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Anthos platform, formerly known as Google Cloud Services, is a Kubernetes-powered service for building and managing hybrid applications, which is now available on Google Cloud with GKE, adding to the Kubernetes infrastructure.

While the erstwhile Google Cloud Services Platform uses Kubernetes to manage hybrid applications on-premises or on the cloud, Anthos takes things a step further making it possible to manage workloads even on third-party clouds, such as Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services.

Anthos will avail IT administrators a more consistent framework for development, management and control of resources, with tasks automated across on-premise and Google Cloud infrastructure.

Besides Kubernetes, Anthos also incorporates Istio, an open source service that reduces the complexity of cloud deployments, and a Kubernetes platform for serverless workloads, known as Knative.

Anthos boasts of features such as ability of applications to run anywhere, including Google Cloud, and other third-party clouds or even the user’s data center, where Anthos can run on existing hardware with no need for forced stack refresh. Additionally, APIs are made available for users to work with at their own pace.

Google also introduced Anthos Migrate, a beta version of the platform as part of the roll out, in order to help automigrate virtual machines from other clouds or on-premises to containers in the Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE). The migration to Anthos will require a GKE Cluster On-Premise and running new cloud-native apps, or migrating existing applications into a cluster, which can handles such tasks as OS patching and VM maintenance.

Google launches the production version of Anthos for managing multicloud applications



The Wi-Fi Alliance launched WPA3 Protocol with offering of more resilient, and password-based authentication for WiFi users, even when they choose passwords that fall short of typical recommendations.

But the WPA3's Simultaneous Authentication of Equals (SAE) handshake, the secure key protocol between devices which ensure stronger protection against password guessing attempts by third parties has been reported to have a flaw that could allow hackers gain access to non-encrypted traffic between the device and the access point.

The report credited to security researchers, Mathy Vanhoef and Eyal Ronen, which they dubbed Dragonblood revealed that WPA3’s Simultaneous Authentication of Equals (SAE) handshake, known as Dragonfly, is susceptible to password partitioning attacks, with the possibilities of also breaking the encryption.

This flaw could be leveraged by an attacker to crack the WiFi users passwords or even get access to the encrypted traffic exchange taking place between the devices.

As the increase of transmission of sensitive information over the Wi-Fi connections has made it mandatory to secure this important gateway, the Wi-Fi Alliance has made a number of improvements to ensure stronger protections for the data exchanged between computers, phones or smart home devices.

The researchers promptly forwarded their findings to the Wi-Fi Alliance, and the organization worked closely with the security team to release a fix, which software patch will be made available through the regular software update for all devices.

It is highly recommended that all WiFi users should update their devices by installing the latest software patches as they are made available, so as to avoid becoming victims of password hack.

WPA3’s Secure handshake, Dragonfly affected by Password Partitioning Attacks



While Opera browser boasts of free unlimited VPN proxy added some years ago, but the VPN was pretty slow which makes it rather usable for many tasks. Opera 60 (also known as “Reborn 3"), the latest browser version has speed up things a bit, making the free VPN more of a delight, and currently, it also allows you to view Netflix shows, which support was blocked in the former versions.

This means that if, for instance, you're in a region with unsupported Netflix shows, you can use the Opera VPN to watch movies and TV shows that's only accessible for U.S. viewers.

The new Opera 60’s VPN is entirely free, and you can browse different Netflix shows in other supported regions, such as South American soap operas, as well as other selection of movies and TV shows, including Rick & Morty and Spiderman: Homecoming, that are supposed to be unavailable on the Netflix U.S. service.

Albeit, the VPN feature doesn’t offer anonymity for your web connection, that is to say that your connection is non-encrypted; what it does is to simply show your physical location as been somewhere else. Opera, however offered users a choice of an “optimal location” nearby, or the option to choose between servers in “America,” Europe, or Asia.

Opera 60 also introduces a cryptocurrency wallet, which is built on the Ethereum Web3 technology. But the free and unlimited VPN service remains the rallying point of the browser; and perhaps it will help Opera’s browser to rise back to prominence once more.

