Category Archives: Engineering
Retired engineering technician played part in Southland’s flood protection – Stuff.co.nz
Robyn Edie/Stuff
Robin Wilson stands above the Waihopai River dam, in Invercargill, with memories of helping to build it during the construction of Southland's flood protection schemes between 1989 and 1999. He retired as Environment Southland's engineering technician last week.
As Robin Wilson begins retirement, he can look back on helping to build most of the 458km of flood banks in Southland.
His involvement with flood protection schemes, from 1989 to 1999, was one of the main memories Wilson took with him when he retired as Environment Southlands engineering technician in Invercargill on July 30.
It brought to an end his 42 years of working for the organisation, which was known earlier as the Southland Catchment Board.
Its satisfying being involved in it [flood protection work] ... at the start, seeing it finished and seeing it working, Wilson said.
Lots of bridges had to be rebuilt.
READ MORE:* KiwiRail and Environment Southland discuss raising height of Gore's railway bridge * A fantastic flood protection opportunity* Shovel-ready investment to speed up Southland flood protection* Coronavirus: Regional council applies for $18m for stopbank funding
Building flood banks in Invercargill, where the Otepuni Stream flowed was challenging, he added.
Sections of road on Conon St and Ythan St that went over the stream, had to be lifted and widened to allow for flood protection work.
Private land was bought to build flood banks on.
New flood protection was needed in Invercargill after flooding in January 1984, forced 5000 to leave their homes.
After the flood banks were built, Wilson supported the idea to install a track for walkers, runners and cyclists on flood banks in Invercargill.
The flood banks vary in height from one metre to two and a half metres, but the width is three and a half metres.
The first track, made in 2002, was from the North Rd bridge to the Queens Dr bridge and others to follow included tracks from Queens Dr bridge to the Railway bridge (Grasmere) and the Railway bridge to Stead St.
There are 26 kilometres of tracks on flood banks in Invercargill.
For nine years (2003 to 2012), Environment Southland organised a multi sport event, The Wai Tri, through Invercargill recreational areas, including the Waihopai River flood banks.
We wanted people to use the track and appreciate the river, Wilson said.
We got over 500 competitors one day.
Before retiring last Friday, Wilson was the overseeing engineer for the walking track between Invercargill and Bluff.
Its 98 per cent finished, he said.
Environment Southland chief executive Rob Phillips said Wilson was a valuable staff member.
Robin has made a tremendous contribution to not only Environment Southland, but also the wider Southland community, Phillips said.
Hes worked with teams whove planned, developed and maintained Southlands flood protection schemes, with a particular interest in Invercargill, and the walking tracks along the city's flood banks and down to Bluff.
His steadfast approach to his work, humour, ability to get along with people, and passion for the community are just some of the reasons why he has achieved so much and been a fantastic colleague to so many for the past 42 years.
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Retired engineering technician played part in Southland's flood protection - Stuff.co.nz
Why social engineering and spear phishing are such constant business threats – TechHQ
Social engineering and spear phishing are persistently some of the major tactics used by cybercriminals today. While companies had often patched their hardware, software, and networks with sufficient protection, emails were still a gaping access point for bad actors.
When businesses embraced remote working due to the pandemic, many organizations had to speed up their entire digital transformation process. Some organizations were prepared to be fully digitized while others were still in the process of deciding components for their transformation journey.
Company devices had to be updated with the latest patches and software, and additional access accounts for sensitive data had to be created from remote locations. While companies did also enhance their email security, cybercriminals still managed to find ways to infiltrate the system.
According to Barracuda Networks Spear Phishing: Top Threat and Trends report, between May 2020 and June 2021, researchers have analyzed over 12 million spear phishing and social engineering attacks that impacted more than 3 million mailboxes at over 17,000 organizations.
Social engineering and spear phishing attacks occur when cybercriminals lure unsuspecting users into exposing data, spreading malware infections, or unwittingly giving access to restricted systems. Nowadays the attack is often manipulated to be personalized and targeted at specific individuals in an organization.
Interestingly, the report showed that 43% of phishing attacks impersonate Microsoft brands. Other brands being impersonated include WeTransfer, DHL, and Google. As such, hackers are most likely taking advantage of the popularity of Microsofts SaaS such as Office 365. The shift to remote working over the past year also most likely contributed to the increased figures.
