you just hit the jackpot. Did you know NASA called out all the smartphone app makers a few weeks ago to design an app and win $1500?

Out of all the above, my favorite ones are 10, 11 and 12. I made a career out of them. All 20 different ways mentioned above vary from one another. Most of them can be found on freelancing sites like Freelancer, Elance, Odesk (aka Upwork). Pakistani job platforms also enlist most of these sources of income. OLX Pakistan also has a vast listing of online/internet jobs but not all of them are from reliable companies or people.
Pain Points

• Be aware of scam sites. Yes, you won’t believe but there are more scamming sites out there to hunt you than reliable clients paying competitive salaries.
• Get your research work properly done. Don’t be desperate, don’t be blind. Always look for site reviews, google your client’s name or company he/she represents.
• Mark a target for yourself and set your work policies straight. Never work for full in advance before getting paid, or get paid in advance.
• Payment gateways should be agreed on from both sides. Paypal (not allowed in Pakistan yet but still can be used), Skrill, Payoneer, Bank wire transfer or others; make sure both parties agree to one of them. Don’t work outside the freelancing websites. Avoid that or you might be fooled. A friend of mine faced PKR 100,000 loss recently because he made the mistake of dealing with the client outside the primary source of Freelancer.

Share your experiences with us if you have been trying any of the above earning methods. Leave comments to add more ways to earn money online from home.
Happy Earning!

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What is Penetration Testing and Why is It Important?

What is Penetration Testing and Why is It Important?

By Unknown   10:12   1 comment:

Penetration testing (otherwise known as pentesting, or the more general security testing) is the process of testing your applications for vulnerabilities, and answering a simple question: "What could a hacker do to harm my application, or organisation, out in the real world?".
An effective penetration test will usually involve a skilled hacker, or team of hackers. You purposefully ensure that the hacker(s) don't have access to any source code, and ask them to try to gain access to your systems. Penetration tests can be carried out on IP address ranges, individual applications, or even as little information as a company name. The level of access you give an attacker depends on what you are trying to test.
To give a few examples of penetration tests you could run:

1. You could give a team of penetration testers a company's office address, and tell them to try and gain access to their systems. The team could employ a huge range of differing techniques to try and break into the organisation, ranging from social engineering (e.g. asking a receptionist if they can take a look in a computer room to run safety checks, and installing USB keyloggers) through to complex application specific attacks.  
2. A penetration tester could be given access to a version of a web application you haven't deployed yet, and told to try and gain access or cause damage by any means possible. The penetration tester will then employ a variety of different attacks against various parts of the application in an attempt to break in.

One thing which is common amongst all penetration tests, is that they should always have findings. There is no perfect system, and all organisations can take additional steps to improve their security. The purpose of a penetration test is to identify key weaknesses in your systems and applications, to determine how to best allocate resource to improve the security of your application, or organisation as a whole.

Why Are Penetration Tests Important?

1. They can give security personnel real experience in dealing with an intrusion. A penetration test should be done without informing staff, and will allow an organisation to test whether its security policies are truly effective. A penetration test can be imagined much like a fire drill.
2. It can uncover aspects of security policy that are lacking. For example, many security policies give a lot of focus to preventing and detecting an attack on an organisation's systems, but neglect the process of evicting an attacker. You may uncover during a penetration test that whilst your organisation detected attacks, that security personnel could not effectively remove the attacker from the system in an efficient way before they caused damage.
3. They provide feedback on the most at risk routes into your company or application. Penetration testers think outside of the box, and will try to get into your system by any means possible, like a real world attacker would. This could reveal lots of major vulnerabilities your security or development team never considered. The reports generated by penetration tests provide you with feedback on prioritising any future security investment.
4. Penetration testing reports can be used to help train developers to make fewer mistakes. If developers can see how an outside attacker broke into an application or part of an application they helped develop, they will be more motivated to improve their security education, and avoid making similar errors in the future.

So if your organisation isn't already using regular penetration tests to test the security of its systems, applications, and the organisation as a whole, why not? Your first few penetration tests will probably deliver some shocking results, and highlight that your organisation is much more vulnerable to attack than you ever predicted.

