Emotional Intelligence Quotient (EIQ), in many ways, is the essence of being human. Our ability to draw on it as a reserve helps us in so many ways. Emotional intelligence is considered to be twice as important than IQ and technical skills.
What is Emotional Intelligence?
Emotional Intelligence is the ability to control and evaluate emotions, a term created by Peter Salavoy and John Mayer and popularised by Dan Goleman in his book.
Why Emotional Intelligence is a crucial parameter in modern recruitment?
In a survey conducted by the World Economic forum, emotional intelligence was considered by global employers to be the most important skill they would look for while employing potential candidates.
The recruitment process has traditionally focused on assessing qualifications, experience and skills. Leading employers have now agreed that understanding emotional intelligence can help identify traits and characteristics that will help you in evaluating how the candidates would respond to work situations like:
High pressure environments
Interactions with clients
Working with other teammates
Working with different levels of seniority
Different working environments
Embracing the nuances of emotional intelligence in the workplace can
have pragmatic benefits such as better collaboration among employees and a
happier workplace.
Daniel Goleman emphasised the need to teach emotional intelligence in a systematic way to children. A self-aware and emotionally intelligent manager would plan his time properly and get the work done well in advance of deadlines.
Self-management (one of the key attributes of EIQ) is the ability to control, recognise and redirect disruptive impulses and moods. For example, a problem occurs with the team’s presentation. The leader ought to resist the urge to scream. Instead should consider the possible reasons for failure, explain the consequences of their mistakes and explore solutions together.
A passion for the work you do, optimism and energy to improve are the key hallmarks of an emotionally mature person.
Empathy is considering others feelings when making decisions. Consider a situation when a team is trying to pitch to a Japanese client. After the pitch, the client remains silent and usually this could be interpreted as disapproval. But an emotionally mature teammate senses interest owing to the body language and continues with the pitch and wins the deal.
It is very clear that leaders in some of the most successful companies, demonstrate high levels of emotional intelligence.
Emotional intelligence starts with yourself. You cannot enhance other
people’s well-being and sense of self without first understanding how you
operate on an emotional level
The more we automate tasks, the more we realize the benefits of
emotional maturity
5 ways to evaluate emotional intelligence in a candidate:
Recruiters need to pay attention to the candidate’s level of self-awareness. Questions related to situations they have already been in will help in analysing their emotional maturity.
When questioned on how they dealt with a frustrating situation at work, an emotionally intelligent person would clearly show self-awareness, an ability to accept responsibility and empathy towards others. Asking insightful interview questions can help understand a candidate’s ability to learn from negative experiences and move on.
Pay attention to the language they use while describing emotions. The more specific they are, the more likely they are to exhibit emotionally intelligent behaviour.
Observe their verbal and physical language to see if they are adaptable and open to change.
Conduct group interviews – Observe how the candidate interacts in a group.
Incorporating emotional intelligence testing into your candidate selection process can help hire the right candidate who would be a good fit into your company. It is found to be the most crucial factor in determining how successful and apt a candidate would be in his role.
How do you handle conflict? How well you are able to put your opinions aside and stay solution oriented is an indicator of your EIQ. The workplace is an environment where a group of different people come together and work towards a common goal. In order to be successful, everyone has to support each other.
Common traits of emotionally
intelligent people
Some specific traits that you could look out for while hiring include:
Team player-They work for the good of their team. They are happy when their teammate achieves something.
Positive attitude-They take day to day workplace issues in stride.
Focused– They treat their work as priority even with other issues going on in their personal life.
Accountability– They don’t blame others when mistakes happen. They take up responsibility when a crisis occurs.
A number of advantages come with a high EIQ such as employee retention, increased productivity and hence a better success rate. Luckily for humans, they can systematically develop emotional intelligence. When you hire people based not only on their skills and experience but EIQ as well, you nurture a self-sustaining culture. The group thus formed are self-aware and self-driven. They are committed to the collective success of the company and not just their own. Then, when problem arise, they approach them compassionately instead of pointing fingers and wasting your organization’s time and resources.
By prioritising EIQ in your recruitment, you build a motivated team that supports one another and ultimately drives the company’s success.
This is my first article online and I wanted to share an experience and try to analyze emotions, psychology and inferences. I am always fascinated on how complex a human brain is and how different people behave in different circumstances without second thought. I take my short story as an example to start with….
A couple of weeks ago, while at the Bengaluru airport on way to New Delhi for “Renewable Energy India Expo”, I realized my passport was about to expire in 4 months. There was an adrenaline rush of questions – how did I miss it, why didn’t my smartphone remind me in time, what if I had not taken that trip that day and I could have been stranded for a future prospect meeting…..slow down my heartbeat and say “all is well” everything happens for a reason and nothing is late and there is time to do everything right.
