Category: IT Education

Amber has been a software developer and technical trainer since the early 2000s. In recent years, she has focused on teaching AI, machine learning, AWS and Power Apps, teaching students around the world. She also works to bridge the gap between developers, designers and businesspeople with her expertise in visual communication, user experience and business/professional skills. She holds certifications in machine learning, AWS, a variety of Microsoft technologies, and is a former Microsoft Certified Trainer. Once you make it to the end, calculate the loss function again, figure out how much to update weights, then backpropagate to update them. This forward and backpropagation continues until you’ve minimized the overall loss for the network and get accurate predictions.

This article will explain the history and basic concepts of deep learning neural networks in plain English. This process creates an adaptive system that lets computers continuously learn from their mistakes and improve performance. Humans use artificial neural networks to solve complex problems, such as summarizing documents or recognizing faces, with greater accuracy.

Explained: Neural networks

This neural network starts with the same front propagation as a feed-forward network but then goes on to remember all processed information to reuse it in the future. If the network’s prediction is incorrect, then the system self-learns and continues working toward the correct prediction during backpropagation. More specifically, the actual component of the neural network that is modified is the weights of each neuron at its synapse that communicate to the next layer of the network.

• ANNs require high-quality data and careful tuning, and their “black-box” nature can pose challenges in interpretation.
• These networks can be incredibly complex and consist of millions of parameters to classify and recognize the input it receives.
• They do not require hidden layers but sometimes contain them for more complicated processes.
• Traditional machine learning methods require human input for the machine learning software to work sufficiently well.
• This input data goes through all the layers, as the output of one layer is fed into the next layer.
• Through interaction with the environment and feedback in the form of rewards or penalties, the network gains knowledge.

A credit line must be used when reproducing images; if one is not provided
below, credit the images to “MIT.” Please rate or give feedback on this page and I will make a donation to WaterAid. Here are two instances of how you might identify cats within a data set using soft-coding and hard-coding techniques. One benefit of the sigmoid function over the threshold function is that its curve is smooth.

What are the types of neural networks?

Using different neural network paths, ANN types are distinguished by how the data moves from input to output mode. Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are similar to feedforward networks, but they’re usually utilized for image recognition, pattern recognition, and/or computer vision. These networks harness principles from linear algebra, particularly matrix multiplication, to identify patterns within an image. Modern GPUs enabled the one-layer networks of the 1960s and the two- to three-layer networks of the 1980s to blossom into the 10-, 15-, even 50-layer networks of today.

Rectifier functions are often called Rectified Linear Unit activation functions, or ReLUs for short. The rectifier function does not have the same smoothness property as the sigmoid function from the last section. Groups of neurons work together inside the human brain to perform the functionality that we require in our day-to-day lives. However, it took decades for machine learning (and especially deep learning) to gain prominence.

Convolutional Neural Networks

The networks don’t communicate or interfere with each other’s activities during the computation process. Consequently, complex or big computational processes can be performed more efficiently. Suppose you’re running a bank with many thousands of credit-card transactions passing through your computer system every single minute. You need a quick automated way of identifying any transactions that might be fraudulent—and that’s something for which a neural network is perfectly suited. Your inputs would be things like 1) Is the cardholder actually present?

If that output exceeds a given threshold, it “fires” (or activates) the node, passing data to the next layer in the network. This results in the output of one node becoming in the input of the next node. This process of passing data from one layer to the next layer defines this neural network as a feedforward network. Artificial neural networks are computational processing systems containing many simple processing units called nodes that interact to perform tasks.

Advantages of Neural Networks

But at the time, the book had a chilling effect on neural-net research. This illustrates an important point – that each neuron in a neural net does not need to use every neuron in the preceding layer. In most other cases, describing the characteristics that would cause a neuron in a hidden layer to activate is not so easy.

For example, Curalate, a Philadelphia-based startup, helps brands convert social media posts into sales. Brands use Curalate’s intelligent product tagging (IPT) service to automate the collection and curation of user-generated social content. IPT uses neural networks to automatically find and recommend products relevant to the user’s social media activity. Consumers don’t have to hunt through online catalogs to find a specific product from a social media image. Instead, they can use Curalate’s auto product tagging to purchase the product with ease. Speaking of deep learning, let’s explore the neural network machine learning concept.

