[VIDEO] one day in life of SAP software engineer: why? how? difficulty? views?

The video

Why?

I wanted to do a snapshot of my life in a moment I really like what I’m doing and in a moment I think my potential is high. I plan to do the same in few years (5?!) to compare and see how it changed (evolution, progression, etc.).

How?

For the camera, it’s a basic (and a little bit old) Sony Alpha 5000. Not expensive, I bought it second-hand for 180€ (200$). For the software part, I only used Adobe After Effects for the video editing/cutting. The sound is from the YouTube sound library (free). You can find some great musics & sound effects but the risk is to find your music in another video. The font used is the font from Apple, used on iOS : San Fransisco Display (you can find the links link at the end of the article).

Difficulty?

Definitely hard. I think French (also in Paris) are afraid by videos and when they see the camera, the reflex is to go out camera’s view. So yes, it’s not easy to get good images on natural moments. That’s a very important element for a good final result of a video like this.

Views?

That’s fun. I never posted any video on YouTube and this is my first one. I posted it in public and sent it only to my colleagues and friends: 5 days later, I get more than 1200 views, 49 likes, 19 comments. It’s not HUGE but I’m a little bit surprised :).

Some links

W14Y18 – MQTT Client for OSX, Fingerprint & HTTPS, Consola and full width embedded Youtube video

MQTT Client for OSX

For those working with OSX, I suggest you to use the most powerful MQTT client I’ve found: MQTTfx. This soft is complete. You will find all the basic features (like unsecured connection, already available on most light tools) and some very useful:

  • User/password authentication
  • SSL/TLS
  • Proxy settings

You have a large choice of certificates, which covers a lot of scenarios and platforms (SAP IoT 4.0 Platform included)

View/download MQTTfx

Fingerprint Check to verify HTTPS certificates

Sometimes, it can be useful to check if you are sending data or connected to the right website (for security purposes). In my case, when I’m connecting Arduino boards or something like this with network I’m not the owner, I’m using the fingerprint check.

Let’s see how it works.

First, you need to retrieve the fingerprint for the target website/API. For this, go to the website and click on the little “lock” icon in the address bar and click on the Certificate section.

Now, scroll down while you find the Fingerprints section and copy these two values (see below the example with Github).

The last step is to check when you establish the connection, if the fingerprint is the same or not. Below, an example in Arduino

// Check HTTPS
WiFiClientSecure client;
Serial.print("Connecting to ");
Serial.println(host);
if (!client.connect(host, httpsPort)) {
  Serial.println("Connection failed");
  return;
}

if (client.verify(fingerprint, host)) {
  Serial.println("Certificate matches");
} else {
  Serial.println("Certificate doesn't match");
}
// The rest of your code...

Consola

Logs are important when you code – If you pass your day, switching between terminal windows, it’s time to get them sexy! For this, I found Consola and I fall in love with this elegant consoler logger.

npm install consola --save

And now in your code, you can log info like this:

const consola = require('consola')

// See types section for all available types
consola.start('Starting build');
consola.success('Built!');
consola.info('Reporter: Some info');
consola.error(new Error('Foo'));

Give a try here: https://github.com/nuxt/consola

Full width embedded Youtube video

If you want to embed your Youtube video on your blog (WordPress or other), it’s possible with some custom CSS.

First go to the video link you want to embed and click on Share > Embed and get the whole iframe tag.

For example: <iframe width="560" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/<YOUR_VIDEO_ID>" frameborder="0"></iframe>

Now, wrap the iframe tag inside a div and add the css.

<div class="youtubeVideoContainer">
    // the iframe tag here
</div>

.youtubeVideoContainer {
    position: relative;
    padding-bottom: 56.25%;
    padding-top: 25px;
    height: 0;
}
.youtubeVideoContainer iframe {
    position: absolute;
    top: 0;
    left: 0;
    width: 100%;
    height: 100%;
}

That’s it. Your video will use the full width of your post.