On my return home, I research a few quick updates on renewing passport online (the last time I renewed was in Chicago 10 years ago). My eyes scan through the top 10 results and at the same time another thought on how convenient it is to find information online. I find my target website, go through couple of quick links and I realized how technology has advanced in the public Passport Service in India. And so I turn on my Surface Book, fill in all details, ready to pay and schedule an appointment. Now the fun part, my Jekyll and Hyde start playing tricks and one of them has to decide for the moment.
Normal passport = 1500, Tatkaal (a.k.a. “fast track”) = 3500…I tell myself I don’t have any urgency, some one else who is in an emergency situation could possibly get an appointment slot instead of me, and I will save 2000 bucks. So I choose Normal mode, pay 1500, schedule the appointment next Friday and all set. At that point I am still wondering who won – Jekyll or Hyde – the answer was not there yet.
So the magic day arrives on a Friday at 11:45 AM. It had been a couple of rough weeks personally with some weird cold and flu that never fully cured. The appointment is set and I have to go and complete it and not push it tomorrow because tomorrow never dies. As always my mind starts reviewing choices – do I drive or take a cab, should I leave one hour or two hours ahead of the schedule…my sane mind says take the bike get there by 11:20 and forget the rest….that worked in spite of the unpredictable traffic, I reach 11:15 am, park my bike, get in the first queue where token numbers are issued and I realize there are three groups of counters A, B and C to complete the passport application process. About 250 to 300 applicants and 70+ associates handling the daily routine of applications, I walk through security gate with token number N191. Yes there is a prefix and I am not sure but N maybe Normal, T maybe Tatkaal, there was also S & O series.
At 11:40 am, I get through and wait for 10 minutes, my token number pops on the big screen and I am delighted – hey that was fast for Normal mode. Very happy! Walk into the designated area and a quick scan around the premise shows there are more than 20 “A” counters, about 6 “B” counters and maybe 5 or 6 “C” counters. I get through first round of verification and then back to the waiting room. About 30 minutes go by and I am starting to feel uneasy. The questions start coming back to when I was playing Jekyll and Hyde in my head….and someone announces on intercom that about 20 odd tokens can now go to the “B” counters….people start running around cutting queues and lines and I am thinking what happened to the sequence and calling of token numbers that worked beautifully for the “A” counter – is there an answer? – not yet.
Another 15 minutes of waiting / standing in front of the B counters, it starts making sense. There is only one waiting room but no designated space for waiting for B and C counters and that explained the chaos. There was two other big screens confirming the sequence and process still exists and there is no cutting queues/lines. Still happy that it was progressing reasonably well. About an hour since I reached, I got through A and B counters. Not bad right? Yeah I am also having a cheap sense of saving 2000 bucks at this point… haha (lol).
Moving to the last corner of the building where the C counters were crammed, I look at another set of big screens and my heart stops a beat. It was showing token N106 and mine was N191. I stand there hoping it would not be all that bad, but the wait started to get into Hyde’s nerves… it was moving at snails pace and I quickly enquire an associate if this will take time to get to 180+ token number and the answer was YES!
I moved back to the only waiting room with chairs and settled down. My sinuses were starting to act up, my head started throbbing, get on to my smartphone to handle business and team (thinking that might distract me) but the network inside was either blocked or really bad, the internet was not responding. Suddenly I realize I am becoming impatient, frustrated, Hyde pops out of nowhere and says “Look at the Tatkaal tokens they are moving so fast and you are stuck here” – I had to do something before I lose my mind. It is about 12:15 PM now and there ought to be something to do, but I felt time stop and not move at all. Digging deep into my list of things to do, I asked myself, “You always wanted to share and give back and write – did you even start?”. That was the moment. I took my Blackberry and I started writing the first 6 paragraphs above. In fact I even forgot to constantly gaze at the big screens to see if my turn is up. All those emotions (frustration, anger, impatience, instant gratification) completely took a back seat and I was in my moment writing my first draft. Suddenly my name was called out on the intercom because I was not looking at those big screens for the past 20 minutes. I save my draft finish up the last round of verification at the “C” counter and get out of the exit door and look at my clock, it was 2:45 PM. So my Normal passport application was only 3.5 hours but I definitely felt like I was there forever. Take the time machine back 20 years when I got my first passport done, it was agonizing 3 full days and that Friday, I only spent little over 3 hours today. Are we making progress, is technology helping, are we truly making leaps and bounds in our day-to-day things to do- you know we are!! We just don’t take the time to appreciate, assess and compare.