In fact, one could argue that you can’t fully understand deep learning with having a deep knowledge of how neurons work. More complicated neural networks are actually able to teach themselves. In the video linked below, the network is given the task of going from point A to point B, and you can see it trying all sorts of things to try to get the model to the end of the course, until it finds one that does the best job. Because the image is 7 pixels by 7 pixels, that means we have 49 (7×7) pieces of data to feed into the network. Applications whose goal is to create a system that generalizes well to unseen examples, face the possibility of over-training.

A feedforward network uses a feedback process to improve predictions over time. Hidden layers take their input from the input layer or other how do neural networks work hidden layers. Each hidden layer analyzes the output from the previous layer, processes it further, and passes it on to the next layer.

Visualizing A Neural Net’s Prediction Process

This can be thought of as learning with a “teacher”, in the form of a function that provides continuous feedback on the quality of solutions obtained thus far. Each neuron is connected to other nodes via links like a biological axon-synapse-dendrite connection. All the nodes connected by links take in some data and use it to perform specific operations and tasks on the data. Each link has a weight, determining the strength of one node’s influence on another,[111] allowing weights to choose the signal between neurons. Artificial neural networks were originally used to model biological neural networks starting in the 1930s under the approach of connectionism. Deep Learning and neural networks tend to be used interchangeably in conversation, which can be confusing.

The researchers wanted to see which tasks were prioritized and how the trade-offs were made. They devised a series of different experiments that forced participants to choose between tasks that would expire and give some reward (urgent) what are the 2 axes in the eisenhower box and tasks that would not expire and give a larger reward. This recognition that we may need to cut out elements of our schedules that feel productive but are actually wasted time can be traced back to Vilfredo Pareto and the 80/20 rule.

You could delegate this responsibility by suggesting a better person for the job or by giving the caller the necessary information to have him deal with the matter himself. The fourth and last quadrant is called Don’t Do because it is there to help you sort out things you should not being doing at all. Discover and stop bad habits, like surfing the internet without a reason or gaming too long, these give you an excuse for not being able to deal with important tasks in the 1st and 2nd quadrant.

Sort the cards into the 4 quadrants

But how do you determine what to tackle first when you don’t have enough time to do everything in one day? With effective prioritization, you can increase your productivity and ensure that your most urgent tasks get immediate attention. As an easily workable task management tool, the Eisenhower matrix helps you prioritize your tasks by putting them in the right quadrants. Incorporating the Eisenhower Matrix into your daily routine is a simple yet powerful way to take control of your time and achieve greater productivity.

She didn’t overthink the tasks or the consequences of her actions because she was fully aware of them beforehand. The Eisenhower matrix allowed her to make necessary changes in her daily schedule smoothly and with as little stress as possible. The Eisenhower is a task management tool that helps you improve productivity by teaching you how to prioritize better. This technique helps you learn which activities are worth your time and effort and which ones aren’t. These approaches help manage daily challenges more effectively, improving both personal and professional aspects of life for those with ADHD. Consider using task management tools and apps to help you organize and track recurring tasks.

Different Types of Goals and How to Achieve Them

With endless tasks and responsibilities vying for our attention, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and lose track of what truly matters. This is where the Eisenhower Matrix comes into play, offering a structured approach to prioritize tasks and make the most of your time. Continue using the Eisenhower Matrix to organize your day even as your time and tasks shift towards Quadrant 2.

For tasks in the “Not Urgent and Not Important” quadrant, question whether they need to be part of your daily routine and consider reducing or eliminating them. If any tasks are both urgent and can be delegated to others, consider doing so to free up your time for more critical responsibilities. This can include work-related tasks, personal chores, appointments, and anything else you have on your plate for the day. Tiimo is designed for people with ADHD, Autism, and everyone who thinks, works, and plans differently.‍Get started with our free trial. To reduce the number of Quadrant 1 tasks you have, invest time in planning to anticipate and prevent problems. People tend to believe that all urgent tasks are also important — when frequently, they are not.

How do you use the Eisen­how­er Matrix in your work?

These are the tasks that have a strict, very close time limit and might have consequences if not addressed immediately. For example, a math test is an urgent task for a student, and most other things will come secondary to it. Important tasks, on the other hand, allow you to take a step back, analyze your situation, and plan your next move. They’re not time-sensitive, so there is no pressure when completing such tasks. They are time-sensitive and sometimes stressful, as they need our immediate attention.