For cybercriminals, the end goal is to steal login credentials. Once they have access to a users account, they can use it to launch malware attacks such as ransomware or even spy on what these companies are doing, and take advantage of their data.
Compromised email accounts can cause serious damage to an organization. One example of compromised user credentials was the Colonial Oil Pipeline hack. Reports showed that the ransomware hack was enabled by compromised passwords, leading the company to paying out a US$4.5 million ransom to restore operations.
Anyone can be a target for spear phishing and social engineering attacks. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / various sources / AFP)
Anyone can be a target
So who are the intended targets of these phishing emails and social engineering attacks?
Cybercriminals spend a lengthy amount of time researching their victims at their organizations. Social media sites and other publicly-available sources can supply them sufficient information to pick a target. Cybercriminals then plan and design an attack to target the specific individual with a customized message the most common method being email.
With one in every ten social engineering attacks being business compromised emails (BEC), anyone in an organization is potentially a target for such an attack. Depending on scale and intent, the average CEO is reported to receive an average of 57 targeted phishing attacks in a year. BEC attacks target 1 in every 5 employees in a sales role while IT staffers receive an average of 40 targeted phishing attacks in a year. The CFO and finance department are also common targets for phishing emails, with finance department employees receiving an average of six targeted BEC attacks.
Cybercriminals are getting sneakier about who they target with their attack. With the finance department being more secured, they are now targeting employees outside the finance and executive teams, often looking for a weak link in the organization, said Don MacLennan, SVP, Engineering and Product Management, Email Protection at Barracuda.
MacLennan pointed out that by targeting lower-level employees, cybercriminals are having a new way to get inside and work their way towards higher-value targets. He added that its important to ensure businesses have sufficient cybersecurity protection and training for all their employees, regardless of position or role.
Shielding against social engineering and spear-phishing attacks
There are a number of ways that companies can protect their employees from social engineering and spear phishing attacks. While training employees is often considered the most straightforward method, mistakes can still happen now and then.
As people are often considered the weakest link in an organizations security ecosystem, companies should also look into the policies it has when it comes to internal procedures. BEC attacks often request for funds to be transferred to third-party accounts via internal emails. Having internal policies that vet fund transfers, especially to third-party accounts, may just reduce the risk.
Another way of reducing attacks is by making use of AI-based cybersecurity solutions. Organizations can leverage machine learning solutions that analyze communication patterns in the company, to spot any anomalies that may indicate an attack. AI-based solutions like threat intelligence can also help spot any potential threats to the company.
Organizations should also look into deploying account-takeover protection. Deploy technology that uses AI to recognize when accounts have been compromised. It then remediates in real-time by alerting users and removing malicious emails sent from compromised accounts.
With cybercriminals only finding more ways to wreak havoc on organizations, employees need to be vigilant, especially when it comes to their work emails. At the end of the day, checking an email before replying to it or opening attachments could just save the entire organization.
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Why social engineering and spear phishing are such constant business threats - TechHQ
Town to hire engineer to inspect old Center Theater – Mount Olive Tribune
By WILLIAM HOLLOMANStaff Writer
Mount Olive officials intend to hire an engineer to inspect the old Center Street Theatre, which has been vacant for decades.
The downtown facility, says building inspector Justin Hill, needs to be checked inside for structural integrity. He has been denied access to the deteriorating structure.
Kenansville attorney Joseph Ezzell appeared at the town commissioners meeting on July 12. He presented a letter he received from an engineer who inspected the building and stated it was in sound condition.
However, Mount Olive town attorney W. Carroll Turner, challenged Ezzells letter.
Overhead photos taken by a drone showed considerable damage to the buildings roof, which has collapsed. It has become a safety concern to pedestrians and is adjacent to Ribeyes Steakhouse, a popular town restaurant.
Turner forwarded those photos to an out-of-town engineering firm and asked for their opinion on the buildings safety.
If they concur, then if the property owners deny us entry into the building, I will seek an administrative search warrant of the building, Turner said.
Town Manager Jammie Royall said its an issue that needs to be resolved, and the sooner, the better.