I came back home around 3:30 PM, grab my late lunch and settle down in front my Surface Book, having a new perspective. Today’s Passport Renewal by itself seemed like a journey revealing so many things to me and I wanted to share what matters the most. It is important to have Compassion, Empathy, Humanity, Respect, Dignity, Self Discipline, Drive to Succeed and Work any way to achieve the Peaks! It is important to take a deep breath, every time you are angry and frustrated, take a step back and look at the bigger picture! Enough writing today? Yes I need to finish up my days work now. Until next time, Keep dreaming, collaborating, sharing and working together with people (“the true wealth”).
To My Readers, feel free to share your thoughts and comments. I think the best way to master a new skill is to start with the basics and get others to provide constructive criticism!
If you’re a developer it’s almost certain that you’ve used Code Libraries. In simple terms, a Code Library is a collection of reusable code that you can use in your program.
Like most of us, I know how to plug libraries into my programs and use them, but used to get scary for me each time I went through the actual source code of that particular library. Then I got to learning Vanilla JS and it all stopped seeming so scary. Vanilla JS is plain JavaScript code that you write without the use of any external libraries.
When it comes to building a JavaScript library that you will use to create a website, It’s important that you learn DOM manipulation using Vanilla JS before attempting to actually build it. The reason that it’s important is that you won’t have any dependencies and your library will be a simply plug-n-play for your users. You may be familiar with DOM manipulation using jQuery but that will create a dependency on jQuery and your library won’t function on a webpage that doesn’t include a reference to the jQuery library.
If you’re familiar with jQuery and want to learn more about DOM manipulation using Vanilla JS, you can read more about it here.
With all that said let’s dive into creating a JavaScript Library from scratch.
We’ll building an Image Lightbox. A lightbox is library that is used to view images on a webpage by filling the page with the image and de-emphasizing the background. Here’s what we’ll build.
If you want to jump ahead and see the code you can find the GitHub repository here.
When building a JavaScript Library there are a few things that you want to keep in mind. Your code shouldn’t interfere with the existing code written by the user. To do this we’ll encapsulate all our code in a single Function object.
function FsLightbox() {
// all the code goes here
}
All the code that we write in this tutorial will be written in that function body. This will take care of the encapsulation.
We now have to create a list of all the methods that the user will be given access to and that will be useful the user. In this library, we’ll have four such methods
.render(), .next(), .prev(), and .hideLightbox()
The FsLightbox object will thus have these four public members. By public members we mean all those methods and properties that are preceded with the this keyword.
First and foremost we’ll store a reference to the object context as using this keyword can get messy in JavaScript.
let _this = this;
This will eliminate all the confusion and let us use the object context without any worries.
With that out of the way, let’s go over the strategy that we’ll employ to get the lightbox working.
The user will specify the images that will use the lightbox by adding a specific class to those img tags. So, every time DOM loads, we’ll be able to capture those images and save their references in an array.
After that, we’ll add a click listener to each image to make sure that every time the user clicks that image, it will be shown in the lightbox. We’ll leverage both JavaScript as well as CSS to achieve this.
We’ll also need navigation controls for Previous Image, Next Image and a button to Close the lightbox. We’ll wire these controls with their respective click listeners.
We’ll also display some meta information like Image Counter and Caption (we’ll get this from Alt text)
As you may have already realized the JavaScript library that we’ll create will use a lot of CSS and hence, we’ll be including a CSS file also.
Enough talk, let’s write some code. First, we’ll need to keep track of some data and hence, we’ll be declaring some variables that will be available throughout our little Function. These will be the following:
let imagesArray = []; // Array containing the reference of all the images that have the specified class (fs-lightbox)
let currentImage; // Image being displayed currently in the lightbox
let isLightbox = false; // Boolean to tell you whether the image is being displayed in the lightbox or not
After this we’ll write our first public method, .render(). In here we’ll initialize are “global” variables and get a reference of all the images stored in the array. This method will need to be run to actually initialize our Lightbox. Here’s the code:
As seen we’re using a function addKeyListeners() here. This method is used to hook up all the keyboard actions for Next, Prev and Close Lightbox. We’ll get to it later. The event listener that we are adding here is _this.lightbox(). This method will be responsible for actually displaying the image in the lightbox. Here’s it’s implementation.
As evident in the render() method, this method expects the image element _el as a method parameter. This will be a reference to the img element that needs to be displayed in the lightbox. If we analyse this method further, we see that we first hideLightbox() if it’s already displaying some other image. Then we save the reference of the image in our global variable currentImage and also change the isLightbox variable to true. Then the real DOM manipulation begins.