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Diffrence between Hashing And Encrypting

Diffrence between Hashing And Encrypting

By Unknown   08:38   2 comments:

Hashing and encrypting are two words that are often used
interchangeably, but incorrectly so.
Do you understand the difference between the two,
 and the situations in which you should use one over the other?
 In today's post I investigate the key differences between
 hashing
 and encrypting, and when each one is appropriate.

Hashing

What is it?

A hash is a string or number generated from a string of text. The resulting string or number is a fixed length, and will vary widely with small variations in input. The best hashing algorithms are designed so that it's impossible to turn a hash back into its original string.

Popular Algorithms

• MD5 - MD5 is the most widely known hashing function. It produces a 16-byte hash value, usually expressed as a 32 digit headecimal number. Recently a few vulnerabilities have been discovered in MD5, and rainbow tables have been published which allow people to reverse MD5 hashes made without good salts.
• SHA - There are three different SHA algorithms -- SHA-0, SHA-1, and SHA-2. SHA-0 is very rarely used, as it has contained an error which was fixed with SHA-1. SHA-1 is the most commonly used SHA algorithm, and produces a 20-byte hash value.
  
  SHA-2 consists of a set of 6 hashing algorithms, and is considered the strongest. SHA-256 or above is recommended for situations where security is vital. SHA-256 produces 32-byte hash values. 

When Should Hashing Be Used?

Hashing is an ideal way to store passwords, as hashes are inherently one-way in their nature. By storing passwords in hash format, it's very difficult for someone with access to the raw data to reverse it (assuming a strong hashing algorithm and appropriate salt has been used to generate it).
When storing a password, hash it with a salt, and then with any future login attempts, hash the password the user enters and compare it with the stored hash. If the two match up, then it's virtually certain that the user entering the password entered the right one.
Hashing is great for usage in any instance where you want to compare a value with a stored value, but can't store its plain representation for security reasons. Other use cases could be checking the last few digits of a credit card match up with user input or comparing the hash of a file you have with the hash of it stored in a database to make sure that they're both the same.

Encryption

What is it?

Encryption turns data into a series of unreadable characters, that aren't of a fixed length. The key difference between encryption and hashing is that encrypted strings can be reversed back into their original decrypted form if you have the right key.
There are two primary types of encryption, symmetric key encryption and public key encryption. In symmetric key encryption, the key to both encrypt and decrypt is exactly the same. This is what most people think of when they think of encryption.
Public key encryption by comparison has two different keys, one used to encrypt the string (the public key) and one used to decrypt it (the private key). The public key is is made available for anyone to use to encrypt messages, however only the intended recipient has access to the private key, and therefore the ability to decrypt messages.

Popular Algorithms

• AES - AES is the "gold standard" when it comes to symmetric key encryption, and is recommended for most use cases, with a key size of 256 bits. Learn more about AES.
• PGP - PGP is the most popular public key encryption algorithm. Learn more about PGP.

When Should Encryption Be Used?

Encryption should only ever be used over hashing when it is a necessity to decrypt the resulting message. For example, if you were trying to send secure messages to someone on the other side of the world, you would need to use encryption rather than hashing, as the message is no use to the receiver if they cannot decrypt it.
If the raw value doesn't need to be known for the application to work correctly, then hashing should always be used instead, as it is more secure.
If you have a usecase where you have determined that encryption is necessary, you then need to choose between symmetric and public key encryption. Symmetric encryption provides improved performance, and is simpler to use, however the key needs to be known by both the person/software/system encrypting and decrypting data.
If you were communicating with someone on the other side of the world, you'd need to find a secure way to send them the key before sharing your secure messages. If you already had a secure way to send someone an encryption key, then it stands to reason you would send your secure messages via that channel too, rather than using symmetric encryption in the first place.
Many people work around this shortcoming of symmetric encryption by initially sharing an encryption key with someone using public key encryption, then symmetric encryption from that point onwards -- eliminating the challenge of sharing the key securely.

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40 Blogs Every Software Developer Should Be Reading

40 Blogs Every Software Developer Should Be Reading

By Unknown   08:29   1 comment:

Software developers always need to be upskilling, and increasingly are expected to bring more than just great code to an organisation.
There's hundreds of blogs software developers can read to learn, but it's difficult knowing where to begin (or even what's worth reading).
That's why we created today's post: to give software developers like you a headstart, compiling 40 of the best dev blogs on the web.
For each blog we've provided a link to the blog (simply click the name), and also a link to the author's Twitter. 
Let's get started!