The owners have been asked to appear before the commissioners during the boards Sept. 12 meeting and present a plan of action regarding the propertys future.
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Town to hire engineer to inspect old Center Theater - Mount Olive Tribune
MSU, ERDC partner on $7.8 million research project to advance military engineering – The Vicksburg Post – Vicksburg Post
Mississippi State University is leading a $7.8 million U.S. Department of Defense project to advance military engineering capabilities.
The multidisciplinary project is led by MSUs Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems and funded through the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center in Vicksburg. Utilizing a wide range of university research expertise, the three-year project focuses on remote sensing, developing the next generation of materials for force protection, force projection technologies and mobility modeling and simulation.
MSU is proud to once again partner with ERDC on impactful research that will pay dividends for the U.S. military, said MSU Vice President for Research and Economic Development Julie Jordan. CAVS and the centers collaborators across campus have a strong track record of cutting-edge research in the areas of remote sensing, modeling and simulation, off-road autonomous vehicles and advanced materials, all of which will help make this project a success.
The research conducted at MSU aims to develop new technologies to enhance ERDCs military engineering and force protection capabilities in support of national defense. Technical focus areas include sensor analytics and remote sensing, as well as the use of geo-materials, advanced, high-strength steels and future technologies for force protection and projection. MSU researchers will develop advanced materials and systems, garnering new insights into the protection capabilities of next-generation materials used in military efforts. They also will conduct autonomous vehicle modeling and simulation for navigation in cold environments.
Our researchers really excel in developing the models and algorithms necessary to determine how different materials, objects and systems will respond in any given situation, which is a vital part of military engineering and planning, said CAVS Executive Director Clay Walden.
In addition to some common research interests, MSU and ERDC both have extensive high-performance computing capabilities, which helps us advance our work. Any time we can collaborate with ERDC on projects like this, its a win-win for Mississippi because of the innovation and opportunities created by these partnerships, Walden said.
In addition to CAVS personnel, principal investigators on the project represent multiple departments in MSUs James Worth Bagley College of Engineering, as well as its Advanced Composites Institute.
Based in Vicksburg, ERDC is the research unit of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and is one of the premier engineering and scientific research organizations in the world. MSU and ERDC have a long-standing research relationship and have collaborated on dozens of projects. In 2014, the two partnered to create the Institute for Systems Engineering Research, also housed in Vicksburg.
Our ERDC team is excited to continue this long-standing partnership with MSU to advance new materials, manufacturing, mobility, and modeling and simulation capabilities in support of ERDCs military engineering R&D area. These partnerships have and will continue to transition advanced technologies in support of the Armys modernization priorities. Id like to extend my thanks to the MSU team and look forward to continuing this partnership under this new 3-year program, said ERDC Senior Scientific Technical Manager Robert Moser.
CAVS is an interdisciplinary research center that uses state-of-the-art technology to address engineering challenges facing U.S. mobility industries. The center broadens its impact by supporting economic development and outreach activities throughout Mississippi. For more, visitwww.cavs.msstate.edu.
ERDC, a diverse research organization with approximately 2,100 employees, is headquartered in Vicksburg, Mississippi, along with four of its seven laboratories: the Coastal and Hydraulics; Geotechnical and Structures; Environmental; and Information Technology laboratories. Additional laboratories include the Construction Engineering Research Laboratory in Champaign, Illinois; Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Hanover, New Hampshire; and the Geospatial Research Laboratory in Alexandria, Virginia. Its annual program exceeds $1 billion as it supports the Department of Defense and other agencies in military and civilian projects. For more, visitwww.erdc.usace.army.mil.
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IDA hires engineer for sewer designs for Exits 212 and 200 – The Clanton Advertiser – Clanton Advertiser
By JOYANNA LOVE/ Managing Editor
The Industrial Development Authority board approved hiring Sain Engineering to engineer self-contained sewer systems for portions of property near Interstate Exits 212 and 200.
Sain was recommended by the IDA executive committee after members ranked each of the proposals received using the U.S. Economic Development Administration standards.
IDA Executive Director Whitney Barlow said the companies were required to explain letter of interest, knowledge of the EDA grant program, similar projects in the region, proposed personnel and more information about experience in connection to environmental concerns.
