Authors: Stephanie Gannon, PhD, and Nevena Meier “How can we design for what’s best for the customer?” is a question that often kicks off our Emerging Tech design and research discussions for what is next. Throughout the product development process, the Emerging Tech team keeps the customer at the center by valuing research-informed design. Emerging Tech’s charter is to deliver breakthrough capabilities that save customers time and money and enable associates and partners to quickly serve and delight customers anytime, anywhere. We work on platforms from Augmented Reality (AR) to convers ..read more

Automated Input Data Distribution In a Multinode Workflow Authors: Sandesh Balakrishna | Mohsin Kaleem Designing a ML workflow at scale requires multiple considerations — important being memory, Time To Run (TTR), Cost To Run (CTR). Workflows must be designed to maintain a balance of these metrics. There may be use cases where a single node workflow might not be sufficient either in memory or run time SLA (Service Level Agreements) adherence given that each node of a workflow will have a capacity constraint: Memory/CPU in case of Python or number of executors that the node may use in case ..read more

In the ever-evolving landscape of software development, the spotlight often shines on the functional features and capabilities of a new application or system. However, beneath the surface, there exists a critical dimension that plays an equally pivotal role in determining a software’s success: Non-Functional Requirements, or NFRs for short. Here, we will discuss Resiliency, which is one of the most critical Non-Functional Requirements terminologies. Resiliency in software systems or applications is the unsung hero of software engineering. It is the silent architect of software quality, en ..read more

Transforming Text Classification with Semantic Search Techniques — Faiss Classification models serve as supervised tools for organising documents into specific categories. Semantic search emerges as a practical solution for managing new categories and scaling up seamlessly to huge data. Its capability to integrate additional information without extensive retraining adds to its straightforward and reliable nature. Utilizing a nearest neighbors approach, semantic search robustly tackles imbalances in data distribution, ensuring resilient classification across diverse datasets. This adaptability ..read more

Thejasvini K S, Indranath Bardhan, Priyanka Sahoo and Communication Service Team Introduction Placing the customer at the forefront is of utmost importance at Walmart. This involves timely communication with customers like timely grocery deliveries. This led us to develop a communication service architecture that is resilient, fault-tolerant, fail-safe, rapid and time-sensitive. The vital component One of the key features that contribute to Kafka’s success is its ability to partition data across multiple brokers. This partitioning mechanism ensures efficient data distribution and processi ..read more

By: Jason Reaves and Joshua Platt Another day another new loader. During our research lately, we have discovered several new malware loaders that appear to be targeting corporate and enterprise environments. This one calls itself NewBot Loader: The loader is slightly obfuscated but some strings can still be seen giving a bit of insight into the capabilities. <CloseShell>b__0<OpenShell>b__0<GetShell>b__0<GetInstalledEdr>b__0<GetBytes>b__0<Inject>b__0<ExecuteStrategy>b__0pDOMAIN_CONTROLLER_INFOdownloadUploadOverloadget_Payloadset_Payloadset_M ..read more

By: Jason Reaves and Joshua Platt While investigation a range of known bad IPs related to another malware I stumbled upon some very odd looking IP addresses. Using the TLS certificate I started backtracking from domain to related malware samples in VirusTotal[1] which led to a loader that is based on NIM[2]. After unpacking the malware, the main code block contains an AmsiScanBuffer patch followed by a EtwEventWrite patch. The AmsiScanBuffer patch matches up with the proof of concept code that was released[3,4]. The patch: EtwEventWrite patch[5]: Afterwards the malware begins com ..read more

The Microservices pattern has been the hype among developers for quite some time now, all because of its robustness and simplicity. It has enabled developers to write applications quickly and in a more integrated way. While a lot of developers are creating state-of-the-art architectures using microservices, it also has antipatterns that cause more harm than good. Understanding various microservice patterns is very important to avoid basic design mistakes that developers make. In this post, let’s discuss database patterns in the context of microservices paradigm and how they can be implemented ..read more

Photo from UnsplashWhy Causal Analysis? Causal analysis enables us to understand the underlying causes and relationships between interventions (treatments), variables, and outcomes. It provides insights on the cause-and-effect relationships between variables or events, helping business to understand the factors that influence the outcomes. Based on this understanding, more informed and effective strategic decisions can be implemented, predicting the potential impacts and consequences. Now, let’s understand why Causal Analysis is important: a. Causation is not Correlation: Correlation is d ..read more

pageloadtime | wpsiteplan Have you ever opened a page in an app and waited for what seemed like an eternity for the content to appear? If so, you are not alone. Many users experience frustration and boredom when they encounter slow-loading pages, and some may even abandon the app or try to reload the page multiple times. This can have a negative impact on the app’s performance, user retention, and revenue. That’s why optimising page load time is crucial for creating a satisfying and engaging user experience. According to industry standards, the ideal page load time is less than 2 seconds ..read more