W09Y18 – Merge images, SAPUI5 Image component, Raspberry Pi SSH over USB

Merge images

If you need to merge mutiples images in one, I’ll warmly recommend you to use this JavaScript library: https://github.com/lukechilds/merge-images.

Yes, I know what you are going to tell me: it’s possible to do it without any library but it’s more complicated, and not easy to maintain. For example, to do the same in pure JavaScript, you have to play with canvas… below a little example:

var c=document.getElementById("myCanvas");
var ctx=c.getContext("2d");
var imageObj1 = new Image();
var imageObj2 = new Image();
imageObj1.src = "1.png"
imageObj1.onload = function() {
   ctx.drawImage(imageObj1, 0, 0, 328, 526);
   imageObj2.src = "2.png";
   imageObj2.onload = function() {
      ctx.drawImage(imageObj2, 15, 85, 300, 300);
      var img = c.toDataURL("image/png");
      document.write('<img src="' + img + '" width="328" height="526"/>');
   }
};

It’s not as sexy as…

mergeImages(['/body.png', '/eyes.png', '/mouth.png']).then(b64 => document.querySelector('img').src = b64);

Agree? And you have some interesting features:

– positioning (x, y) – opacity – size (width, height)

And it’s under MIT licence.

SAPUI5, fix error 404 on sap.m.Image component

I developed some apps using the SAP UI5 frontend framework and on each app, I have the same errors in the console on each page I use the SAPUI5 Image component (sap.m.Image).

It’s not a blocking point or something really embarrassing but… if someone opens the console, it’s weird.

It’s due to retina support (good intention…) but if you haven’t your images with different densities, it will generate errors (see this article). The solution to avoid this error is to set the densityAware to false.

setDensityAware function.

By default it’s true, but I think that’s bad and should be set to false…

Raspberry Pi Zero & SSH over USB

I realized something very bad: the Raspberry Pi Zero is using a mini HDMI port (see below the HDMI vs mini HDMI)

I was very surprised and little bit blocked because it’s not a adaptor I have in my pocket. Then, I ordered one on AliExpress for less than 2$ (Mini HDMI adaptor).

If you are in the same situation then me, I have a good news, you will not be struggled because you can use your USB to ssh in few easy steps!

Step 1:

On the root of your SD card you have to add the following property at the end of the config.txt file:

dtoverlay=dwc2

Step 2:

On the root of your SD card you have to add the following property just after the rootwait parameter in the cmdline.txt file:

modules-load=dwc2,g_ether

Step 3:

Last step, you have to create a new file named “ssh” without any extension on the root of your SD card. Now connect the Raspberry Pi to your laptop and let it boot. Wait 30 seconds for the RPi to finish the boot, open your terminal and launch the command:

ssh pi@raspberrypi.local

Tadaaaaa

SAP Cloud Platform & Cloud Foundry – test, feedback, tips and tricks

After you followed all the steps to setting up Cloud Foundry in your SAP Cloud Platform Cockpit, it’s time to dig into and like all new environment you are testing, you’ll face some problems.

In this article, I’ll quickly overview the activation/installation and talk about a simple NodeJS with a MongoDB scenario. I hope it will help you to be more familiar with the tools, to implement your own needs on the platform.

Quick CF activation/installation

Install CF on your machine and follow instructions detailed here. One it’s installed, you need to test the CF CLI by typing cf in your favorite terminal.

A quota was not automatically assigned for my account because I had several sub accounts. Then, when I deployed an application, I get an error message:

Activate MongoDB / PostgreSQL and other services

Follow the path: Cloud Foundry > Services > Service Marketplace and activate the services you want to use. You can directly map the service with your app if you have already deployed it.

Create and deploy a NodeJS

First, you need to create a skeleton NodeJS project using the Nodeclipse available for free on the Eclipse Market or create your own project from scratch using the framework your like. You can simply download this project from my Github account : js-app-for-sap-cloud-foundry.