The system at Exit 212 would be for the future Alabama Farm Center and the proposed nearby commercial/ retail district.
The memorandum of understanding for the Alabama Farm Center, which is a non-binding document, lists water as being provided by Chilton County.
The Exit 200 sewer system would be for potential development in that area. The IDA has applied for a grant that would fund this sewer system, if it was approved.
Since the systems would be self-contained, it would eliminate the need to tie in to an existing sewer system.
A contract with Sain Engineering will come to the IDA for approval at a future meeting.
Construction of the systems will be bid out after it is engineered.
In the proposal, the IDA asked for a system with a large capacity, up to 1 million gallons.
Board chair Monica Cooper said this was to ensure that the board would receive quality proposals. However, a specific number of how many gallons the systems would need to hold would be determined during the engineering process.
Also during the meeting, the IDA approved applying for $5 million in tax liability credits through the Growing Alabama program for the Alabama Farm Center.
Barlow said the program was extremely competitive.
Board member Liz Huntley left the meeting before this vote because of a conflict of interest. Huntley serves on the Growing Alabama Commission that awards the credits. However, she said she will not be a part of discussion or a vote on whether this project receives the credit.
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Use these metrics to get the most out of your engineering team – VentureBeat
All the sessions from Transform 2021 are available on-demand now. Watch now.
This post was written by Rob Zuber, CTO of CircleCI
Ive been leading software teams for more than 20 years and one thing Ive learned about metrics is that leaders tend to put too much emphasis on engineering metrics alone, without considering the bigger picture.
After speaking to a range of engineering industry leaders, and poring over millions of jobs processed from software teams worldwide, we found that the most insightful and relevant metrics fall into three categories:
Engineering velocity metrics measure the speed and efficiency of software delivery pipelines its the metric category that managers typically pay the most attention to. While Ill explain why its not the only important category to track, velocity metrics are critical in helping teams identify slowdowns and find ways to optimize their overall performance.
Some of the most common velocity metrics include:
Moses Mendoza, former Head of Engineering at data processing and review platform Zapproved, uses throughput to understand the pace of his teams work.
Throughput helps us identify and understand speed but the throughput of a system is also bound by its primary constraint, Mendoza said. Throughput will show you what the slowest issue is in a chain of events, but it wont show you how to fix it to speed up your work.
Graeme Harvey, an engineering manager on my team, emphasizes that its important for all engineers to customize throughput measurement to their individual team.
Because our team practices pair-programming, measuring throughput isnt something that can be tied to an individuals productivity, Harvey said.
When it comes to throughput, his engineers optimize for the team rather than the individual. Pair-programming and helping each other might feel like its impeding the progress of an individual but in actuality, it refocuses energy on whats most important for the team and ultimately the business.
While throughput is a valuable metric that helps you track output, there is no one-size-fits-all way to measure it. Measuring throughput accurately requires you to evaluate the structure of your team and how you work.
According to Alex Bilmes, former VP of Growth at software configuration tool Puppet, there are two ways to measure change lead time. One way to measure change lead time is to look at how long it takes to get an idea out and for the idea to go full cycle. The other way is to look at deployment lead time, which measures how long it takes to get to production after a developer has pushed the change to production.
Full change lead time will point out issues in communication and understanding, as well as the depth of your backlog. Deployment lead time is more likely to show the quality of your pipelines and tooling.
Sprint velocity measures the amount of work a team can tackle during a single sprint and can be used for planning and measuring team performance.
Tom Forlini, CTO at video conferencing platform Livestorm, dives even deeper when measuring velocity, focusing on three smaller metrics:
Livestorm engineers work on two-week sprints and have 50 story points per sprint, Forlini said. We track the number of issues done vs. planned because it gives us a good indication of the sprint planning quality between Product and Tech.
Then, his team looks at the percentage of issues by type. When a sprint contains only new feature issues, we know from the start that it might be quite a challenging sprint to tackle, Forlini added. Ideally, you should balance the type of issues by sprint as much as possible.
Morale metrics are probably the most overlooked metric category in engineering. They tell you how engineers feel about the quality of their work and their job happiness, which is a major retention factor. Keeping retention high means keeping morale high.
