Over 100 recipes to help you solve the most common problems faced by Android Developers today About This Book Find the answers to your common Android programming problems, from set up to security, to help you deliver better applications, faster Uncover the latest features of Android Marshmallow to make your applications stand out Get up to speed with Android Studio 1.4 - the first Android Studio based on the IntelliJ IDE from JetBrains Who This Book Is For If you are new to Android development and want to take a hands-on approach to learning the framework, or if you are an experienced developer in need of clear working code to solve the many challenges in Android development, you can benefit from this book. Either way, this is a resource you’ll want to keep at your desk for a quick reference to solve new problems as you tackle more challenging projects. What You Will Learn Along with Marshmallow, get hands-on working with Google’s new Android Studio IDE Develop applications using the latest Android framework while maintaining backward-compatibility with the support library Master Android programming best practices from the recipes Create exciting and engaging applications using knowledge gained from recipes on graphics, animations, and multimedia Work through succinct steps on specifics that will help you complete your project faster Keep your app responsive (and prevent ANRs) with examples on the AsynchTask class Utilize Google Speech Recognition APIs for your app. Make use of Google Cloud Messaging (GCM) to create Push Notifications for your users Get a better understanding of the Android framework through detailed explanations In Detail The Android OS has the largest installation base of any operating system in the world; there has never been a better time to learn Android development to write your own applications, or to make your own contributions to the open source community! This “cookbook” will make it easy for you to jump to a topic of interest and get what you need to implement the feature in your own application. If you are new to Android and learn best by “doing,” then this book will provide many topics of interest. Starting with the basics of Android development, we move on to more advanced concepts, and we’ll guide you through common tasks developers struggle to solve. The first few chapters cover the basics including Activities, Layouts, Widgets, and the Menu. From there, we cover fragments and data storage (including SQLite), device sensors, the camera, and GPS. Then we move on more advanced topics such as graphics and animation (including OpenGL), multi-threading with AsyncTask, and Internet functionality with Volley. We’ll also demonstrate Google Maps and Google Cloud Messaging (also known as Push Notifications) using the Google API Library. Finally, we’ll take a look at several online services designed especially for Android development. Take your application big-time with full Internet web services without having to become a server admin by leveraging the power of Backend as a Service (BaaS) providers. Style and approach This book progresses from the fundamentals of Android Development to more advanced concepts, with recipes to solve the most common problems faced by developers. This cookbook makes it easy to jump to specific topics of interest, where you’ll find simple steps to implement the solution and get a clear explanation of how it works.

Build and customize a wide range of powerful Unity AI systems with over 70 hands-on recipes and techniques About This Book Empower your agent with decision making capabilities using advanced minimaxing and Negamaxing techniques Discover how AI can be applied to a wide range of games to make them more interactive. Instigate vision and hearing abilities in your agent through collider based and graph based systems Who This Book Is For This book is intended for those who already have a basic knowledge of Unity and are eager to get more tools under their belt to solve AI and gameplay-related problems. What You Will Learn Use techniques such as A*and A*mbush to empower your agents with path finding capabilities. Create a representation of the world and make agents navigate it Construct decision-making systems to make the agents take different actions Make different agents coordinate actions and create the illusion of technical behavior Simulate senses and apply them in an awareness system Design and implement AI in board games such as Tic-Tac-Toe and Checkers Implement efficient prediction mechanism in your agents with algorithms such as N-Gram predictor and na?ve Bayes classifier Understand and analyze how the influence maps work. In Detail Unity 5 comes fully packaged with a toolbox of powerful features to help game and app developers create and implement powerful game AI. Leveraging these tools via Unity’s API or built-in features allows limitless possibilities when it comes to creating your game’s worlds and characters. This practical Cookbook covers both essential and niche techniques to help you be able to do that and more. This Cookbook is engineered as your one-stop reference to take your game AI programming to the next level. Get to grips with the essential building blocks of working with an agent, programming movement and navigation in a game environment, and improving your agent's decision making and coordination mechanisms - all through hands-on examples using easily customizable techniques. Discover how to emulate vision and hearing capabilities for your agent, for natural and humanlike AI behaviour, and improve them with the help of graphs. Empower your AI with decision-making functions through programming simple board games such as Tic-Tac-Toe and Checkers, and orchestrate agent coordination to get your AIs working together as one. Style and approach This recipe-based guide will take you through implementing various AI algorithms. Each topic is explained and placed among other related techniques, sometimes building on the knowledge from previous chapters. There are also references to more technical books and papers, so you can dig deeper if you want to.

