In our current continuous delivery pipeline, we have to distribute a number of secure keys to various servers for access to different resources. It’s common to use encrypted data bags in Chef to store protected values such as passwords or, in my case, SSH keys. The typical process for doing this is: 1. Create the […]
I have the problem of working against multiple open-source Chef servers to manage cookbooks, environments, etc in our continuous delivery pipeline. Chef and the “knife” tool, in general, like to use configuration information from ~/.chef/knife.rb. Within that file lies the all-important configuration item: chef_server_url. How do you deal with this if you’re working with multiple […]
One of the new features of the 2013 Q4 Secure CI Release was the inclusion of a testing framework, optimized for web based browser testing. I’m continuing to make a few updates to the testing framework, but more than anything I’ve been discovering more and more uses for it. I’ve been working in the mobile […]
Summary: Alan Crouch discusses one of the most Frequently Asked Questions during his Software Testing Course: How Does Security Fit In My QA Process? Alan includes advice on integrating Security Testing in your QA Process, example security requirements and how to start implementing security testing for software testers. Complete Article: Better Software Magazine (July/August 2014) […]
Transitioning from the classroom to any type of work environment often takes a little bit of time. However, when transitioning into an Agile work environment, I feel as though the transition can take a little bit longer without the proper help and expectations. In my software development course, we learned about Agile, and claimed to […]
Dear Loyal Readers, I’ve been delving into automating AWS deployments and I’m a huge ruby fan for any sort of Linux admin, so I started with the AWS SDK and the samples/ec2/run_instance.rb. The example for deploying an instance was pretty straight forward; I just wanted write about some features/modifications that I found useful. Modification #0 — […]
Agile projects are well known for using a task board for teams to track what is being worked. They can be a simple wall in an office taped off with columns for status or web-based tools that allow detailed tracking of individual stories and tasks. No matter what is being used, the task board needs […]
Crisis management is a tough job. The biggest problem isn’t solving the technical problem — given a little time, you surely can solve it. It often involves planning and anticipating crises will occur. Good crisis management has a contingency plan and always gives themselves a bit of wiggle room to avoid the necessary shifting priorities. […]
I’ve been working in the mobile space plenty recently, and exploring a whole host of tools. One of the great tools I recently stumbled across was Blazemeter. Among other things, Blazemeter lets you playback a recorded script of web traffic, and simulate user load, similar to JMeter. Blazemeter, however, can mimic all sorts of different […]
Backups Off site backups are an often talked about and rarely done well item for small to medium enterprises. This is usually due to the cost of an offsite facility storage, complexity of backup software, and operational costs. However, offsite backups are critical to keep an enterprise running if an unfortunate event happens to hit […]