Some common morale metrics include:
At Zapproved, Mendoza tracked morale in order to monitor employee retention. We measured morale at work using surveys, having conversations, and asking managers to dive deeper in one-on-one meetings to find out how employees felt.
If responses to a survey are overwhelmingly positive, youll want to know what is working and how to replicate that positive work environment. Similarly, if responses are negative, its helpful to find out directly from your team why they feel that way and what you can do to fix the problem.
Mendoza at Zapproved measured confidence by reviewing every sprint in conjunction with that teams manager and their scrum master. As we measured code quality confidence over two or three sprints, if we saw code quality tanking, it meant something was wrong with how the teams planned their individual investment with the work, says Mendoza.
The engineering managers that I lead also measure work by confidence.
Focusing on confidence over coverage as a metric requires that the emphasis isnt on code coverage, Harvey added. Its critical to break the reliance on having 80% or 90% code coverage and then shipping it only to find out the code is broken. Test coverage is a partial proxy for code confidence. If you know 95% of your code is fully tested, versus 20%, then youre going to feel pretty confident that if your tests pass, your code is legitimate.
Harveys team focuses on delivering small iterations quickly. This provides the confidence that the team is building something of quality, nothing is broken, and theyve made the right choices in building tools for the dashboard.
Everything an engineer does should propel the company forward. Thats why its also essential to track business metrics.
Some common business metrics include:
Tracking business metrics is how your team accommodates for user growth effectively. According to Yixin Zhu, formerly of Uber, while its essential to look at engineering execution metrics, its also important to be dialed into the businesss goals and to measure the company growth.
As Uber grew exponentially, tracking business metrics was incredibly important in order for Zhus engineering team to succeed. When youre talking about doubling every six months, you have to be tracking that to know what you need to build, what degradations to expect, how many data centers you need, how many boxes, etc., Zhu said.
In short, engineers have to keep an eye on real-time business metrics to project and plan accurately. You have to be proactive, Zhu added.
Here are some tips to help you get the most value out of your engineering efforts:
Rob Zuber (@z00b) is the CTO of CircleCI. He leads a team of 250+ engineers who are distributed around the globe. He is a three-time founder and five-time CTO, currently living in Oakland, CA with his family.
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Use these metrics to get the most out of your engineering team - VentureBeat
Why we need engineers who study ethics as much as maths – The Conversation AU
The recent apartment building collapse in Miami, Florida, is a tragic reminder of the huge impacts engineering can have on our lives. Disasters such as this force engineers to reflect on their practice and perhaps fundamentally change their approach. Specifically, we should give much greater weight to ethics when training engineers.
Engineers work in a vast range of fields that pose ethical concerns. These include artificial intelligence, data privacy, building construction, public health, and activity on shared environments (including Indigenous communities). The decisions engineers make, if not fully thought through, can have unintended consequences including building failures and climate change.
Read more: Why did the Miami apartment building collapse? And are others in danger?
Engineers have ethical obligations (such as Engineers Australias code of ethics) that they must follow. However, as identified at UNSW, the complexity of emerging social concerns creates a need for engineers education to equip them with much deeper ethical skill sets.
Engineering is seen as a trusted and ethical profession. In a 2019 Gallup poll, 66% rated the honesty and ethical standards of engineers as high/very high, on a par with medical doctors (65%).
However, ethics as a body of knowledge is massive. There are nearly as many academic papers on ethics as mathematics, and clearly more than on artificial intelligence.
With such a rich backdrop of knowledge, engineers must embrace ethics in a way that previous generations embraced mathematics. Complex societal problems make much greater demands on engineering thinking than in the past. We need to consider whole and complex systems, not just issues as individual challenges.
Read more: Most buildings were designed for an earlier climate here's what will happen as global warming accelerates
The construction industry provides a topical example of such complexity. Opal Tower in Sydney, Lacrosse building in Melbourne, Grenfell Tower in London and Torch Tower in Dubai became household names for all the wrong reasons.
Importantly, these issues of poor quality and performance dont arise from new technology or know-how. They involve well-established technical domains of engineering: combustible cladding, fire safety, structural adequacy and so on. A fragmented design and delivery process with unclear responsibility and/or accountability has led to poor outcomes.