Opera Software releases Opera 60 with a free, faster VPN and Cryptocurrency wallet



Google Cloud platform is designed to make it possible for organizations to manage security, not just for the Google platform, but also for other cloud-based applications, run by the companies. And to make things a bit easier, Google is bringing new enhancements to its Cloud platform to improve the ability of organizations to manage security across multicloud.

The Cloud Platform now afford businesses context-aware access at no additional charges, coupled with the virtual private cloud security controls, previously in beta, which allow organizations to define security perimeters around certain resources such as storage buckets, BigQuery datasets, and BigTable instances.

While the Google Cloud Security Command Center, which was first introduced last year, now also generally available, will help companies to defend against cyberattacks around the cloud infrastructures.

Google has also partnered with third-party vendors for additional capabilities, such as StackRox to bring detail insights and security support for Kubenetes containers, which previously customers had to have two separate management panels, Google's own, and another for StackRox tools.

Now, StackRox data will be directly available through Google's Cloud Security Command Center, and the security data can be sourced from both private or public cloud provider for Kubernetes containers, and also providers offering non-Kubernetes containers.

Albeit, there is the downside of potential attack surface which can be larger than normally the case, as StackRox can analyze traffic patterns of applications, to identity which lines of communication are used, which it can shut down, and automatically handle such configurations.

Additional security issue, is the Kubernetes native management dashboard, which opened Tesla backdoor to hackers who were able to use Kubernetes platform to create new containers to run cryptomining software.

Google is nonetheless working tirelessly to protect its own services and users on both these fronts, and will be expanding its Android-based strong authentication, a separate, secure alternative to text messages, for companies to use with their own apps.

Google's virtual private Cloud Security Controls, previously in beta, now generally available



Google Station is a free WiFi service from Google in partnership with local broadband providers to roll out WiFi hotspot in public places, which was first internationally extended to India and Indonesia in March 2018, and later the service was made available in Nigeria.

The company at the “Google for Nigeria” event last year, announced the entrance of the Google Station into Africa, with Nigeria as the first point of call to enjoy the privilege of high speed broadband Internet via WiFi, with the goal of solving the huge connectivity challenge in the country.

And for now, the free WiFi service is only available in the cities of Lagos and Abuja, the federal capital territory of Nigeria, with the promise of extension to other popular cities in the country soon.

Where to Connect the Google Station in Lagos?



There are currently 6 Google Station in lagos, namely: The Landmark Event Centre on Oniru at Victoria Island, The Palms in Lekki, Murtala Muhammed Airport (MMA 2), Computer Village Ikeja, The Ikeja Mall, and The University of Lagos.

So if you reside in any of these locations or work there, or perhaps you just happen to be around any one of the place, you can easily enjoy fast and reliable internet connection.

Where to Connect the Google Station in Abuja?



The Google Station free WiFi is currently present in Wuse Market, Enab Plaza and Banex Plaza where it was first activated in a planned roll-out across the federal capital territory. While the Abuja Google Station was launched in partnership with BCN (Backbone Connectivity Network), a communications and data management company based in Abuja.

How to Connect to the Google Station Free WiFi?



To connect to the free WiFi hotspot at a Google Station location, simply turn on your smartphone WiFi and search for the network name, Free Google Station-21st Century and select it. Then it will bring up a request for you to sign in using your phone number. Now, click on the request page and enter your mobile phone number in the provided box. Google will send you a verification code via SMS, enter the code on the page. That's it, you are connected!

What's in it for Google, you may want to ask, Google will be pushing some ads to the users on the Google Station’s free WiFi, and thus will be making some revenue when such users click on the ads. And the users will enjoy free high speed internet in return, that's a win win situation!

Google Station: How to Connect to the Free WiFi service in Nigeria



Microsoft launched Visual Studio Code for Linux back in 2016, with the open source code editor haven been adjudged as one of the best text editors for Linux distributions and programming. Now, the company is bringing the Visual Studio Code as a Snap, to cater for the open source community and thus reaffirm its continuing romance with Linux.

Snap, the new universal packaging system for Linux apps, which can be updated on any supported distro without actually affecting the host, has been hugely loved by the open source community.