Start by tackling the tasks in the “Urgent and Important” quadrant. Once those are completed, move on to the “Important but Not Urgent” tasks. Important tasks contribute to your long-term mission, values, and goals. They may not yield immediate results (making them easy to neglect). Focusing on important tasks puts you in a responsive mindset, which can make you feel calm, rational, and open to new ideas. By attending to Q2 consistently, you decrease the number of pressing problems that pop up in Q1.

Not urgent but important tasks

This is where personal and professional growth meets planning, prevention, and action. But there’s good news, too — the mere-urgency effect can be reversed. When participants were prompted to consider the consequences of their choices at the time of selection, they were significantly more likely to choose the important task over the urgent one. The findings suggest that if you keep the long-term importance of non-urgent tasks in view, you can overcome the pull toward urgent distractions and focus on what really matters.

An example of that could be a long-planned restart of your gym activity. The third quadrant is for those tasks you could delegate as they are less important to you than others but still pretty urgent. You should keep track of delegated tasks by e-mail, telephone or within a meeting to check back on their progress later. An example of a delegated task could be somebody calling you to ask for an urgent favor or request that you step into a meeting.

Sorting through your to-do list is the hardest part of the Eisenhower Matrix, but with automation, you no longer need to do this step manually.

We might prioritize the wrong tasks first and be left to complete the most important thing in the late hours of the night. If you need to filter your reports further, you can use tags to see which quadrant of your Eisenhower Matrix took up most of your time. If the Not urgent part consumed most of your workday, this information will help you refine your priorities. This way, you can determine your priorities with ease by grouping your tasks according to difficulty or urgency, and eliminating distractions once and for all.

The difference between URGENT and IMPORTANT tasks

For example, asking a coworker to create a PowerPoint presentation or to take notes for you during a meeting because you have some emergency work. For instance, if a person puts off eating healthy for years because other things get in the way, health complications like obesity or diabetes will suddenly make it an urgent priority. Or, if you don’t create a financial plan for the following year, you might suffer serious consequences such as accumulating debts, overspending, no money for emergencies, and similar. For tasks in the “Urgent but Not Important” quadrant, delegate them if possible.

• Similarly to the Eisenhower Matrix, the researchers defined task importance by whether the task involves significant outcomes, and defined task urgency by a short completion window.
• Not urgent but important tasks help you achieve your goal — and don’t have a pressing deadline.
• While the Eisenhower Matrix is primarily a means for prioritization, it offers similar benefits for figuring out how individuals or teams should spend their time.
• Differentiating between urgent and important within the Eisenhower Matrix can help you identify which tasks you should jump on and which tasks might be better handled by other team members.
• Also known as the Urgent-Important Matrix, it was popularized by Stephen Covey in his best-selling book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Bypassing it might lead us to put out software that’s functional but could be lacking in user-friendliness or cross-platform compatibility, potentially impacting user satisfaction. Automated testing features are included, which can trim down the time invested and reduce manual effort. But that’s not all, the platform’s debugging tools aid in quickly locating and rectifying issues, cutting down the expense tied to post-production fixes.

Effective GUI testing must account for various devices, browsers, and operating systems, leveraging cross-browser testing tools and cloud-based platforms to manage this complexity efficiently. GUI testing focuses on verifying the graphical user interface of an application to ensure it meets specified requirements and provides a good user experience. Based on the requirements, define a set of test cases to cover all aspects of the application’s GUI. This should include tests for every button, menu, text field, and all other visual components. It’s also important to plan tests for the software’s various functionalities and possible user interactions.

Compatibility Testing

GUI Testing, or Graphical User Interface Testing, is a process of testing a software’s graphical user interface to ensure it meets the specified requirements. Based on your analysis, make any necessary changes to the software application. This might involve fixing bugs, tweaking the interface, or improving performance.

Selenium helps in executing tests across various browsers and platforms, ensuring compatibility and consistency. By understanding and addressing these challenges, testers can improve the overall quality and user experience of the application. By following these steps, you can create a comprehensive GUI test plan that ensures your application’s interface is thoroughly tested and ready for users. Carlos is a .NET software developer with experience in both desktop and web development, and he’s now trying his hand at mobile. And he’s interested in practices that help you improve app health, such as code review, automated testing, and continuous build.

Demo: How to do GUI Test

UI Testing essentially acts as a quality checkpoint, verifying that the software’s user interface aligns with the user’s needs and expectations, thus enhancing overall user experience. GUI testing processes may be either manual or automatic and are often performed by third-party companies, rather than developers or end users. In manual testing, a tester manually navigates through the application, inspecting the visual elements, and interacting with the software just as a user would. They look out for any visual anomalies, usability issues, or functionality bugs that could mar the user experience. CrossBrowserTesting allows testers to run automated and manual tests on numerous browsers and real devices.