Master SDDC Operations with proven best practices About This Book Understand the drawbacks of the traditional paradigm and management that make operations difficult in SDDC Master performance and capacity management in Software-Defined Data Center Operationalize performance and capacity monitoring with proven dashboards Who This Book Is For This book is primarily for any system administrator or cloud infrastructure specialist who is interested in performance management and capacity management using VMware technologies. This book will also help IT professionals whose area of responsibility is not VMware, but who work with the VMware team. You can be Windows, Linux, Storage, or Network team; or application architects. Note that prior exposure to the VMware platform of data-center and cloud-based solutions is expected. What You Will Learn Simplify the task of performance and capacity management Master the counters in vCenter and vRealize Operations and understand their dependency on one another Educate your peers and management on SDDC Operations Complete your SDDC monitoring to include non-VMware components Perform SDDC performance troubleshooting Explore real-life examples of how super metric and advanced dashboards Introduce and implement a Performance SLA Accomplish your Capacity Management by taking into service tiering and performance SLA In Detail Performance management and capacity management are the two top-most issues faced by enterprise IT when doing virtualization. Until the first edition of the book, there was no in-depth coverage on the topic to tackle the issues systematically. The second edition expands the first edition, with added information and reorganizing the book into three logical parts. The first part provides the technical foundation of SDDC Management. It explains the difference between a software-defined data center and a classic physical data center, and how it impacts both architecture and operations. From this strategic view, it zooms into the most common challenges—performance management and capacity management. It introduces a new concept called Performance SLA and also a new way of doing capacity management. The next part provides the actual solution that you can implement in your environment. It puts the theories together and provides real-life examples created together with customers. It provides the reasons behind each dashboard, so that you get the understanding on why it is required and what problem it solves. The last part acts as a reference section. It provides a complete reference to vSphere and vRealize Operations counters, explaining their dependencies and providing practical guidance on the values you should expect in a healthy environment. Style and approach This book covers the complex topic of managing performance and capacity in an easy-to-follow style. It relates real-world scenarios to topics in order to help you implement the book’s teachings on the go.

Implement complex iOS user interfaces with ease using Swift About This Book Build compelling user interfaces that users will enjoy using the iOS UIKit frameworkMake your iOS apps easily recognizable and familiar with the UIKit frameworkUse this comprehensive, step-by-step guide to create a complete custom layoutWho This Book Is ForThis easy-to-follow guide is perfect for beginner-level iOS developers who want to become proficient in user interface development. It would also be useful for experienced iOS developers who need a complete overview of this broad topic all in one place, without having to consult various sources.What You Will LearnUnderstand the basic requirements to work with iOS user interfacesGet to know about the UI tools, frameworks, and built-in componentsPlot dynamic layout structures using Auto LayoutShape and implement adaptive user interfaces for different screen sizesDraw and animate your user interfaces using the CALayer and UIKit animationsIntercept and handle user touches to create user interface interactivity Create and depict totally custom controls Design with iOS through Core Graphics In Detail Through this comprehensive one-stop guide, you’ll get to grips with the entire UIKit framework and in a flash, you’ll be creating modern user interfaces for your iOS devices using Swift. Starting with an overview of the iOS drawing system and the available tools, you will then learn how to use these technologies to create adaptable layouts and custom elements for your applications. Next, you’ll be introduced to other topics such as animation and code-drawing with Core Graphics, which will give you all the knowledge you need to create astonishing user interfaces. By the end of this book, you will have a solid foundation in iOS user interface development and will have gained valuable insights on the process of building firm and complex UIs. Style and approach This concise yet information-packed guide is full of step-by-step instructions and screenshots of real-life examples, delivered in a direct manner, to get you creating modern user interfaces for your iOS devices using SWIFT in no time.

Become more fluent in Python—learn strategies and techniques for smart and high-performance Python programming About This Book Write smarter, bug-free, high performance code with minimal effort Uncover the best tools and options available to Python developers today Deploy decorators, design patters, and various optimization techniques to use Python 3.5 effectively Who This Book Is For If you are a Python developer and you think that you don’t know everything about the language yet, then this is the book for you. We will unlock the mysteries and re-introduce you to the hidden features of Python to write efficient programs, making optimal use of the language. What You Will Learn Manipulate object creation processes for instances, classes, and functions Use the best possible language constructs to write data structures with super speed and maintainability Make efficient use of design patterns to decrease development time and make your code more maintainable Write better test cases with an improved understanding of the testing framework of Python and unittests, and discover how to develop new functionalities in it Write fully-optimized code with the Python language by profiling, compiling C modules, and more Unlock asynchronous programming to build efficient and scalable applications In Detail Python is a versatile programming language that can be used for a wide range of technical tasks—computation, statistics, data analysis, game development, and more. Though Python is easy to learn, it’s range of features means there are many aspects of it that even experienced Python developers don’t know about. Even if you’re confident with the basics, its logic and syntax, by digging deeper you can work much more effectively with Python – and get more from the language. Python Unlocked walks you through the most effective techniques and best practices for high performance Python programming - showing you how to make the most of the Python language. You’ll get to know objects and functions inside and out, and will learn how to use them to your advantage in your programming projects. You will also find out how to work with a range of design patterns including abstract factory, singleton, strategy pattern, all of which will help make programming with Python much more efficient. Finally, as the process of writing a program is never complete without testing it, you will learn to test threaded applications and run parallel tests. If you want the edge when it comes to Python, use this book to unlock the secrets of smarter Python programming. Style and approach This is book had been created to help you to “unlock” the best ways to tackle the challenges and performance bottlenecks that many Python developers face today. The keys are supported with program examples to help you understand the concepts better and see them in action.

