At a recent cloud technology conference, Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched a tool to help streamline data analytics in the cloud. This new tool, named “Glue,” is designed to help reduce the burden on engineers and employees so they can get down to the important elements of data analytics. Read on for an explanation of the AWS Glue and all the ways it can benefit your business.

Data analysis can be an extremely profitable arm of your business, if undertaken carefully. Much of what people consider to be data analysis for a business is actually just digital clerical work, which makes the process even more frustrating and time-consuming than it needs to be. At its core, AWS’s Glue is an app that automates this tedium, which is often referred to as ETL (extract-transform-load).

Third-party software already exists to help with this task, but the service from AWS is one of the first cloud-based alternatives to come to market. Glue is designed to work with businesses that have their own on-premises data centers and infrastructures in addition to working with AWS frameworks. In fact, if a business makes changes to on-premises data, Glue can be set up to trigger jobs and update the data in the cloud so users always have access to the most up-to-date information for use and analysis.

Essentially, AWS extracts various types of data from a wide array of sources and analyzes it, ultimately homogenizing the data to fit the business's existing database. This eliminates a great deal of work because the extremely tedious task of importing data is often done by hand. Handing this burden over to AWS allows businesses to focus on the real analysis work; saving effort, time, and money in the process.

Every day, data becomes more and more integral to building a successful company. And with such a heavy burden placed on this facet of business, falling behind on the technology that makes it possible is an expensive mistake. If you’re hosting large amounts of data on-premises or in an AWS database, contact us today about how you can eliminate costly ETL processes.

A new form of spam is cluttering up iCloud Calendars, and Apple hopes its new feature will get it under control. By inviting users to report and remove items they never wanted on their calendar, Apple believes it can get to the root of the problem and stop it from growing altogether. If you’re frustrated by the lack of a more concrete solution, you might want to read this first.

The problem started in late October, and it continues today. iCloud devices continue to receive numerous calendar invites from unsolicited people. These invites typically advertise “junk” products in an attempt to exploit the increase in shopping associated with the holidays. Users who actually do click the links find themselves redirected to sites that have zero connection to what they thought they would find. But worse yet, everyone, regardless of their interest, is being completely inundated by unwanted notifications.

Denying calendar invitations alerts spammers that the email address the rejection came from is still active. This just results in more and more spam in the future. Apple apologized to customers affected by the oversight, but until now users have had no efficient way of deleting the spam from their calendar.

A “Report Junk” button has been added as Apple’s best shot at a long-awaited solution to the calendar spam problem. This reporting mechanism can be found on any calendar invitation sent by someone not listed in your contacts.

Unfortunately, it requires opening each item and selecting “Report Junk” through iCloud.com (the feature has not yet been released for iOS or macOS). However, once you have deleted an event from your calendar, the information will be deleted from all synced calendars, even those that are shown in the iOS apps.

Spam is one of the worst externalities that comes with increased connectivity. Although we’re still waiting for a more thorough solution to this problem, you can rest assured that in the meantime we’re working hard to come up with one of our own. For all the insider tips and tricks on Apple devices, contact us today.

Virtual containers have incrementally increased the ability of users to create portable, self-contained kernels of information and applications since the technology first appeared in the early 2000s. Now, containers are one of the biggest data trends of the decade -- some say at the expense of the virtual machine (VM) technology that preceded them. Read on to find out some of the performance differences between containers and virtual machines, and how the two can work together for your business.

When it comes to the virtual world, containers and VMs are not all that different. The VM is a good option for those who need to use more than one operating system in the course of a business project, while containers serve those who are comfortable staying within a Linux or Windows operating system without deviating. There are performance advantages to using containers, although these are counterbalanced by organizational advantages derived from a VM system.

Performance Nuances

• Faster startup time: Containers don't have as much to start up, making them open more quickly than virtual machines. While it may not seem revolutionary, this can be up to a few minutes per instance -- a cost that adds up to quite a bit over the course of a year or more.

• Resource distribution: Containers only need to pull hardware resources as needed, while a VM requires a baseline of resources to be allocated before it will start up. If you have two VM processes running at the same time, this might mean two of the same programs are pulled up even if they aren't being used.

• Direct hardware access: A VM cannot pull information from outside of itself (the host computer), but a container can utilize the host system as it runs. This may or may not matter depending on what your users are doing, but certainly puts a point in the container column nonetheless.

Virtualization is an incredibly tricky solution to grasp in its entirety. New avenues spring up all the time to get more use out of its benefits, and it might be tempting to take a “wait and see” mentality. In reality, one of the best things about virtualization is how adaptable it is as a business solution. We suggest you get into the game as soon as possible; give us a call so we can tell you how.