While the Visual Studio Code offer redefined editors for building modern web and cloud applications, with built-in full support for debugging and control of a variety of frameworks; and the availability for Linux as a snap, will ensure seamless auto-updates for its users.

With over 40 Linux distros supporting Snap, the team behind Visual Studio Code will be able to contribute across the board, and the automatic update capability will further make it possible for all apps to be up to date in security fixes and enhancements.

And as containerised software packages that work across the cloud, IoT devices and desktop, also natively on most Linux distributions, Snap brings automatic updates and rollback functionality, and greater flexibility for developers working within any Linux environment.

The Visual Studio Code for Linux as a snap is available to download at https://snapcraft.io/code, with Visual Studio Code – Insiders build, the build with the latest features, available for download here: https://snapcraft.io/code-insiders.

The Open Source Visual Studio Code now available as a Snap Package for Linux



Microsoft has released Kaizala mobile messaging app for business to its customers on Office 365 worldwide, almost two years after its unveiling, as an integral part of Microsoft Teams in a bid to win over the so-called “first-line” workers.

Kaizala, which was originally available on Android/iOS platforms for U.S. users, though not included in Office 365 subscriptions, but subsequently made available for commercial Office 365 subscriptions in 28 countries including Turkey, Brazil, India and Indonesia, in 2017.

Now, Microsoft has rolled out Kaizala to Office 365 customers in about 40 languages and 180 markets globally, including the U.S., in bid to stem the usage of consumer apps in the workplace which has been a huge challenge for large organizations as regards the control of sensitive data leakages.

The messaging app supports both video and audio calls, as well as group text messaging just like WhatsApp and Messenger, albeit it served as a business alternative to these consumer messaging apps, with more focus on business usage; Kaizala has strong security and administrative features that are lacking in those consumer-focused apps.

Kaizala ensures that data is encrypted at rest and in transit, and the management portal allow administrators to create and manage groups, as well as define policies for each of the groups.

And Microsoft account is not compulsory to access Kaizala, as users can sign up with their phone numbers, which “open directory” approach will serve for temporary employees and contractors who may be required to have access to the organizations services.

Also, it makes it pretty easy to support first-line workers or employees who are not provided with a corporate account, thus address the challenges of traditional business communications which prevents them from extending their services to such grade of workers.

Microsoft's planned wider rollout of Kaizala along with recent updates to Teams, the company’s collaboration and communication tool, may perhaps be the ultimately kill switch in the usage of consumer apps in the workplace.

Microsoft’s messaging app, Kaizala is now available to Office 365 business customers



Looking through your old contents, emails and invoices, you’ll find several clients that you haven’t spoken with in months, or even possibly years. Now check up on them with the right intentions. It doesn’t always have to be a message, you could also just leave a comment or something along those lines to something they’ve recently posted.

And that's the starting line on low-cost ways to increase your company's revenue, as compiled by the team at Dreamer Solutions, with the full list as follows:

Open the door for conversation with old client



Ask old clients how they feel about the work you did for them in the past, now that they’ve been given a longer time to rethink. And share with them a content piece relating to your industry, bonus points if it’s something you made. Ask them to subscribe and/or follow you if they don’t already, doesn’t matter if it’s social media or an email list, they will be seeing you more often. It’s easy to tell if you’re being genuine, so don’t ask about his new grandson if you truly don’t care.

Email list



Start by collecting emails if you aren’t already. Ask people to join your mailing list, friends, family, or past clients. Host a giveaway to collect emails. Offer a 10% discount to whoever places an order and is on your email list. Remember it’s not just a portal for you to throw offers at. If you’re in the real estate industry, write an informative piece of things a person should always look for before moving into a home. The possibilities are endless. If you don’t position yourself as a position of authority in your industry, why would they go to your business versus someone proving they have skin in the game.

