IT Infrastructure *

Let's take a deeper look at the Q1 2023 DDoS attacks mitigation statistics and observations from Qrator Labs' perspective.

Explaining main algorithm.

For a while I’ve been thinking of writing a scientific article. I wanted it to have certain utility.

Morse code is binary: it takes only two values – either dot (short) or hyphen (long). I figured out that short (s) can stand for two-eye blinking whilst long (l) can indicate left-eye blinking. Another question emerged: how to understand when does one-symbol recording stop?

Empty space between two symbols can be presented by right-eye blinking – r. If I input singly symbol of short (dot) and long (hyphen), I will blink my right eye once to indicate the space between two symbols.

To separate independent words, one has to blink her right eye twice and get rr.

Hence, I have collected an ordered set of symbols – r, l, s, - that can be converted into a full-fledged text. Once I accomplish the transformation, I get an answer.

In the DevOps realm, where automation is crucial, the management of resources and updating processes in the cloud is vitally important. Many modern projects, particularly in AWS cloud environments, leverage Auto Scaling Groups (ASG). This mechanism aims to achieve three key objectives: balancing loads, increasing service reliability, and optimizing operational costs for efficiency and effectiveness.

Imagine working at a company where you deploy applications on Amazon's resources. To streamline this process and manage configurations more effectively, you use pre-built AMI images. These are crafted with tools like HashiCorp Packer, ensuring your applications launch swiftly and reliably. For the actual infrastructure deployment, you turn to Terraform. It's widely recognized as the standard in many major companies for managing cloud resources and using the IaC (Infrastructure as Code) approach.

As an IT engineer, you sometimes need to update instance versions to a newer AMI image, either for the latest security patches or to introduce new functionalities. The challenge lies in updating an active ASG without causing downtime. It's crucial to ensure the new AMI performs as reliably as the existing one, balancing the need for updates with system stability and uptime.

ASG's instance refresh is a crucial feature that allows for updating instances within a group while minimizing downtime, thereby maintaining high availability. However, ensuring the success of such updates, especially in large, complex systems, can be a challenge. Terraform resources, such as aws_autoscaling_group, can initiate this process but don't provide progress tracking. This limitation becomes apparent when other infrastructure components, such as certificate renewals or DNS updates, depend on the state and version of the instances. Monitoring the update process is essential to maintain an accurate infrastructure state after Terraform's execution.

To overcome this challenge, Ansible can be utilized...

In our last article we covered the anatomy of a presale meeting gone wrong. In that article we posed some questions for everyone to think about. What exactly does an American company wanting to hire a Russian custom software development company, feel about this Russian company? What are they afraid of? What are their concerns?

In the end we came up with five concerns.

1. Is the company a fly by night company, is the company a one-day company?

2. Will they be professional in supporting or developing the software that they've sold to us?

3. Will they have proper data security?

And now the two new ones that are because of the mess the world is in now...

4. Will they be able to complete the project on time? This includes proper internet access an infrastructure to support IT.

5. Where is your team located? Are you still located in Russia?

Now we're going to look at the last 2, number four and five.
However let's look at number 5 first.

Many IT companies today if they want to work with the United States or even Europe they must not have their developers located inside of Russia. Matter of fact it goes so far that if a developer is located in Russia and they're using a VPN and somehow the VPN is breached the credentials are canceled for that developer to work on the project.

It's for this reason that Russian IT companies are opening offices around the world. Let's look at Armenia as an example.

Wait a minute I have to go back for a second...... We must discuss how countries look to America Canada and Western Europe. I basically give them a score based on questions that are brought up in the mind of the American company or European company.

Lose Your Sale) How to lose an IT project sale. 

My name is Paul Karol and I work as a director in a Russian IT company that mostly sells their products into the American Market. What we will discuss today was so costly for that company that I want to share this knowledge so that it doesn't happen to other Russian IT companies. 

Case Study

Today I want to tell you about a sale that almost was. I was Consulting for this one company and they were involved in selling software to the United States. This one particular client was in contact with the sales manager for 2 months.

Now this sales manager was very good at their job and they had a lot of charisma on the phone and in the text messages. However they specifically did not know something that cost them a large contract. 

1. In Russia it's respectful not to talk about your personal life because you feel that you're wasting someone's time if you do not know them well. 

2. In the United States once you have been talking with somebody for a couple of months you would start to consider them sort of a friend. 

The Russian IT sales manager had not been in contact with this client for about a week and this was unusual. 

They were worried. 

Then the text message came that said this. 

"I'm sorry Marina that I have not been in contact with you for some time. I took my family and kids to the Lakeside and we enjoyed some time by the beach." 

The Russian IT sales manager did not know how to think about this and they asked this question. 

" So, do you want to buy our product?" 

This is one of the most important articles I’ve written. 

In this article, I’m going to dive deep into one of the largest differences between Russia and America pertaining to sales and marketing. 

1. You must use your name. 

2. You must have a personal approach. 

3. You must show that you are involved. 

4. You must show that you care about the needs and desires of the client. 

Recently, I was faced with an interesting problem. I was asked to call clients without making it personal. 

So let’s go back to when I was in America, living and working as a sales person. The company I work for, was very large, and had multiple branches around the Washington DC area. They had offices in three states. 

They put me through a sales training course. 

The biggest “take away” from the course….. 

You’re not selling the product/ 

you’re selling yourself. 

It's important to use your charisma and your genuine caring for the customer to win them over. Once they understand that you're actually trying to help them, then they will seriously consider the item you are telling them about. 

I also want to say, very clearly, that it's not a prideful approach. It should be a professional approach. You're responsible to tell the customer/ the client all the benefits of the item and how this item will help their business.

Everything above pertains to sales in America. So if you are approaching America as a sales manager this is how you should craft your approach. 

Now I've spoken to my colleague,

Kristina Pashnina and we have agreed upon some stark differences to the Russian sales climate. Here she will begin to tell you how the Russians see sales. 

My last article stirred up some definite comments and even questions about different things in business. I’m going to keep giving you as much information as I can so that you can continue to do business as IT professionals outside of Russia with other countries. 

How do you design a website that will be viewed in the west and appreciated by the people there?

What are the most important elements

for, America and other western markets?