Just Five Mins!

Well, if you have ever heard of NodeJS then this might be of interest to you :)

NodeJS has been around for quite some time, and used by a lot of large companies - but it did have some issues (not to mention the whole NPM world!).

The creator of NodeJS went away a few years ago to create DENO (yes, switch those letters around!). DENO aimed to fix some of the failings of NodeJS but didn’t support a lot of the existing NodeJS ecosystem.

DENO 2 does let you use the older NodeJS modules as well as it’s own newer modules which are, apparently, a lot safer.

Also, I didn’t quite do my research - DENO 2 is built with RUST :)

Deno is written in Rust and based on the V8 engine that powers Chromium browsers. "Rust has been crucial to Deno’s development, especially with Rusty V8, recently stabilized," Dahl told The Register. "Rust's unified build system simplifies adding third-party functionality compared to C++, keeping Deno fast and reliable for server-side apps."

Anyway, take a listen and here are a few links if you need them.

https://deno.com/

https://fresh.deno.dev/

DENO 2 Serverless hosting

Okay, take care until the next time!

Well now, are you using Docker? never heard of Docker? well perhaps you might want to ask AI to help there.

If you do use Docker to create containers of your apps/micro-services then what about Fly.io?

Fly.io is a public cloud infrastructure platform. Users deploy applications as Docker images, but Fly.io does not utilize Docker to run the applications.

Docker images are actually OCI (Open Container Initiative) images, which are essentially stacks of tarballs (are these similar to harballs that a cat has?). Fly.io unpacks these layers onto virtual machines and can retrieve the container manifest from the Docker registry.

Fly.io employs a custom registry to fetch and unpack image layers. It utilizes Firecracker microVMs for virtualization. Firecracker is a virtual machine manager that creates lightweight microVMs. Fly.io uses Firecracker to orchestrate these VMs, along with containerD for isolation. ContainerD is responsible for managing and unpacking application images, with each app instance running on its own isolated kernel.

There are some generous free options described here.

Well, what do you know? back to some frontend web stuff no less!

I have been using bootstrap CSS for years, and still do, but when I eventually realised Tailwind CSS was “something”, I have since been trying a few projects out with Tailwind CSS. However, because I am lazy and have been using WordPress with Elementor (page builder), I stumbled across dev dojo and some of their product offerings, one of which is “tails” - a page builder using Tailwind CSS no less! It looks really cool and produces a webpage/site with Tailwind CSS for the display aspects.

Interestingly, dev dojo also have a product called “pines” which using AlpineJS and TailwindCSS to build really stylish websites too… AlpineJS is an ultra-minimal JavaScript framework that I really must rediscover!

Until next time, take care!

We are not talking just chatbots - albeit more intelligent ones!

An AI agent/assistant can be tasked to do specific things to reach a goal and work with other agents, either in parallel, or sequential (i.e. do all these things first, then does this).

The cool thing is each AI agent can use a completely different model i.e. you don’t have to tie everything into just chatGPT/Open AI. You might find a different model or model sets beneficial for certain things.

Also, the big component is a mix of RAG (retrieval augmented generation), goal setting and external “tools” or functions where you can call out to external systems.

I will be creating a video (Just Fifteen Mins! as if I ever stick to any timeline!) to explain a few of these concepts in more details. I am also going to be creating a workshop course too! not overly technical, but mostly from a business perspective about the concepts and how they could benefit companies. Again, we are not talking just fancy chatbots!

Until next time, take care everyone!

Please consider subscribing too! It’s okay, you don’t have to pay - unless you want to of course! :) If you do pay for a subscription, you will get a free weekly update from the chief unicorn - Ulysses :)

Well, for the time being, I am sticking with OneNote as I have so much in there!

However, the way Obsidian Notes is moving, is looking tempting. Of course, the notes/data stay on your device which is a plus however, for convenience, you will most likely need the data synchronised to your other devices. It is possible of course!

Also, AI is ever creeping in to everything in modern life - love it or hate it.

Obsidian

Obsidian Sync

Obsistants for Obsidian

Until next time, take care!

Okay, two suggestions for the price of one!

Both from my good friend Tim Abel who also has a podcast if you wish to take a listen.

In fairness, the first GitHub Action thing, I have little idea of what/how this is used and even when I looked at the use case, I was still a little baffled! I guess you need to be “an actual developer” to appreciate this! :)

On to the second suggestion, Playwright for browser web app testing. I get this and it is nice to remember that you don’t need to code lots of things like good old selenium. You can test your web app as a user would use your application. It has some wide support for different languages and seems to be easy enough to get started.

Thanks again Tim!

VMWare “Player” was always free, but the workstation (or Mac Fusion Pro) used to cost real money (not Unicorn dollars).

No you can create VM’s on your laptop/Mac for freeeeeeee

Here is the post for VMWare

“And now for something completely different”, as Monty Python once said:

VS Code Profiles! yes, if you are like me and have far too many extensions in VS Code, maybe use profiles to split up the different categories of development! with different themes too!

Why? oh why?

That is all…

Okay, free for as long as you have an Azure subscription ;)

Still, who doesn’t want a 32gb cloud-based Azure SQL database to play with?

Check out the details here

Of course you can then use something like Azure Data Studio to work with the database - again for free! it even has a free version of Copilot for Azure Data Studio so you can look like a SQL pro! (I did say “look like” ;) )

Hey and what the heck, why not throw a REST or GraphQL API at the database too - for free! using Data API Builder.

I will be showing some of the above in action via a new-fangled device called a “video” - apparently all the kids these days are doing this…

Just Five Mins! is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

I remember the days when we had to create Docker containers to deploy our apps…

Well, you still can use Docker - more on that later.

Fermyon Spin (and so much more) is a framework to build WASM (Web Assembly) apps. I covered a little of this back in Episode 65 and an intro to Fermyon a while back.

This episode was prompted by my good friend Tim Abel who also has a podcast called Software Should Be Free (check it out, some good insights here).

Quite a bit to get into in this episode - hence it ran over to 10 mins! which reminds me, I really should delve a little deeper into some of these articles and produce a video on my “Just 15 mins” YouTube channel… BTW, it is just full of tumbleweeds right now ;)

Anyway, Docker desktop also has beta support for running WASM modules too! Again, will get more details together and perhaps a video for that one!

Dotnet is not forgotten either! since dotnet 8, experimental WASM/WASI features have been thrown in.

Take a listen for more info