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It’s hard to believe that we’re celebrating the 20th year of the Apache Software Foundation. But here we are—and it’s safe to say open source has come a long way over the last two decades. We just got back from ApacheCon, where DataStax—one of the major forces behind the powerful open source Apache Cassandra database—was a platinum sponsor this year.  We don’t know about you, but we couldn’t be more excited about what the future holds for software development and open source technology in particular. During CTO Jonathan Ellis’ keynote, we announced three exciting new developer tools for the Ca ..read more

Yesterday at ApacheCon, our very own Patrick McFadin announced the public preview of an open source tool that enables developers to run their AWS DynamoDB workloads on Apache Cassandra. With the DataStax Proxy for DynamoDB and Cassandra, developers can run DynamoDB workloads outside of AWS (including on premises, in other clouds, and in hybrid configurations). The Big Picture The cloud has changed computing forever, and as cloud services continue to evolve up the stack, the new capabilities they offer developers come with trade-offs. One of the trade-offs developers, architects, and IT departm ..read more

Historically, software was monolithic. In most cases, development teams would have to rewrite or rebuild an entire application to fix a bug or add a new feature. Building applications with any sense of speed or agility was largely out of the question, which is why software suites like Microsoft Office were generally released once a year. Much has changed over the last decade or so. In the age of lightning-fast networks and instant gratification, leading software development teams are adopting DevOps workflows and prioritizing CI/CD so they can pump out stronger software releases much faster an ..read more

If your business is looking to make the most out of the upcoming holiday season, you need to start preparing as soon as possible.  Otherwise, you might not be able to accommodate customer demand—which will mean, leaving an untold number of dollars on the table. Last year, holiday retail sales spiked to $707.5 billion, with nearly $150 billion of those sales occurring online or through other non-store channels, according to data from the National Retail Federation (NRF). The NRF expects retail sales to climb even higher in 2019, with online sales growing between 10 and 12 percent—four to five t ..read more

Data is at the heart of every agile organization. It helps companies make better decisions, improve customer experiences, ensure optimal inventory levels, and pivot when market trends shift. At the same time, data can devastate organizations when it’s not secure. According to IBM-Poneman’s 2019 Cost of a Data Breach Report, the average data breach cost $3.92 million last year. In the U.S., the problem is even worse, with an average breach carrying a $8.19 million price tag. Beyond financial implications, breaches can generate a ton of negative PR and damage brand image. Depending on how severe ..read more

Your data, by itself, isn’t scary. You need it to make the best decisions. There’s just one problem, and it’s a big one: Unscrupulous actors want your data, too. In the age of data breaches, far too many organizations have found out the hard way how dangerous unsecured databases can be. Target paid $162 million after their systems were breached in 2013. Uber paid out $148 million for the same reason. More recently, Equifax was hit with a $700 million fine by the FTC for its 2017 breach, and the list goes on. Suffice it to say that when systems are breached, bad things happen.  Not only can bre ..read more

Last weekend, I spoke at Data Con LA, an event DataStax has supported for several years, this year as a platinum sponsor. For those who weren’t able to make it, I figured I’d share a high-level overview of my keynote presentation, which was about three major data trends that affect developers and what DataStax is doing in response to each of them.  (You can also read about other data management trends here.) Let’s jump right in. 1. Working with data needs to be easy and obvious According to a recent Stack Overflow survey, 41 percent of developers have less than five years of professional expe ..read more

Popeyes sandwich shortage highlights the necessity of real-time inventory management So, you’ve hyped your product so well that you can’t keep enough on the shelves.  Nice work! This is the case with the new Popeyes chicken sandwich, as reported by BuzzFeed. Honestly, this sounds like a wonderful position to be in. What business owner wouldn’t want so many people clamoring for their products that folks are freaking out because of local shortages?  Well, not the “freaking out” and “local shortages” part. But, otherwise, good job marketing team! One could argue that there’s only so much chicken ..read more

When’s the last time you sat there patiently when a website or app took forever to load—either for personal or professional purposes? In the age of Amazon and smartphones, we all know how websites should work. When they don’t meet our expectations, we get frustrated.  For customer-facing sites, inefficient applications lead to disgruntled customers. For employee-facing enterprise apps, slow loading times lead to productivity decreases and unhappy staffers.  When we talk about expectations, we mean this: Nearly half of users expect sites to load in two seconds or less. Two seconds!  In the age ..read more