Over 90 hands-on recipes to design Internet scalable web and mobile applications with Amazon DynamoDB About This Book Construct top-notch mobile and web applications with the Internet scalable NoSQL database and host it on cloud Integrate your applications with other AWS services like AWS EMR, AWS S3, AWS Redshift, and AWS CloudSearch etc. in order to achieve a one-stop application stack Step-by-step implementation guide that provides real-world use with hands-on recipes Who This Book Is For This book is intended for those who have a basic understanding of AWS services and want to take their knowledge to the next level by getting their hands dirty with coding recipes in DynamoDB. What You Will Learn Design DynamoDB tables to achieve high read and write throughput Discover best practices like caching, exponential back-offs and auto-retries, storing large items in AWS S3, storing compressed data etc. Effectively use DynamoDB Local in order to make your development smooth and cost effective Implement cost effective best practices to reduce the burden of DynamoDB charges Create and maintain secondary indexes to support improved data access Integrate various other AWS services like AWS EMR, AWS CloudSearch, AWS Pipeline etc. with DynamoDB In Detail AWS DynamoDB is an excellent example of a production-ready NoSQL database. In recent years, DynamoDB has been able to attract many customers because of its features like high-availability, reliability and infinite scalability. DynamoDB can be easily integrated with massive data crunching tools like Hadoop /EMR, which is an essential part of this data-driven world and hence it is widely accepted. The cost and time-efficient design makes DynamoDB stand out amongst its peers. The design of DynamoDB is so neat and clean that it has inspired many NoSQL databases to simply follow it. This book will get your hands on some engineering best practices DynamoDB engineers use, which can be used in your day-to-day life to build robust and scalable applications. You will start by operating with DynamoDB tables and learn to manipulate items and manage indexes. You will also discover how to easily integrate applications with other AWS services like EMR, S3, CloudSearch, RedShift etc. A couple of chapters talk in detail about how to use DynamoDB as a backend database and hosting it on AWS ElasticBean. This book will also focus on security measures of DynamoDB as well by providing techniques on data encryption, masking etc. By the end of the book you’ll be adroit in designing web and mobile applications using DynamoDB and host it on cloud. Style and approach An easy-to-follow guide, full of real-world examples, which takes you through the world of DynamoDB following a step-by-step, problem-solution based approach.

Create exciting projects by connecting the Raspberry Pi to your Android phone About This Book Manage most of the fundamental functions of Raspberry Pi from your Android phone Use the projects created in this book to develop even more exciting projects in the future A project-based learning experience to help you discover amazing ways to combine the power of Android and Raspberry Pi Who This Book Is For The target audience for this book includes Raspberry Pi enthusiasts, hobbyists, and anyone who wants to create engaging projects with Android OS. Some knowledge of Android programming would be helpful. What You Will Learn Install the tools required on your Pi and Android to manage and administer the Pi from Android Share your files between different Android devices using the Pi as a server Set up the Pi to live-stream the camera in surveillance mode and customize Android to receive this content Turn your Pi into a media center and control it from your Android See your Android display on a large screen using Raspberry Pi Connect your car's dashboard to your Android device using Raspberry Pi In Detail Raspberry Pi is the credit card-sized, general purpose computer which has revolutionized portable technology. Android is an operating system that widely used in mobile phones today both on the high and low ends of the mobile phone market. However, there is little information about how to connect the two in spite of how popular both of them are. Raspberry Pi Android Projects starts with simple projects that help you access the command prompt and the desktop environment of Raspberry Pi from the comfort of your Android phone or tablet. Then, you will be introduced to more complex projects that combine the strengths of the Pi and Android in amazing ways. These projects will teach you how to manage services on the Pi from Android, share files between Android devices using the Pi as a server, administer and view the Pi’s camera from Android in surveillance mode, and connect your car to the Pi and make data more accessible using Android. The introductory projects covered will be useful each time you need to access or administer your Pi for other purposes, and the more advanced projects will continue to be valuable even after you become an expert on Pi. By the end of this book, you will be able to create engaging and useful projects that will help you combine the powers of both Android and Raspberry Pi. Style and approach A quick and easy-to-follow guide that will show how you can add up the power of Pi and Android by combining them.

Over 90 hands-on recipes to help you create digital comics from page setup to exporting the final product About This Book Design creative and custom digital comics with the perfection equivalent of pen-and-paper drawings Explore the latest features from Manga Studio EX 5 such as custom brush effects, layers, masks, 3D objects, panels, and multiple-page story layout A pragmatic manual with engaging recipes and attractive screenshots that make comic creation fun and easy Who This Book Is For This book is intended for competent comic artists working on Manga Studio who want to create more attractive comics by using powerful tools and features from software for digital comic creation. What You Will Learn Create story files and custom pages for any Web or publishing project Customize brushes for special ink effects, hatching and cross-hatching, and much more Work with vector images in Manga Studio EX 5 Use the new Symmetry ruler and the new Line tools to create your illustrations faster and more efficiently Make and save custom screentones, and add them to your comic pages Punch up your illustrations with color palettes and special effects Add 3D models to create or accentuate your comic scenes Finish a project by exporting it for the Web or for a printed collection In Detail Manga Studio is a software application for the digital creation of comics and manga. Manga Studio EX 5 has all the features of Manga Studio 5, professional story creation tools, and other special features that make it the ultimate illustration tool for serious comic, manga, and graphic artists. Made specifically for comic artists and illustrators, it has some of the most powerful digital art creation tools available. From digital perspective rulers to a library of screentones, Manga Studio 5 works for the artist with an intuitive, customizable interface and tools. With Manga Studio EX 5, you can create custom page templates, save commonly used designs, make custom brushes, mimic traditional media, pose 3D objects directly on the art canvas, and export all of your comic pages for print or the Web. The book starts with everything you need to know to set up custom pages for your comic or Manga project. These recipes will take you all the way through to exporting your illustrations for print or to display them on the Web. You will learn how to create custom brushes that you will use for inking, or for repetitive tasks such as drawing foliage or rubble. Next, you will move on to understanding Layer Modes and Layer Masks. Then, you'll learn how to finish up your illustrations with color, screentones, special effects, and 3D objects. Finally, you will be taught to export your hard work and share it with the world, either through the Web or in print. This cookbook will give you just the right recipes to turn on the power of Manga Studio EX 5 and get you creating more illustrations faster and more efficiently. Style and approach An easy-to-follow, and informative book full of recipes that explore real-world topics for the comic creator. Each recipe is explained with detailed steps and interesting screenshots.