1) Code Simplicity

Code Simplicity is a companion blog to author Max Kanat-Alexander’s application design book Code Simplicity: The Science of Software Development. Max is a software engineer at Google, and the chief architect of the Bugzilla Project – and his blog draws upon this experience to offer advice on simplifying software design. His mantra is ‘Complexity is stupid. Simplicity is smart’ – and after reading the blog, I’m inclined to agree.
Follow on Twitter

2) Joel on Software

In addition to being a former Microsoft program manager, Joel Spolsky is a co-founder of programming Q&A site StackExchange, the man behind software development company Fog Creek Software, and the awesome little browser-based workflow tool Trello. He’s been blogging since 2000, and his site is a goldmine of insight on software dev, management and business.
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3) Scott Berkun

Scott Berkun’s eponymous blog is one of the most multi-faceted on this list, offering advice and insight into creativity, leadership and philosophy – alongside his experiences as a manager at giants Microsoft and WordPress. If you’re tired of reading the same old blog content, Scott’s blog offers a plethora of engaging info, all of which is designed to help you become a better person, as well as a better programmer.
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4) Coding Horror

Coding Horror is the outlet of seasoned web application developer (and, like Joel Spolsky above, co-founder of StackExchange) Jeff Atwood. The blog tackles all manner of software development and security topics, but it’s Jeff’s interest in the human component of development that makes the blog stand out. As Jeff himself says:
‘In the art of software development, studying code isn't enough; you have to study the people behind the software, too.’
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5) Scott Hanselman

Scott Hanselman’s blog tackles the full pantheon of software developer interests, covering technology, code, gadgets, dev culture and the web. As a former professor, and current employee of Microsoft, his hands-on advice is clear, concise and helpful. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Scott’s writing is also bursting with personality. If you’re a fan of Scott’s insight, you can also check out his three podcasts and YouTube channel.
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6) /\ndy

Andy Hunt is a prolific author, a co-founder of the Agile Alliance, and part of the team that developed the Agile Manifesto. Andy’s blog tackles a diverse range of development topics, and unsurprisingly, offers some of the most interesting and unique insight into agile development anywhere on the web.
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7) Paul Graham’s Essays

Paul Graham was one-half of the duo behind Viaweb, arguably the very first (started in 1995) software as a service company. Since then, he’s gone on to co-found Y Combinator, a start-up incubator that’s funded the likes of Dropbox, Reddit and Airbnb. Paul Graham’s Essays collates his long-form insights into developing SaaS businesses, and provides developers a wonderful insight into their role within the wider business world.
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8) Federico Cargnelutti

Federico is a professional mobile and web developer, and regularly blogs around coding (particularly PHP), software architecture and agile development. With a mixture of straight-to-the-point tutorials and, courtesy of his Twitter, a ton of tech news and insight, Frederico’s blog is a great read for any software developer.
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9) DailyJS

Courtesy of author Alex Young, DailyJS provides exactly what you might expect – daily insights and advice on all things Javascript. The site contains all-manner of hands-on tips and worked examples, alongside information on the field’s latest news and developments. For users of Vim, Alex also runs the equally useful usevim blog.
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10) David Walsh

David Walsh is Mozilla’s senior web developer, and the core developer for the MooTools Javascript Framework. David’s blog reflects his skills in HTML/5, JS and CSS, and offers a ton of engaging advice and insight into front-end technologies. Even more obvious is his passion for open source contribution and trial-and-error development, making his blog one of the most honest and engaging around.
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11) Pontikis

Ponitkis is a blog of two halves, offering the latest in web technology, business and news, alongside a plethora of how-tos and guides. Author Christos Pontikis offers seriously in-depth instructions on all-manner of languages and frameworks, with his expert insights into PHP, jQuery and MySQL a serious incentive for any knowledge-hungry developers.
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12) Six Revisions

Six Revisions is blog resource for web developers and designers, offering hands-on tutorials, news and advice for anyone involved in website and web app development. Alongside some great commentary on all-things HTML, CSS and JavaScript, the site offers excellent guidance on UX and UI design.
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13) Web Appers

