AnchorTag Development

Using Selenium ChromeDriver in Docker / Kubernetes Containers With Node.js

How to configure a Dockerfile for Chrome / Selenium and use it in Node.js code. This sample includes support for downloading files through Chrome.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 7 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

Kubernetes

Ghost Blog / CMS on Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)

How to configure and run Ghost Blog/CMS on Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 7 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

Kubernetes

8GB Azure Kubernetes Node Server for $1 / month

Azure Virtual Nodes have allowed us to scale while reducing cost and response time.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 7 Jan 2020 • 1 min read

Databases

Indexed Queries of Nested Object Arrays in ArangoDB

ArangoDB supports indexed nested object arrays, but without some planning and profiling, it may not use your indices.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 7 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

Javascript / Node.js

Smarter Async Batching in Javascript / Node.js

A comparison of For Loop vs Promise.all with Array.map vs Async-Batch

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 7 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

Kubernetes

Schedule Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) Node Security Patches with Kured

How to install the current version of Weaveworks Kured.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 7 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

Databases

Configuring PostgreSQL Backups Using pg_dump and AzCopy

A good backup strategy is essential to any database. Recently, we implemented a simple PostgreSQL backup using pg_dump and AzCopy on Ubuntu 18.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 5 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

Databases

Self Hosting PostgreSQL 12.x on Azure

AWS RDS and Azure Database for PostgreSQL are excellent offerings, but can quickly escalate in price as databases grow. Hosting Postgres on VMs takes effort, but may be a valuable cost-saving alternative with greater flexibility to customize the database.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 5 Jan 2020 • 4 min read

Databases

Relational Query With Joins Performance in PostgreSQL vs ArangoDB

ArangoDB outperformed Postgres in our relational join tests by an order of magnitude

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 4 Jan 2020 • 1 min read

DevOps

How to Resize an Azure VM Spot Instance

While it may seem straightforward, there isn't currently a way to update an Azure Spot Instance VM size in the Azure Portal.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 4 Jan 2020 • 1 min read

DevOps

How to Convert Your Azure VM to Spot Instances and Save ~80%

Microsoft Azure now has Spot Instances in Preview. These are effectively the same as the AWS Spot Instances on EC2. The provide an excellent way to reduce costs for non-mission critical processes.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 4 Jan 2020 • 2 min read

DevOps

Accessing IP Restricted Azure Databases from CircleCI

CircleCI is a simple, yet powerful Continuous Integration platform, but it doesn't provide any guarantees or even tight ranges on outbound traffic IP addresses.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 30 Dec 2019 • 3 min read

Databases

Installing PostgreSQL 12 on Ubuntu

Postgres is an excellent database, but, as of now, version 12 is two months old and the Installation Instructions are still based on Postgres 11.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 30 Dec 2019 • 1 min read

Kubernetes

Resolution to Kubernetes Cluster DNS and Routing Failures After Azure AKS Upgrade

After upgrading an AKS cluster with Virtual Nodes, you need to disable and re-enable the Virtual Nodes Add-On for inter-cluster communication.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 30 Dec 2019 • 2 min read

Kubernetes

Virtual Pods Not Assigned Cluster IP Addresses after Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) Upgrade

Despite being optional in Kubernetes, the Deployment containerPort is required for AKS Virtual Node Deployments. Barbara Liskov's famed "Liskov Substitution Principle" (LSP) violated once again...

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 30 Dec 2019 • 1 min read

DevOps

2GB Extra For Free on Azure VMs

Have you ever noticed that your Azure VM has a 30GB OS disk. Azure defaults the OS disk to 30GB, but if you look at the Managed Disk Pricing, the minimum size you are charged for is 32GB.

Keith A. Knight

Keith A. Knight 29 Dec 2019 • 1 min read