Unleash the power of computer vision with Python using OpenCV About This Book Create impressive applications with OpenCV and Python Familiarize yourself with advanced machine learning concepts Harness the power of computer vision with this easy-to-follow guide Who This Book Is For Intended for novices to the world of OpenCV and computer vision, as well as OpenCV veterans that want to learn about what's new in OpenCV 3, this book is useful as a reference for experts and a training manual for beginners, or for anybody who wants to familiarize themselves with the concepts of object classification and detection in simple and understandable terms. Basic knowledge about Python and programming concepts is required, although the book has an easy learning curve both from a theoretical and coding point of view. What You Will Learn Install and familiarize yourself with OpenCV 3's Python API Grasp the basics of image processing and video analysis Identify and recognize objects in images and videos Detect and recognize faces using OpenCV Train and use your own object classifiers Learn about machine learning concepts in a computer vision context Work with artificial neural networks using OpenCV Develop your own computer vision real-life application In Detail OpenCV 3 is a state-of-the-art computer vision library that allows a great variety of image and video processing operations. Some of the more spectacular and futuristic features such as face recognition or object tracking are easily achievable with OpenCV 3. Learning the basic concepts behind computer vision algorithms, models, and OpenCV's API will enable the development of all sorts of real-world applications, including security and surveillance. Starting with basic image processing operations, the book will take you through to advanced computer vision concepts. Computer vision is a rapidly evolving science whose applications in the real world are exploding, so this book will appeal to computer vision novices as well as experts of the subject wanting to learn the brand new OpenCV 3.0.0. You will build a theoretical foundation of image processing and video analysis, and progress to the concepts of classification through machine learning, acquiring the technical know-how that will allow you to create and use object detectors and classifiers, and even track objects in movies or video camera feeds. Finally, the journey will end in the world of artificial neural networks, along with the development of a hand-written digits recognition application. Style and approach This book is a comprehensive guide to the brand new OpenCV 3 with Python to develop real-life computer vision applications.

Gain expertise in Flask to create dynamic and powerful web applications About This Book Work with scalable Flask application structures to create complex web apps Discover the most powerful Flask extensions and learn how to create one Deploy your application to real-world platforms using this step-by-step guide Who This Book Is For If you are a Flask user who knows the basics of the library and how to create basic web pages with HTML and CSS, and you want to take your applications to the next level, this is the book for you. Harnessing the full power of Flask will allow you to create complex web applications with ease. What You Will Learn Set up a best practices Python environment Use SQLAlchemy to programmatically query a database Develop templates in Jinja Set up an MVC environment for Flask Discover NoSQL, when to use it, when not to, and how to use it Develop a custom Flask extension Use Celery to create asynchronous tasks In Detail Flask is a library that allows programmers to create web applications in Python. Flask is a micro-framework that boasts a low learning curve, a large community, and the power to create complex web apps. However, Flask is easy to learn but difficult to master. Starting from a simple Flask app, this book will walk through advanced topics while providing practical examples of the lessons learned. After building a simple Flask app, a proper app structure is demonstrated by transforming the app to use a Model-View-Controller (MVC) architecture. With a scalable structure in hand, the next chapters use Flask extensions to provide extra functionality to the app, including user login and registration, NoSQL querying, a REST API, an admin interface, and more. Next, you’ll discover how to use unit testing to take the guesswork away from making sure the code is performing as it should. The book closes with a discussion of the different platforms that are available to deploy a Flask app on, the pros and cons of each one, and how to deploy on each one. Style and approach With plenty of useful examples, this guide introduces new concepts and then shows you how those concepts can be used in a real-world environment. Most sections are based around a single example app that is developed throughout the book.