WebAppers dedicates itself to sourcing and collating free open-source tools and resources, with the professional web dev and web designer in mind. In addition to a pantheon of almost 700 plugins, the blog shares a ton of actionable guidance and helpful advice, with a view to helping web developers use the tools in the most beneficial way possible.
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14) Ajaxian

Despite the name, Ajaxian offers a ton of engaging, insightful advice on a huge range of development topics, covering everything from .Net development to XML. Unsurprisingly, some of the best insights look at Javascript and AJAX - but with contributions coming from a core team of 12 developers (including devs with decades of professional experience working for industry giants like Google), the site is a must-read resource for any software developer.
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15) ProgrammableWeb

Since its inception in 2005, ProgrammableWeb has been at the forefront of the evolving API economy. It offers a staggering amount of hands-on content, and manages to maintain its quality across an incredible publication schedule ranging as high as 10 posts per day. In addition to its fantastic blog content, ProgrammableWeb has a huge directory of APIs for web and mobile development, and a plethora of whitepapers and research.
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16) Martin Fowler

Software developer Martin Fowler is a prolific author (having penned no less than seven programming books), and an even more prolific blogger. He writes primarily around agile, refactoring and project delivery – with a particular focus on the design of software systems, and ways to maximise the productivity of development. Whilst the blog is a great resource for all types of developer, it should have a special interest to those managing a development team.
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17) Eric Sink

Eric Sink is a software developer at SourceGear – but prior to his current role, he served as project lead for the browser development team that prototyped a little-known browser called ‘Internet Explorer’. Since then, Eric has been blogging consistently around software development, with his advice, news roundups and opinions stretching all the way back to 2001.
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18) The Daily WTF

If you’re looking to break-up the monotony of personal development, The Daily WTF should provide ample relief. The site pairs genuinely helpful development insights with an awesome sense of humour, creating a blog that’s as funny to read as it is useful. The site has a particular focus on how-not-to-guides, and the disastrous development stories its shares will easily consume your lunch break.
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19) UIE Brainsparks

User Interface Engineering is a research and training company focused on web and application usability. Its Brainsparks blog is an industry-leading resource, covering all aspects of UI and UX development – with founder Jared Spool offering his expert insight on a weekly basis. In addition to the blog, UIE offer podcasts, long-form articles, event and seminars for devs interested in improving their UI skills.
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20) PragDave

Programmer turned publisher Dave Thomas blogs and tweets about all manner of development news and advice. Alongside tutorials, guides and opinions, Dave has developed his own Zen-like approach to the art of coding – creating the martial arts inspired CodeKata to help developers change their attitude to coding, and develop an always-learning mindset.
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21) Silk and Spinach

Kevin Rutherford is a freelance agile developer, a Certified Scrum Master, and a member of the Agile Alliance. Unsurprisingly, his fantastic blog offers a plethora of agile development advice, alongside his own opinions and thoughts, formed from four decades of experience in the industry.
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22) YTechie

For a little insight into his blog (and mind), Jason Young’s bio contains the sentence ‘My brain is written in C#, I speak Node.js, and I believe the universe runs on Windows Azure.’ Unsurprisingly, his blog contains a ton of humour and personality, a shed-load of help advice, and a whole ton of Azure advocacy.
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23) Bit-Player

If the majority of the blogs on this list aren’t advanced enough for your mathematically-inclined mind, you’ll find yourself enjoying Brian Haye’s computation and mathematics blog, bit-player. Brian is a senior writer for American Scientist, writing their Computing Science column. As you’d expect, his own blog follows an extremely high-calibre of data-driven analysis, advice and insight.
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24) Exploration Through Example

Brian Marick’s Exploration Through Example blog does exactly what you’d expect – helping developers to improve and build-upon their knowledge through the medium of trial-and-error. His content contains a ton of guidance and advice, and looks at his own experiences learning and re-learning the best practices of coding, testing and agile development.
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25) Clarke Ching Rolls Rocks

Rolls Rocks is the educational outlet of agile and Theory of Contraints expert Clarke Ching. A seasoned blogger and accomplished author, the blog is named after Clarke’s own book on accelerating agile development – Rolling Rocks Downhill – so if you’re a fan of his blog, it’s worth checking out his other publications too.
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26) Jonathan Kohl