If you are not using mongodb in the scenario, you can comment the line require(‘./server/db/mongo-connect.js’)(oAppEnv);. It simplifies the workflow, you can uncomment it later. When your project is ready, be sure it compiles by running the two following commands:

npm install
node app.js

If all is OK, your project is ready to be hosted on CF.

// Logon to Could Foundry
cf login
// Enter your credentials and navigate to the space you want to host the app
// Change directory and push it!
cd js-app-for-sap-cloud-foundry
cf push

The file manifest.yml is very important for your app deployment, to specify the app information: commands, name, buildpack, etc. Below, an example of manifest.yml file

---
applications:
- name: js-app
  memory: 512M
  host: js-app
  command: node app.js

Fields you need to know for the manifest.yml file:

Key Value
name The name of the application
buildpack The name of the Node.js buildpack determined before with command cf buildpacks. (by default an auto determination of the buildpack is done if the buildpack information is missing)
command For NodeJS apps, a start command is needed to start the application. Here for example, it’s “node app.js”.
memory RAM available for the application.
disk_quota Disk space available for the application.
host Host information used in the URL which makes the application accessible.

Connect with a MongoDB

The first step is to create a new MongoDB instance. You have to go to your SAP CP CF sub account > Services > Service Marketplace and select MongoDB. Now in your left panel you can select Instances and create a new one (see below)

Now you are able to map your instance with the app you deployed before. The manifest.yml will change a little bit and the service will be mapped like this:

---
applications:
- name: js-app
  memory: 512M
  host: js-app
  command: node app.js
  services:
  - mongodb-service 

/!\ “mongodb-service” is the name of you instance, you need to adapt /!\

Useful links

Github | SAP/hcp-cloud-foundry-tutorials
SAP CP | Cloud Foundry Tutorials
Github | Cloud Foundry CLI
Cloud Foundry CLI Reference Guide

Useful CLI commands

cf
cf apps
cf login
cf logout
cf push
cf buildpacks
cf marketplace
cf api api.cf.<host information>
cf create-service mongodb v3.0-dev mongo-service

Google Apps Script: Get current user email from a spreadsheet Add-On

Retrieve the current user email using App Script in your Spreadsheet Add-On is a little bit tricky. You can easily use the Session object to get it but in some cases, this object will return undefined.

Current user email using Session object

var userEmail = Session.getActiveUser().getEmail();

So, you need to find a workaround. The workaround could be to use the PropertyService object.

Current user email using PropertiesService object

var userEmail = PropertiesService.getUserProperties().getProperty('userEmail');

Why not, that’s another way to get it but not 100% too. If you want to secure it and combine another way to get it, you need to work with the sheet protection.

Current user email using spreadsheet protection

var protection = SpreadsheetApp.getActive().getRange('A1').protect();
protection.removeEditors(protection.getEditors());
var editors = protection.getEditors();
if (editors.length === 2) {
    var owner = SpreadsheetApp.getActive().getOwner();
    editors.splice(editors.indexOf(owner), 1);
}
userEmail = editors[0];
protection.remove();
PropertiesService.getUserProperties().setProperty('userEmail', userEmail);

Free to play

The full method, ready to use, capy-paste in your code and have fun:

function getCurrentUserEmail() {
    var userEmail = Session.getActiveUser().getEmail();
    if (userEmail === '' || !userEmail || userEmail === undefined) {
        userEmail = PropertiesService.getUserProperties().getProperty('userEmail');
        if (!userEmail) {
            var protection = SpreadsheetApp.getActive().getRange('A1').protect();
            protection.removeEditors(protection.getEditors());
            var editors = protection.getEditors();
            if (editors.length === 2) {
                var owner = SpreadsheetApp.getActive().getOwner();
                editors.splice(editors.indexOf(owner), 1);
            }
            userEmail = editors[0];
            protection.remove();
            PropertiesService.getUserProperties().setProperty('userEmail', userEmail);
        }
    }
    return userEmail;
}