Unleash the power of shell *s to solve real-world problems by breaking through the practice of writing tedious code About This Book Learn how to efficiently and effectively build shell *s and develop advanced applications with this handy book Develop high quality and efficient solutions by writing professional and real-world *s, and debug *s by checking and shell tracing A step-by-step tutorial to automate routine tasks by developing *s from a basic level to very advanced functionality Who This Book Is For This book is ideal for those who are proficient at working with Linux and who want to learn about shell *ing to improve their efficiency and practical skills. By the end of this book, you will be able to confidently use your own shell *s in the real world. What You Will Learn Familiarize yourself with the various text filtering tools available in Linux Combine the fundamental text and file processing commands to process data and automate repetitive tasks Understand expressions and variables and how to use them practically Automate decision-making and save a lot of time and effort of revisiting code Get to grips with advanced functionality such as using traps and signals and using dialogs to develop screens Start up a system and customize a Linux system Take an in-depth look at regular expressions and pattern matching to understand the capabilities of *ing In Detail Linux is the one of the most powerful and universally adopted OSes. Shell is a program that gives the user direct interaction with the operating system. Scripts are collections of commands that are stored in a file. The shell can read this file and act on the commands as if they were typed on the keyboard. Shell *ing is used to automate day-to-day administration, and for testing or product development tasks.This book covers Bash, GNU Bourne Again SHell, preparing you to work in the exciting world of Linux shell *ing. We start with an introduction to the Shell environment and explain basic commands used in Shell. Next we move on to check, kill, and control the execution of processes in Linux OS. Further, we teach you about the filter tools available in Linux and explain standard output and standard errors devices.Then we will ensure you understand Shell’s interpretation of commands and get a firmer grasp so you use them in practice. Next, you’ll experience some real-world essentials such as debugging and perform Shell arithmetic fluently. Then you’ll take a step ahead and learn new and advanced topics in Shell *ing, such as starting up a system and customizing a Linux system. Finally, you’ll get to understand the capabilities of *ing and learn about Grep, Stream Editor, and Awk.Style and approach This practical book will go from the very basics of shell *ing to complex, customized automation. The idea behind this book is to be as practical as possible and give you the look and feel of what real-world *ing is like.

Learn shell *ing to solve complex shell-related problems and to efficiently automate your day-to-day tasks About This Book Familiarize yourself with the terminal by learning about powerful shell features Automate tasks by writing shell *s for repetitive work Packed with easy-to-follow, hands-on examples to help you write any type of shell * with confidence Who This Book Is For This book is aimed at administrators and those who have a basic knowledge of shell *ing and who want to learn how to get the most out of writing shell *s. What You Will Learn Write effective shell *s easily Perform search operations and manipulate large text data with a single shell command Modularize reusable shell *s by creating shell libraries Redirect input, output, and errors of a command or * execution to other streams Debug code with different shell debugging techniques to make your *s bug-free Manage processes, along with the environment variables needed to execute them properly Execute and embed other languages in your *s Manage creation, deletion, and search operations in files In Detail Shell *ing is a quick method to prototype complex applications or problems. Shell *s are a collection of commands to automate tasks, usually those for which the user has a repeated need, when working on Linux-based systems. Using simple commands or a combination of them in a shell can solve complex problems easily. This book starts with the basics, including essential commands that can be executed on Linux systems to perform tasks within a few nanoseconds. You’ll learn to use outputs from commands and transform them to show the data you require. Discover how to write shell *s easily, execute * files, debug, and handle errors. Next, you’ll explore environment variables in shell programming and learn how to customize them and add a new environment. Finally, the book walks you through processes and how these interact with your shell *s, along with how to use *s to automate tasks and how to embed other languages and execute them. Style and approach This book is a pragmatic guide to writing efficient shell programs, complete with hands-on examples and tips.

Learn to process massive real-time data streams using Storm and Python—no Java required!About This Book Learn to use Apache Storm and the Python Petrel library to build distributed applications that process large streams of data Explore sample applications in real-time and analyze them in the popular NoSQL databases MongoDB and Redis Discover how to apply software development best practices to improve performance, productivity, and quality in your Storm projects Who This Book Is For This book is intended for Python developers who want to benefit from Storm’s real-time data processing capabilities. If you are new to Python, you’ll benefit from the attention to key supporting tools and techniques such as automated testing, virtual environments, and logging. If you’re an experienced Python developer, you’ll appreciate the thorough and detailed examples What You Will Learn Install Storm and learn about the prerequisites Get to know the components of a Storm topology and how to control the flow of data between them Ingest Twitter data directly into Storm Use Storm with MongoDB and Redis Build topologies and run them in Storm Use an interactive graphical debugger to debug your topology as it’s running in Storm Test your topology components outside of Storm Configure your topology using YAML In Detail Big data is a trending concept that everyone wants to learn about. With its ability to process all kinds of data in real time, Storm is an important addition to your big data “bag of tricks.” At the same time, Python is one of the fastest-growing programming languages today. It has become a top choice for both data science and everyday application development. Together, Storm and Python enable you to build and deploy real-time big data applications quickly and easily. You will begin with some basic command tutorials to set up storm and learn about its configurations in detail. You will then go through the requirement scenarios to create a Storm cluster. Next, you’ll be provided with an overview of Petrel, followed by an example of Twitter topology and persistence using Redis and MongoDB. Finally, you will build a production-quality Storm topology using development best practices. Style and approach This book takes an easy-to-follow and a practical approach to help you understand all the concepts related to Storm and Python.