Jonathan Kohl’s blog combines formidable expertise in mobile application development with a ton of obvious business-savvy, creating a wealth of resources perfect for developers interested in the business-side of software development. Jonathan also puts pen-to-paper in his published book, Tap into Mobile Application Testing, and the forthcoming Tap into Mobile Application Design.
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27) Word Aligned

Thomas Guest’s Word Aligned blog is an affair both personal and professional in nature. You’ll find humour and personal anecdotes alongside coding tips and tricks – with his article on Jokey Code a particularly enjoyable inside joke for developers everywhere.
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28) Technology, Strategy, People & Projects

Eric Brown is an entrepreneur and technology and marketing consultant, and his blog approaches development from a decidedly big-picture perspective. His content shares his advice and opinions on a wealth of business and development topics, and perfectly demonstrates the marriage of technology and business evident in so many of today’s most exciting software companies.
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29) David Chelimsky

David Chelimsky is the former lead developer of RSpec, a behaviour-driven development framework for the Ruby programming language. His blog covers a ton of Ruby-related concepts, which David elaborates on in the co-authored RSpec Book.
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30) Ruminations of a Programmer

Ruminations of a Programmer is the personal and professional outlet of self-proclaimed programming nerd Debasish Ghosh. His blog contents a mixture of actionable, example-lead tutorials, and insights into the mathematics of programming – both of which Debasish builds upon his two books, DSLs In Action and Functional and Reactive Domain Modeling.
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31) Herding Cats

Glen Alleman’s blog specialises in the intricacies of effective project management, and Herding Cats erding ccollates his expertise into series of in-depth blog posts, perfect for team leaders and agile developers. If his advice resonates with you, Glen has created an all-in-one reference, in the form of his book, Performance-Based Project Management.
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32) My Secret Life as a Spaghetti Coder

As a self-proclaimed spaghetti coder, Sammy Larbi’s blog offers a ton of helpful, humorous advice on the challenges developers face on a daily basis. With a great sense of personality radiating through his writing, Sammy’s blog manages to pair interest and education like no other, making it a great resource for other secret spaghetti coders.
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33) Software by Rob

Rob Walling’s professional career spans corporate developer, consultancy, and eventually, serial entrepreneurship. Software by Rob charts his journey into software development and self-funding, and offers actionable advice and great insights into developing SaaS products.
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34) Implementing Scrum

Implementing Scrum is the result of an unlikely partnership between certified Scrum trainer and practitioner Michael Vizdos, and entrepreneur and artist Tony Clark. Their blog tackles agile development and Scrum implementation, with their expert advice brought to life by a decent sense of humour and a plethora of cartoon illustrations.
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35) Succeeding with Agile 

With over 20 years of experience managing Scrum projects, Mike Cohn is a hugely vocal proponent of agile processes. His blog offers expert (and highly-focused) insight into the best ways for businesses to adopt agile, making it a must-read for any devs looking to improve and expand their agile capabilities.
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36) Regular Geek

Robert Diana is a software engineer and web developer, with a particular penchant for social media. Alongside his own takes on the typical blog fodder of development tools and techniques, Rob collates a daily round-up of the web’s best development news and resources.
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37) Good Coders Code, Great Reuse

With three books and a Silicon Valley start-up under his belt, Peteris Krumins has a ton of great development insight to share. As an entirely self-taught dev (opting for a degree in Physics instead of Computer Science) he’s dedicated to continual self-improvement – and helping other devs achieve the same.
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38) secretGeek

Equal parts hands-on tutorials and DevOps anecdotes, secretGeek is the sounding board of Leon Bambrick. As a self-described ‘perpetual beginner’, and the creator of TimeSnapper and NimbleText, he regularly offers concise and honest insights into all aspects of application and product development.
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39) Otaku, Cedric’s Blog

With blog archives stretching back as far as 2003 (truly blogging before it was cool), Otaku is packed-full of a ton of development advice, building off of author Cédric Beust ‘s experience as a former engineer at Android, and a the creator of the Java testing framework TestNG.
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40) A Geek with a Hat

Swizec Teller is a full-stack web engineer, a published author and a serial blogger. Over a million people have read Swizec’s A Geek with a Hat Blog, learning a ton about topics as diverse as Javascript, job hunting and the quirks and benefits of being a developer.
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