These issues prompted the Australian Building Ministers Forum to commission the Shergold Weir Report, followed by a task force to implement its recommendations across Australia.
There are real shortcomings in the legal and contractual processes for allocating and commoditising risk in the industry. However, ethics should do the heavy lifting when legal frameworks are lacking. One key question is whether erosion of professional ethics has played a part in this state of affairs. The answer is a likely yes.
Engineers face ethical dilemmas such as:
Should I accept a narrow or inadequately framed design commission within a design and build delivery model when there is no certainty my design will be appropriately integrated with other parts of the project?
How can I accept a commission when my client provides no budget for my oversight of the construction to ensure the technical integrity of my design is maintained when built?
How do I play in a commercially competitive landscape with pressures to produce "leaner designs to save cost without compromising safety and long-term performance of my design?
"Do I hide behind the contractual clauses (or minimum requirements of codes of practice) when I know the overall process is flawed and does not deliver quality and/or value for money for the end user?
Or worse: Do I resort to phoenixing to avoid any accountability?
Read more: Lacrosse fire ruling sends shudders through building industry consultants and governments
The enduring connection of Aboriginal Australians to Country requires engineers to navigate ethical considerations in Indigenous communities. Engineers must reconcile the legal, technical and regulatory requirements of their projects with Indigenous cultural values and needs. They might not be properly equipped to navigate ethical scenarios when they encounter unfamiliar cultural connections, or regulations are insufficient.
Consider, for example, the sacred sites of the McArthur River Mine. Traditional owners have raised concerns that current mining activities do not adequately protect sacred and cultural heritage sites. Evidence given by community leaders provides insight into the intimate and diverse relationship that traditional owners have with the land.
In considering such evidence, engineers must be able to evaluate both physical site risks (such as acidification of mine tailings and contamination of water bodies) and cultural risks (such as failing to identify all locations of cultural value).
How might we tackle such complicated projects? By properly engaging with traditional communities and by having diverse teams with multiple worldviews and experiences, along with strong technical skills. The broad field of ethical knowledge provides the skill sets to attempt to reconcile the diverse considerations.
Read more: Juukan Gorge inquiry puts Rio Tinto on notice, but without drastic reforms, it could happen again
Engineering students ethical development requires a holistic approach. One assessment suggested:
[] that institutions integrate ethics instruction throughout the formal curriculum, support use of varied approaches that foster highquality experiences, and leverage both influences of cocurricular experiences and students desires to engage in positive ethical behaviours.
The curriculum should include:
skills/expertise the underlying intellectual basis for discerning what is ethical and what is not, which is much more than codes of conduct or a prescriptive, formulaic approach
practice practical know-how in terms of ethical solutions that engineers can apply
mindset having an individual and group culture of acting ethically. The engineers problem-solving mindset must be supplemented by constant reflection on the decisions made and their ethical consequences.
Ethics is not an add-on subject. It must permeate all aspects of tertiary education teaching, research and professional behaviour.
While the arguments for acting now are strong, market realities will also drive the process. The upcoming generation will likely displace those who are slow or reluctant to adapt.
For instance, engineering firms are under pressure from their own staff on the issue of climate change. More than 1,900 Australian engineers and nearly 180 engineering organisations have signed a declaration committing them to evaluate all new projects against the need to mitigate climate change.
Future engineers must transcend any remaining single-solution mindsets from the past. Theyll need to embrace a much more complex and socially minded ethics. And that begins with their university education.
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Why we need engineers who study ethics as much as maths - The Conversation AU
In Pursuit of a Career in Healthcare, She Became an Engineer – The Wall Street Journal
Growing up in Guilford, Conn., Gabriella Lanouette watched her mother head off to work each day as a pediatric nurse.
Every day she comes home having helped kids, says Ms. Lanouette, who began planning her own career in healthcare while still a child. Seeing her work in this field was really inspiring to me.
As she got older she realized she didnt want to be a healthcare provider, so she began looking for other ways to get involved in the field. A passion for coding led to an engineering job. After earning a masters degree from Columbia University, Ms. Lanouette landed a job at Orbis International, an international nonprofit focused on preventing and treating blindness and eye diseases in economically developing countries.