However, creating the initial model can be time-consuming, and maintaining the model requires effort as the application evolves. Despite these challenges, model-based testing is a powerful technique for ensuring the quality and reliability of GUI applications. UI testing involves evaluating the functionality and performance of a software application’s user interface and meets user expectations. BrowserStack is a cloud-based testing platform that enables manual and automated testing across thousands of real devices and browsers. It ensures that the web applications work seamlessly across various platforms, offering comprehensive testing capabilities in a scalable cloud environment.

What is Smoke Testing? How To Perform It?

The software has to generate interest in the user and therefore has to look fine and give a smooth experience to the user at first glance to keep him/her involved with the app. When any user will use your application, the first thing she/he is going to experience is the Interface. It is the first impression and the accessibility provider of the software. If the user experiences any glitch in this first look, he/she will get disappointed by the application.

When it comes to the problem of UI test speed, you can take several steps. For starters, you should have a clear distinction between UI tests and end-to-end (E2E) tests. One of the implications of this is that UI tests don’t need as much test data as E2E tests, which can make them run faster. The UI is the layer of an app that you can see and interact with, which allows a larger number of people—including non-technical stakeholders—to have a say on how it looks and works. The UI of an app has to not ly allow the user to access its features and having them behave as expected. It also must conform to marketing concerns—such as adhering to the universal brand guidelines of the company.

Test case development

So, for example, after selecting E-13 in the first step, the application could automatically select E-13,14,15. It is important to note that E-13 is automatically deselected since the application assumes that the people will want to sit together, and then F-22 will be selected. You can use a test scenario to specify how a web application or website behaves or interacts in real-world situations. This creates a huge load on the server that fetches the website. The testing of this scenario also falls under UI testing and can undoubtedly improve performance.

For obvious reasons, this method takes time and the authenticity of the testing is purely based on how creative and sharp the tester is. The appearance and interface of the app should be smooth and sensible. This UI testing (User Interface Testing) tutorial will now look at how to run UI tests for our websites or web applications.

The Ultimate Guide to GUI Testing: Features, Types & Tools

Regular updates and maintenance of your test cases and testing environment are essential to keep up with changes in the application. Clear and detailed test cases form the backbone of successful GUI testing. Each test case should outline specific steps, expected outcomes, and criteria for success or failure. A consistent testing environment is crucial for accurate and reliable GUI testing.

• It’s a continually evolving discipline, shaped by new tools and emerging trends.
• We develop an in-depth understanding of the applications under test and include software testing strategies that deliver quantifiable results.
• In Software testing, the most frequent drawback or problem while performing Regression Testing is that GUI changes regularly.

Test case 06 – Verify that the label “Modifiers” consists of 4 radio buttons with the name public, default, private, protected. The following checklist will ensure detailed GUI Testing in Software Testing. By understanding its different characteristics, GUI testing can be clarified further. The whole process sounds very easy but there are some challenges involved.

Compatibility testing ensures that all users have a consistent experience, regardless of their environment. This involves real users performing tasks and providing feedback on their experience. Usability testing helps identify gui software testing areas where users struggle, allowing for improvements in design and functionality to enhance overall user satisfaction. GUI Testing is not just a finishing touch — it’s an integral step in the software development process.

However, it’s a common convention to name it after the database and add the “Context” suffix. This way, if you have multiple DbContext classes, you can easily distinguish them. Most people what is entity framework use Microsoft.Data.Sqlite by installing pre-build NuGet packages, as shown above. Alternately, the code can be built and packages can be created directly on your development machine.

The following diagram shows the supported types of applications that we can develop using EF Core. Entity Framework Core supports many database providers to access different databases and perform database operations. The code may compile in without any issues but problems can show up in runtime.

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Since migrations are chronological, the prefix is an essential tool for making sense of the changes occurring to our schema. We’ll keep the subject simple, but we’ll also explore some important EF Core concepts. Our subject matter is Entertainment, both movies and television, which we’ll call Productions. I hope as folks read these sentences, they start to formulate the relationships in their mind. Entity Framework has come a long way since its original inception.