Leverage the computational power of Python with more than 60 recipes that arm you with the required skills to make informed business decisions About This Book Want to minimize risk and optimize profits of your businessLearn to create efficient analytical reports with ease using this highly practical, easy-to-follow guide Learn to apply Python for business intelligence tasks—preparing, exploring, analyzing, visualizing and reporting—in order to make more informed business decisions using data at hand Learn to explore and analyze business data, and build business intelligence dashboards with the help of various insightful recipes Who This Book Is For This book is intended for data analysts, managers, and executives with a basic knowledge of Python, who now want to use Python for their BI tasks. If you have a good knowledge and understanding of BI applications and have a “working” system in place, this book will enhance your toolbox. What You Will Learn Install Anaconda, MongoDB, and everything you need to get started with your data analysis Prepare data for analysis by querying cleaning and standardizing data Explore your data by creating a Pandas data frame from MongoDB Gain powerful insights, both statistical and predictive, to make informed business decisions Visualize your data by building dashboards and generating reports Create a complete data processing and business intelligence system In Detail The amount of data produced by businesses and devices is going nowhere but up. In this scenario, the major advantage of Python is that it's a general-purpose language and gives you a lot of flexibility in data structures. Python is an excellent tool for more specialized analysis tasks, and is powered with related libraries to process data streams, to visualize datasets, and to carry out scientific calculations. Using Python for business intelligence (BI) can help you solve tricky problems in one go. Rather than spending day after day scouring Internet forums for “how-to” information, here you’ll find more than 60 recipes that take you through the entire process of creating actionable intelligence from your raw data, no matter what shape or form it’s in. Within the first 30 minutes of opening this book, you’ll learn how to use the latest in Python and NoSQL databases to glean insights from data just waiting to be exploited.< We’ll begin with a quick-fire introduction to Python for BI and show you what problems Python solves. From there, we move on to working with a predefined data set to extract data as per business requirements, using the Pandas library and MongoDB as our storage engine. Next, we will analyze data and perform transformations for BI with Python. Through this, you will gather insightful data that will help you make informed decisions for your business. The final part of the book will show you the most important task of BI—visualizing data by building stunning dashboards using Matplotlib, PyTables, and iPython Notebook. Style and approach This is a step-by-step guide to help you prepare, explore, analyze and report data, written in a conversational tone to make it easy to grasp. Whether you’re new to BI or are looking for a better way to work, you’ll find the knowledge and skills here to get your job done efficiently.

Load, wrangle, and analyze your data using the world's most powerful statistical programming language About This Book Load, manipulate and analyze data from different sources Gain a deeper understanding of fundamentals of applied statistics A practical guide to performing data analysis in practice Who This Book Is For Whether you are learning data analysis for the first time, or you want to deepen the understanding you already have, this book will prove to an invaluable resource. If you are looking for a book to bring you all the way through the fundamentals to the application of advanced and effective analytics methodologies, and have some prior programming experience and a mathematical background, then this is for you. What You Will Learn Navigate the R environment Describe and visualize the behavior of data and relationships between data Gain a thorough understanding of statistical reasoning and sampling Employ hypothesis tests to draw inferences from your data Learn Bayesian methods for estimating parameters Perform regression to predict continuous variables Apply powerful classification methods to predict categorical data Handle missing data gracefully using multiple imputation Identify and manage problematic data points Employ parallelization and Rcpp to scale your analyses to larger data Put best practices into effect to make your job easier and facilitate reproducibility In Detail Frequently the tool of choice for academics, R has spread deep into the private sector and can be found in the production pipelines at some of the most advanced and successful enterprises. The power and domain-specificity of R allows the user to express complex analytics easily, quickly, and succinctly. With over 7,000 user contributed packages, it’s easy to find support for the latest and greatest algorithms and techniques. Starting with the basics of R and statistical reasoning, Data Analysis with R dives into advanced predictive analytics, showing how to apply those techniques to real-world data though with real-world examples. Packed with engaging problems and exercises, this book begins with a review of R and its syntax. From there, get to grips with the fundamentals of applied statistics and build on this knowledge to perform sophisticated and powerful analytics. Solve the difficulties relating to performing data analysis in practice and find solutions to working with “messy data”, large data, communicating results, and facilitating reproducibility. This book is engineered to be an invaluable resource through many stages of anyone’s career as a data analyst. Style and approach Learn data analysis using engaging examples and fun exercises, and with a gentle and friendly but comprehensive "learn-by-doing" approach.

Master the complexities of Bash shell *ing and unlock the power of shell for your enterprise About This Book Identify the high level steps such as verifying user input, using command lines and conditional statements in creating and executing simple shell *s Create and edit dynamic shell *s to manage complex and repetitive tasks Learn about *ing in Perl and programming in Python as a BASH *ing alternative with this practical, step-by-step guide Who This Book Is For Mastering Linux Shell Scripting has been written for Linux administrators who want to automate tasks in their daily lives, saving time and effort. You’ll need to have command-line experience and be familiar with the tasks that you need to automate. What You Will Learn Use the type command to identify the order of command evaluation Create interactive *s that prompt for user input Foster menu structures for operators with little command-line experience Develop *s that dynamically edit web configuration files to produce a new virtual host Write *s that use AWK to search and reports on log files Draft effective *s using functions as building blocks, reducing maintenance and build time Make informed choices by comparing different * languages such as Perl and Python with BASH In Detail Shell *ing is a quick method to prototype a complex application or a problem by automating tasks when working on Linux-based systems. Using both simple one-line commands and command sequences complex problems can be solved with ease, from text processing to backing up sysadmin tools. In this book, you’ll discover everything you need to know to master shell *ing and make informed choices about the elements you employ. Get to grips with the fundamentals of creating and running a * in normal mode, and in debug mode. Learn about various conditional statements' code snippets, and realize the power of repetition and loops in your shell *. Implement functions and edit files using the Stream Editor, * in Perl, program in Python – as well as complete coverage of other *ing languages to ensure you can choose the best tool for your project. Style and approach The book will capture your attention and keep you engaged with the simplicity and clarity of each explanation. Every step is accompanied with screen captures so you can cross-check the results before moving on.

