Notes and articles on business operations, systems integration, agentic AI, and where they meet.
Agentic AI is the next chapter of digital transformation, and the businesses that already digitised and connected their operations are the ones positioned to benefit. A worked example from Si Novi's own books.
AI can automate the judgement-heavy middle of your operations - reading messy inputs, routine decisions, exceptions - but only once your systems are connected. A practical guide to what works, what doesn't, and how to start.
A support chat that asks you to keep your phone awake is a sign the architecture has pushed its problem onto the customer. On designing mobile web sessions that survive interruption.
How the Permissions-Policy header controls access to browser features like camera, microphone and geolocation, its syntax, and how to set it in Apache and PHP.
How the Referrer-Policy header controls what URL information is shared with other sites, the values available, and how to set a sensible default in Apache and PHP.
Handy aws s3 sync command examples for uploading, downloading, mirroring with --delete, filtering, cache headers and dry runs, from deploying static sites to S3.
Handy aws s3 cp command examples for copying single files and directories to and from Amazon S3, including recursive copies, content type and cache headers, and streaming with stdin and stdout.
What the X-Content-Type-Options nosniff header does, why MIME-type sniffing is a risk, and how to set it in Apache, PHP and on AWS CloudFront.
How the Content-Security-Policy header controls which resources a page can load, its key directives, report-only mode, and how to set it in Apache, PHP and AWS CloudFront.
Practical rsync command examples for file synchronisation, backup, and deployment workflows.
How to implement HSTS to enforce HTTPS connections and improve web application security across different platforms.
Preventing clickjacking by configuring the X-Frame-Options header across various web frameworks and servers.
Working with AWS S3 getObject using modern JavaScript promises and async/await instead of callbacks.
How to add a cron job to an Elastic Beanstalk PHP app, and how to make your environment variables available to the cron.
Adding HTTPS to a single-instance Elastic Beanstalk PHP application by putting CloudFront in front of it, including the Apache and Yii2 configuration needed.
How adding a Captcha widget like Google's reCaptcha to your website's public forms helps keep out automated bots.
How to set up AWS sub-accounts and cross-account IAM roles for secure, isolated access across multiple AWS environments.
A technical guide to migrating Yii 1 models to Yii 2, covering namespaces, validation rules, relations, and search methods.
Digitising business processes with web applications, integrations and the cloud to save money, reduce duplication and improve efficiency.
The US Navy tore the touchscreen controls out of its destroyers and went back to physical throttles after the USS John S McCain collision. What that says about complexity, human error and designing software people can actually use.
How to migrate legacy PHP applications to AWS cloud hosting with no disruption to your business, for scalability and reliability.
A guide to migrating PHP web applications from Yii 1 to Yii 2, covering the differences between versions and upgrade strategies.
Using the Xero API to integrate your back-office and operations software, generating invoices and bills automatically.
Essential security practices for PHP web applications, including OWASP guidelines, DevOps security, and regular maintenance.
How to transform unwieldy Excel processes into scalable web applications that improve business efficiency and data management.