It eliminates the need for most custom data-access codes we usually write without an ORM. We still need to retrieve the data from the database and map it to our data model. This is a feature that allows you to query data from a database without keeping track of the retrieved entities’ changes. The purpose of using “NoTracking” is primarily for read-only scenarios or when you don’t intend to update or persist changes to the database for the entities you retrieve. From my previous experience with Entity Framework 6, I find the generated SQL of EF Core more readable and concise. EF Core still falters around some strange edge cases, but the EF team is actively working to support more complex LINQ to SQL translations.

Column Mapping

Change tracking in EF Core is a mechanism that keeps track of changes made to entities. It enables EF Core to detect which entities have been modified and need to be updated in the database when SaveChanges is called. Change tracking is essential for maintaining data consistency between the application and the database. Likely the most complex query in this list, let’s find actors playing characters in different productions. We’ll need to start at the Actors entity and navigate through the Characters collection while including the Production information.

This choice significantly improves performance when fetching data from a query. This provides detailed control over the mapping between the entity class and the database table. Scaffolding is a reverse engineering technique that allows us to create entity classes and a DbContext based on the schema of a database. The EF Core supports relational and non-relational databases, which is possible due to the database providers. The Database Provider sits between the EF Core and the Database it supports.

What is the difference between TempData and Session in ASP.NET Core?

EF Core uses the naming convention of [Entity]Id to map values to the in-memory object instance. Developers can override EF Core conventions, but I recommend folks starting with EF Core use the default conventions. We can use the NuGet tool window to find and install all these packages into our project. The DbContext class is the primary class that allows us to query our data, manage the database connection, and ensure that the mapping is correct. Hello everyone, in the previous article, we provided an overview of how to access data from our database through ADO.NET.

Entity Framework Core is a lightweight, extensible and cross-platform version of Microsoft’s object-relational mapper (ORM), Entity Framework is the official data access platform for Microsoft. Entity Framework Core uses a provider model to access many different databases. EF Core includes providers as NuGet packages which you need to install. Model First requires that we use the EDMX editor to create the data model.

Entity Framework Approaches

Entity Framework is an Object/Relational Mapping (O/RM) framework. It is an enhancement to ADO.NET that gives developers an automated mechanism for accessing & storing the data in the database. An ORM (Object-Relational Mapper) is used to interact with a database using an object-oriented programming language. ORMs allow developers to work with databases using familiar, object-oriented concepts, rather than writing raw SQL statements. Additionally, EF Core 8 optimizes change tracking and saving efficiency, albeit with considerations for SQL Server’s database triggers and computed columns.

EF Core 5 applies an approach known as Table-per-hierarchy (TPH), where we store hierarchically related entities in a single table. When we finish setting up our project, we can run the dotnet-ef command, where the EF unicorn will greet us. If we now make a call to the endpoint GetAllTodoWithItems we will see that the entity and its respective items have been deleted from our database. We recommend using the daily builds to get the latest code and provide feedback on Microsoft.Data.Sqlite.

The value of “The” finds its way into the generated SQL’s where clause. Unlike the previous query, this example only uses the Rating entity, which results in the following SQL. The first approach is to use the DbSet on our EntertainmentDbContext class. The discriminator is an important mechanism that we’ll see used later in this post’s query section. To get started, I recommend folks install the latest version of the .NET 5 SDK.

• However, if you are developing new projects, particularly projects targeting .NET Core or .NET 5/6+, EF Core is the best choice.
• Entity Framework Core (EF Core) is an ORM (Object-Relational Mapping) framework for the .NET platform.
• This choice will allow us to address topics like migrations and the Code First approach, which we will discuss in detail later.

Therefore, it’s crucial to use this method carefully, reserving it for situations where you only need to retrieve data and not modify entities. When using AsNoTracking(), the database context will not maintain an internal state of the retrieved entities. This means there will be no tracking of changes made to these entities, making the data retrieval process faster and more efficient. These methods are essential because they allow deferring the execution of queries until the actual results are requested. Additionally, they convert the results into convenient data structures such as lists, dictionaries, or arrays that can be easily used in the application. This approach provides better control over when queries are executed and yields optimized results for further processing.

Most people use EF Core by installing pre-build NuGet packages, as shown above. Install the provider package corresponding to your target database. I have School and Student entities that are mapped to the tables with the same name in database. There is a one to many association between them(School has many students). An ORM Framework like Entity Framework or EF Core can do all of the above for us and saves a lot of time if we provide the required information to the ORM Framework. The ORM Framework sits between our application code and the Database.