If you’re using products, you might want to nominate a vendor or product for a database tool that helps you. The Database Trends and Applications Reader’s Choice Awards is taking nominations for the next few weeks.
At Redgate Software, we try to build useful products that help you solve problems and get work done. If you think we help you, I’d appreciate you nominating us in one or more categories.
I was watching Brent’s webcast session on GitHub recently. I’ve struggled to explain this to users in the past, and it’s always good to see what others do when they do similar sessions.
You can watch Brent’s session, and I’ve got some content on git. Need to do more for Redgate, so look for some content to appear on the Hub or our YouTube Evangelist playlist.
Git is a version control system (VCS). If you’ve ever used TFS for code, or Visual SourceSafe or Subversion, Perforce, CVS, etc., they are all methods of tracking versions of files. Usually for code, but could be for any files. Binaries don’t work as well, but any text, and plenty of people use a VCS for book projects.
While git (or Git) is a VCS, there are various companies that provide git hosting services. GitHub is the most well known, now owned by Microsoft. This means that they provide essentially a remote file service for git projects. Since git is a distributed VCS, this means that you can have multiple copies of your git repository (folder) and sync back and forth. Like DropBox, but with programming code versions.
BitBucket, GitLab, Beanstalk, Codebase, etc. are all hosting services. You could duplicate the git portion of hosting with a VM in Azure, AWS, etc. However, these services provide a few other things. They include some features like security, clients, and pull requests. A pull request is a method of notifying people to review your code before it merges, and it’s a fantastic team feature. It’s in git, but it’s cleaner with a service.
I tend to use Azure DevOps for my git hosting, but I do have repos at GitHub as well. I’ve tried BitBucket, and really they all feel the same. I get used to a GUI or CLI push/pull of code and then it doesn’t matter.
If you’ve never tried using git for code, give it a try today. I’ll get more content and videos up soon, so watch for those.
We hear regularly about consumer backlash from data breaches. There are usually legal repercussions, and often hard dollars (euros, yen, etc.) being spent on things like identity protection or credit monitoring. In addition, in the last couple of years, there are plenty of people that try to limit, or cease, doing business with organizations that lose their data. That isn’t always possible, especially when the government is the one getting hacked, but more and more people are taking an active stance against poor internet security by organizations.
It’s not anything that I think will happen soon, but I bet it will happen. Airbus had a breach that lost employee data. I wonder when we’ll start to see employees initiating lawsuits or other actions against their employers. My suspicion is that this will happen with former employees first, but with the GDPR, current employees in the EU might feel emboldened, and with good reason. Employers have a lot of data about us, and that ought to be well protected.
There have been hacks to lower a stock price, or affect a company. Why not hacks to attack employees? I wouldn’t have thought of this until I talked with a forensic analyst about other possible second order attacks. Could there be individuals that might seek to attack IT staff through personal information and blackmail or otherwise extort them to copy data? What about partners and spouses of employees at big companies? I don’t worry about Redgate as a target, but what if you work for Google/Apple/Microsoft/Facebook? We already had a potential sleeper employee at Twitter.
Unfortunately, I see no depths to which criminals might sink. Across the last decade there have been stories of actions that I never would have contemplated. While I hope my fears are unfounded, I worry that sensitive data about employees might be on the radar for some nefarious individuals.
Steve Jones
Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 3.4MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and Libsyn.
I’m wondering what you think. Is the idea of trading some paid time off (PTO) for student loan debt relief a good idea? That’s what Unum, an insurance company, is offering. They give their employees 28 days off, which is quite generous. I don’t know many people that get than many days off. If employees wish, they can trade up to 5 days for the equivalent salary, which is used to give them money for their student loans, or their children’s.
It’s a creative offer, and one that doesn’t force people to forego vacation, as they’d still have more than four weeks of time to take off. In the US, most people don’t take their entire vacation allowance when it’s over two weeks. This gives them a chance to pay down some debt with minimal impact on their work life balance. At least, minimal for me. I struggle to take my 25 days, so this is a trade I’d make.
The downside, to me, is that there may be plenty of employees that don’t have student loan debt. They don’t get a choice here, which feels unfair. I’d much rather the company offer employees the chance to sell back up to five days and use that payment for anything. After all, plenty of people have debt that isn’t related to education. Why not give them a chance to reduce other obligations?
I am not quite sure of what I think of companies becoming more involved in employee’s personal lives. We are in a more freelance, gig economy where people change jobs regularly and often may work remotely. For me, I tend to favor the approach from Basecamp where the company treats people fairly and create an environment where employees are respected and want to work for a long time. While I know this is hard for many companies, and certainly hard to change, I do think more organizations could improve their culture and treatment of employees.
I’m very lucky in that I work for a company that’s amazing. Redgate Software is the kind of company I’d want to create if I built another organization, and I have a fantastic set of co-workers, managers, and benefits. We are growing and hire here and there, and if you’re interested, I can’t recommend this organization enough.
Can you say the same thing about your employer?
Steve Jones
Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 3.4MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and Libsyn.