Ms. Lanouette is part of a team that develops algorithms for the companys telemedicine platform, Cybersight. Clinicians use the tool to diagnose eye diseases like diabetic retinopathy and glaucoma, uploading images of the back of the eye to the platform, which provides artificial intelligence-enabled analysis.
The Wall Street Journal recently spoke with Ms. Lanouette about how her pursuit of a career in healthcare led her to engineering. Heres her story, edited and condensed.
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In Pursuit of a Career in Healthcare, She Became an Engineer - The Wall Street Journal
How to Think not What to Think: the UNSW Document Outlining Engineering Ethics – Architecture and Design
A Vision Document published by the University of New South Wales seeks to champion Ethical Civil Infrastructure and Sustainable Environments and outlines that major problems in the building and construction industry have been evoking regulatory responses from various governments in Australia.
Published in the wake of the recent apartment building collapse in Miami, Florida, the document asks if the tragedy would have ever occurred if engineering ethics were upheld at every link in the supply chain. It also points out that legislative responses are commonly introduced when ethical practices have eroded or failed. The Opal Tower and Mascot Towers in Sydney, as well as the Neo200 block and Collins Arch project in Melbourne are further examples of poor engineering ethics.
One of the main aims of the Vision Document is to support a cultural shift within engineering education and the relevant engineering professions emphasising a value on the ethical rather than solely technical consideration.
The authors note that it is important to fully appreciate that professional engineering decisions are not constrained to highly formalised narrow technical tasks. They highlight the fact that modern problems of humanity that call for engineering solutions are increasingly complex and multifaceted involving conflicting demands.
Ethical decision-making goes beyond what is legal, acceptable or common. Something may well be legal but still be unethical depending on a particular viewpoint - for example the interaction of aquifers and agriculture.
An ethical professional decision is not merely based on what is allowed and/or technically valid, but also what is judged to be right and fair. Most critically, the deliberation must be conducted at the onset where it can influence decisions not after the fact to simply provide excuses.
The documents authors believe tertiary education is crucial in fostering an ethical culture throughout an engineers academic training, that can then follow through their progression in the profession.
The document hopes engineers ascertain ethical skills to solve novel problems which may have never been encountered previously. Ideally, teaching them how to think, not what to think in order to avoid disaster.
Image: Reuters
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How engineers fought the CAP theorem in the global war on latency – TechCrunch
CockroachDB EC-1 Part 2: Technical design
CockroachDB was intended to be a global database from the beginning. The founders of Cockroach Labs wanted to ensure that data written in one location would be viewable immediately in another location 10,000 miles away. The use case was simple, but the work needed to make it happen was herculean.
The company is betting the farm that it can solve one of the largest challenges for web-scale applications. The approach its taking is clever, but its a bit complicated, particularly for the non-technical reader. Given its history and engineering talent, the company is in the process of pulling it off and making a big impact on the database market, making it a technology well worth understanding. In short, theres value in digging into the details.
In part 1 of this EC-1, I provided a general overview and a look at the origins of Cockroach Labs. In this installment, Im going to cover the technical details of the technology with an eye to the non-technical reader. Im going to describe the CockroachDB technology through three questions:
Spencer Kimball, CEO and co-founder of Cockroach Labs, describes the situation this way:
Theres lots of other stuff you need to consider when building global applications, particularly around data management. Take, for example, the question and answer website Quora. Lets say you live in Australia. You have an account and you store the particulars of your Quora user identity on a database partition in Australia.
But when you post a question, you actually dont want that data to just be posted in Australia. You want that data to be posted everywhere so that all the answers to all the questions are the same for everybody, anywhere. You dont want to have a situation where you answer a question in Sydney and then you can see it in Hong Kong, but you cant see it in the EU. When thats the case, you end up getting different answers depending where you are. Thats a huge problem.
Reading and writing data over a global geography is challenging for pretty much the same reason that its faster to get a pizza delivered from across the street than from across the city. The essential constraints of time and space apply. Whether its digital data or a pepperoni pizza, the further away you are from the source, the longer stuff takes to get to you.
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How engineers fought the CAP theorem in the global war on latency - TechCrunch