Steady content strategy that stands you apart



Develop a content strategy that suits your business. Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates about 3 times as many leads. A client once told me,You don’t NEED to hire anyone for good content. Just thoroughly think it out and dedicate a few hours whenever you can to developing a content schedule. This doesn’t translate to flooding the timeline to magically save your bad week. For example, if you’re a fitness brand you could post three times as week: like Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Another could be sharing one of your favorite workout routines, two could be lifestyle type photos of people praising the routine. You can then later expand on that through an email to your subscribers or a blog post.

Mobile optimization



According to Google studies, many web pages on average take 15 seconds to load. That’s far too slow when you consider these same studies show that 53% of mobile site visitors leave a page that takes longer than three seconds to load. You can easily make a lot of the important changes yourself. Compress that big logo you have at the top, that could shave off a few seconds just by itself. Look at the actual code of the page. If some of it looks useless, delete it & preview the changes. If nothing changed, keep it deleted. Any images on the webpages, make sure they are compressed in general and the right dimensions for where it will be served.

Create quality contents



Sticking to original contents is arguably still the best way to rank on search engines. Practically any of those contents you send out to your email list are fair game to be a grande content piece on it’s own, if the content is informative and well thought out enough. Ideally you’d want the words out, not necessarily just an article on your website, however that would be the perfect place to start. Pitch the piece to your local newspaper, favorite blog, news station, magazine you read in the dentists office pertaining to your industry, anything. Research the keywords hashtags in your industry, use them multiple times in your writing so if it does make it to an online medium, anyone searching those keywords or hashtags has a higher chance of finding you.

In conclusion, content remains king and keeping relations with old and new clients doesn’t have to be all that difficult.

5 Low-cost Ways to Significantly Increase your Company’s revenue



Apple released the newest version of the MacOS/iOS programming language, Swift 5 with the promise of enabling even more slimmer apps, and better interoperability with stable application binary interface (ABI) and binary compatibility in the application development.

While Swift libraries are incorporated right into every latest release versions of iOS, MacOS, WatchOS and TVOS, as such developers are no longer required to include the libraries, making the applications building much easier.

Swift 5 brings dynamically callable types support which improve interoperability with other languages such as Python, JavaScript and Ruby.

This upgrade makes the ABI stable on all Apple platforms, and the enforcement of exclusive access to memory for release and debug builds ensure Swift is safer, with reimplementation of String, data types, and enforcing of exclusive access to memory during runtime.

Swift 5 string literals delimiters support for raw text is more enhanced, with single-line and multiline string literals enabled and capable of containing any content type.

And the Swift Package Manager now comes with target-specific build settings, customized deployment targets, dependency mirroring and the ability to generate coverage data.

Additionally, SIMD (single instruction, multiple data) vectors get the library subset of operations on the SIMD types supported by most processors in the library. To download Swift binaries for Linux, simply head to Swift.org or check out the Apple Xcode 10.2 IDE, available on the Apple Mac App Store.

Apple’s programming language, Swift 5 promises better interoperability, slimmer apps



April 1 is observed as April Fool's Day, and many tech companies have come to use the day to show mocked up teasers of Utopian ideas, but Google chose to offer its Maps users a cool Easter Egg, allowing them to play the legendary game ‘Snake’ right within the app.

Perhaps, you don’t have Google Maps installed on your smartphone, don't worry as there is a standalone site here, which allows you to play the game without the app, though the Easter Egg is supposed to expire in a week, the site will let you play the game for awhile longer.

For those with Google maps, simply tap the menu button on the Google Maps screen, and select the ‘Play Snake’ option to give it a try. And you can also select any city map presented on screen, either choose between London, San Francisco, Cairo, São Paulo, Sydney, Tokyo, or other region on the map.

Albeit, the actual game play have been tweaked a bit, so instead of a regular Snake, you will be getting a bus or train to pick passengers with en route to various landmarks along the given region.

April Fools' Day certainly ain't for kids only any more, as the tech companies also like to show they've got sense of humor; so expect fake news even from the most unlikely sources. And keep a watch on social media feeds as you're sure to find links across Twitter and Facebook about some ridiculous new venture from the likes of Uber.

But remember not to believe everything you see and relive the April Fools' web pranks, as more jokes roll in, so watch out and remain skeptical.

Google teases Maps users with Snake game play for April Fools’ Day

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