Over 150 real-world recipes to simplify database management, automate repetitive tasks, and enhance your productivity About This Book This book helps you build a strong foundation to get you comfortable using PowerShell with SQL Server, empowering you to create more complex *s for your day-to-day job The book provides numerous guidelines, tips, and explanations on how and when to use PowerShell cmdlets, WMI, SMO, .NET classes, or other components It offers easy-to-follow, practical recipes to help you get the most out of SQL Server and PowerShell Who This Book Is For If you are a SQL Server database professional (DBA, developer, or BI developer) who wants to use PowerShell to automate, integrate, and simplify database tasks, this books is for you. Prior knowledge of *ing would be helpful, but it is not necessary. What You Will Learn Explore database objects and execute queries on multiple servers Manage and monitor the running of SQL Server services and accounts Back up and restore databases Create an inventory of database properties and server configuration settings Maintain permissions and security for users Work with CLR assemblies, XML, and BLOB objects in SQL Manage and deploy SSIS packages and SSRS reports In Detail PowerShell can be leveraged when automating and streamlining SQL Server tasks. PowerShell comes with a rich set of cmdlets, and integrates tightly with the .NET framework. Its *ing capabilities are robust and flexible, allowing you to simplify automation and integration across different Microsoft applications and components. The book starts with an introduction to the new features in SQL Server 2014 and PowerShell v5 and the installation of SQL Server. You will learn about basic SQL Server administration tasks and then get to know about some security-related topics such as the authentication mode and assigning permissions. Moving on, you will explore different methods to back up and restore your databases and perform advanced administration tasks such as working with Policies, Filetables, and SQL audits. The next part of the book covers more advanced HADR tasks such as log shipping and data mirroring, and then shows you how to develop your server to work with BLOB, XML, and JSON. Following on from that, you will learn about SQL Server's BI stack, which includes SSRS reports, the SSIS package, and the SSAS cmdlet and database. Snippets not specific to SQL Server will help you perform tasks quickly on SQL servers. Towards the end of the book, you will find some useful information, which includes a PowerShell tutorial for novice users, some commonly-used PowerShell and SQL Server syntax, and a few online resources. Finally, you will create your own SQL Server Sandbox VMs. All these concepts will help you to efficiently manage your administration tasks. Style and approach SQL Server 2014 with PowerShell v5 Cookbook is an example-focused book that provides step-by-step instructions on how to accomplish specific SQL Server tasks using PowerShell. Each recipe is followed by an analysis of the steps or design decisions taken and additional information about the task at hand. Working *s are provided for all examples so that you can dive in right away. You can read this book sequentially by chapter or you can pick and choose which topics you need right away.

Harness the power of RStudio to create web applications, R packages, markdown reports and pretty data visualizationsAbout This BookDiscover the multi-functional use of RStudio to support your daily work with R codeLearn to create stunning, meaningful, and interactive graphs and learn to embed them into easy communicable reports using multiple R packagesDevelop your own R packages and Shiny web apps to share your knowledge and collaborate with others.Who This Book Is ForThis book is aimed at R developers and analysts who wish to do R statistical development while taking advantage of RStudio’s functionality to ease their development efforts. R programming experience is assumed as well as being comfortable with R’s basic structures and a number of functions.What You Will LearnDiscover the RStudio IDE and details about the user interfaceCommunicate your insights with R Markdown in static and interactive waysLearn how to use different graphic systems to visualize your dataBuild interactive web applications with the Shiny framework to present and share your resultsUnderstand the process of package development and assemble your own R packagesEasily collaborate with other people on your projects by using Git and GitHubManage the R environment for your organization with RStudio and Shiny serverApply your obtained knowledge about RStudio and R development to create a real-world dashboard solutionIn DetailRStudio helps you to manage small to large projects by giving you a multi-functional integrated development environment, combined with the power and flexibility of the R programming language, which is becoming the bridge language of data science for developers and analyst worldwide. Mastering the use of RStudio will help you to solve real-world data problems.This book begins by guiding you through the installation of RStudio and explaining the user interface step by step. From there, the next logical step is to use this knowledge to improve your data analysis workflow. We will do this by building up our toolbox to create interactive reports and graphs or even web applications with Shiny. To collaborate with others, we will explore how to use Git and GitHub with RStudio and how to build your own packages to ensure top quality results. Finally, we put it all together in an interactive dashboard written with R.Style and approachAn easy-to-follow guide full of hands-on examples to master RStudio.Beginning from explaining the basics, each topic is explained with a lot of details for every feature.

Delve into the SAP Data Services environment to efficiently prepare, implement, and develop ETL processes About This Book Install and configure the SAP Data Services environment Develop ETL techniques in the Data Services environment Implement real-life examples of Data Services uses through step-by-step instructions to perform specific ETL development tasks Who This Book Is For This book is for IT technical engineers who want to get familiar with the EIM solutions provided by SAP for ETL development and data quality management. The book requires familiarity with basic programming concepts and basic knowledge of the SQL language. What You Will Learn Install, configure, and administer the SAP Data Services components Run through the ETL design basics Maximize the performance of your ETL with the advanced patterns in Data Services Extract methods from various databases and systems Get familiar with the transformation methods available in SAP Data Services Load methods into various databases and systems Code with the Data Services *ing language Validate and cleanse your data, applying the Data quality methods of the Information Steward In Detail Want to cost effectively deliver trusted information to all of your crucial business functionsSAP Data Services delivers one enterprise-class solution for data integration, data quality, data profiling, and text data processing. It boosts productivity with a single solution for data quality and data integration. SAP Data Services also enables you to move, improve, govern, and unlock big data. This book will lead you through the SAP Data Services environment to efficiently develop ETL processes. To begin with, you’ll learn to install, configure, and prepare the ETL development environment. You will get familiarized with the concepts of developing ETL processes with SAP Data Services. Starting from smallest unit of work- the data flow, the chapters will lead you to the highest organizational unit—the Data Services job, revealing the advanced techniques of ETL design.You will learn to import XML files by creating and implementing real-time jobs. It will then guide you through the ETL development patterns that enable the most effective performance when extracting, transforming, and loading data. You will also find out how to create validation functions and transforms.Finally, the book will show you the benefits of data quality management with the help of another SAP solution—Information Steward.Style and approach This book is an easy-to-follow guide with step-by-step instructions to perform specific ETL development tasks.

Enhance your Solr indexing experience with advanced techniques and the built-in functionalities available in Apache Solr About This Book Learn about distributed indexing and real-time optimization to change index data on fly Index data from various sources and web crawlers using built-in analyzers and tokenizers This step-by-step guide is packed with real-life examples on indexing data Who This Book Is For This book is for developers who want to increase their experience of indexing in Solr by learning about the various index handlers, analyzers, and methods available in Solr. Beginner level Solr development skills are expected. What You Will Learn Get to know the basic features of Solr indexing and the analyzers/tokenizers available Index XML/JSON data in Solr using the HTTP Post tool and CURL command Work with Data Import Handler to index data from a database Use Apache Tika with Solr to index word documents, PDFs, and much more Utilize Apache Nutch and Solr integration to index crawled data from web pages Update indexes in real-time data feeds Discover techniques to index multi-language and distributed data in Solr Combine the various indexing techniques into a real-life working example of an online shopping web application In Detail Apache Solr is a widely used, open source enterprise search server that delivers powerful indexing and searching features. These features help fetch relevant information from various sources and documentation. Solr also combines with other open source tools such as Apache Tika and Apache Nutch to provide more powerful features. This fast-paced guide starts by helping you set up Solr and get acquainted with its basic building blocks, to give you a better understanding of Solr indexing. You’ll quickly move on to indexing text and boosting the indexing time. Next, you’ll focus on basic indexing techniques, various index handlers designed to modify documents, and indexing a structured data source through Data Import Handler. Moving on, you will learn techniques to perform real-time indexing and atomic updates, as well as more advanced indexing techniques such as de-duplication. Later on, we’ll help you set up a cluster of Solr servers that combine fault tolerance and high availability. You will also gain insights into working scenarios of different aspects of Solr and how to use Solr with e-commerce data. By the end of the book, you will be competent and confident working with indexing and will have a good knowledge base to efficiently program elements. Style and approach This fast-paced guide is packed with examples that are written in an easy-to-follow style, and are accompanied by detailed explanation. Working examples are included to help you get better results for your applications.

Build and optimize efficient messaging applications with ease About This Book Learn to administer, configure, and manage RabbitMQ instances Discover ways to secure and troubleshoot RabbitMQ instances This book is fully up-to-date with all the latest changes to version 3.5 Who This Book Is For If you are a developer or system administrator with a basic knowledge of messaging who wants to learn RabbitMQ, or if you want to further enhance your knowledge in working with the message broker, then this book is ideal for you. To fully understand some examples in the book, a basic knowledge of the Java programming language is required. What You Will Learn Apply messaging patterns using the message broker Administer RabbitMQ using the command line, management Web console, or management REST services Create a cluster of scalable, and highly-available, RabbitMQ instances Use RabbitMQ with the Spring Framework, MuleESB, WSO2, and Oracle databases Deploy RabbitMQ using Puppet, Vagrant, or Docker Fine-tune the performance of RabbitMQ Monitor RabbitMQ using Nagios, Munin, or Monit Secure, troubleshoot, and extend RabbitMQ In Detail RabbitMQ is Open Source Message Queuing software based on the Advanced Message Queue Protocol Standard written in the Erlang Language. RabbitMQ is an ideal candidate for large-scale projects ranging from e-commerce and finance to Big Data and social networking because of its ease of use and high performance. Managing RabbitMQ in such a dynamic environment can be a challenging task that requires a good understanding not only of how to work properly with the message broker but also of its best practices and pitfalls. Learning RabbitMQ starts with a concise de*ion of messaging solutions and patterns, then moves on to concrete practical scenarios for publishing and subscribing to the broker along with basic administration. This knowledge is further expanded by exploring how to establish clustering and high availability at the level of the message broker and how to integrate RabbitMQ with a number of technologies such as Spring, and enterprise service bus solutions such as MuleESB and WSO2. We will look at advanced topics such as performance tuning, secure messaging, and the internals of RabbitMQ. Finally we will work through case-studies so that we can see RabbitMQ in action and, if something goes wrong, we'll learn to resolve it in the Troubleshooting section. Style and approach Each chapter of the book is an easy-to-follow guide that expands and builds on the knowledge already gained in previous chapters. Throughout the course of the book, a sample system called the CSN (Corporate Social Network) is used to illustrate the core principles described. At the end of each chapter, there is a Q&A session that covers practical questions that may arise in practice when working with RabbitMQ.