We create the overlay div overlay using createElement method and add the class lightbox-image to it. The CSS file that we create will contain all the necessary CSS for the overlay such as position and background-color. I won’t dive into that code as that is not the point of this post. That being said, here’s a snippet detailing the same:
Once we create the overlay, we need to create a container for the actual image. The imageContainer variable will contain the same. The variable will be a reference to a div that we create and then we will create an img element image and append it to the same div. With the supplied _el function parameter we’ll have the src of the clicked image and will set the src of image element to the same value. Then, we append these newly created elements, overlay and imageContainer to the DOM. That’s it! Now every time the user clicks an image that has the fs-lightbox class added to it, it will trigger the lightbox() method and the image will be displayed in the lightbox.
That’s most of the hard-work done. Now comes the polish. That’s just us making our library a little more user friendly. This is very important when creating a library. Always think from a user’s perspective. The more convenient it’s for the user, better it will be received.
So, let’s get to it then. Remember, earlier in the post I mentioned all the four public methods that will be available to the users. We have just implemented one of those four methods – render(). We need to implement the rest – next(), prev() and hideLightbox().
This will be done in the prepareControls() method. You can see in the lightbox() method we’re calling this method. This method will take care of both rendering the UI Elements, i.e., buttons for the above actions as well as attaching click listeners to them. Here’s the implementation.
As I said, creating controls and hooking them up with click listeners is all that’s being done here. The handlers this.next() and this.prev() are implemented as:
this.next = () => {
let imgIndex = getCurrentImageIndex();
if (imgIndex === _this.imagesArray.length - 1)
return;
_this.lightbox(_this.imagesArray[getCurrentImageIndex() + 1]);
}
this.prev = () => {
let imgIndex = getCurrentImageIndex();
if (imgIndex === 0)
return;
_this.lightbox(_this.imagesArray[getCurrentImageIndex() - 1]);
}
this.hideLightbox = () => {
let overlay = document.querySelector('.lightbox-overlay');
let image = document.querySelector('.lightbox-image');
let controls = document.querySelector('.lightbox-controls');
if (overlay)
document.querySelector('body').removeChild(overlay);
if (image)
document.querySelector('body').removeChild(image);
if (controls)
document.querySelector('body').removeChild(controls);
this.isLightbox = false;
};
.next() gets the next image from the array imagesArray and passes it to .lightbox() method and similarly for .prev() method. hideLightbox() removes the displayed image from the DOM.
We’re left with two more things – Showing meta information and Binding keyboard shortcuts.
We’ll write two methods for this, addKeyListeners() and showCounter() (poor name choice, should be showMetaInformation), Here’s the implementation. It’s fairly simple to understand once you go through it.
function showCounter() {
let imgIndex = getCurrentImageIndex();
let counter = document.createElement("span");
let counter_Html = `<br/>${imgIndex + 1} of ${_this.imagesArray.length}`;
if(_this.currentImage.alt){
counter_Html += ` - ${_this.currentImage.alt}`;
}
counter.innerHTML = counter_Html;
document.querySelector('.lightbox-image').appendChild(counter);
}
function addKeyListeners() {
document.removeEventListener('keydown', bindKeys);
document.addEventListener('keydown', bindKeys);
}
function bindKeys(e) {
// left arrow key
if (e.keyCode === 37 && _this.isLightbox) {
_this.prev();
return;
}
// right arrow key
else if (e.keyCode === 39 && _this.isLightbox) {
_this.next();
return;
}
// escape key
else if (e.keyCode === 27 && _this.isLightbox) {
_this.hideLightbox();
return;
}
}
That’s all the code that we’re going to write in our function body. We now need to initialize it. This will be done by calling the .render() method that we created. Remember, it’s the method responsible for actually initializing everything. We can do this outside the Function body like this:
var fsLightbox = new FsLightbox;
fsLightbox.render();
Now the user will have to reference the .js as well as the .css files in their html and they will be up and running with using the library.
That’s about it. There are some smaller functions that I didn’t mention here like getCurrentImageIndex(), etc as those aren’t really important to understanding the workflow. You can still check those in the Github Repo.
Since we’re done with building our library, we need to understand how to publish it so that other users can use it. We have many options for that. We can use GitHub, npm, etc to host our library. Always remember to include a small readme file that details the library’s usage. You can find the example in the same Github Repo.
TL;DR;To create a JavaScript library, you need to keep in mind that you’re encapsulating the code so that it doesn’t interfere with user code, making it simple and easy to use, and trying to make sure it doesn’t have any dependencies. You follow these and you shall be fine.
Automated check in kiosks now
dominate at the airport. Pilots steer aircraft for a short time only, with
autopilot guiding the rest.
As more and more tasks are
automated, we start to debate the impact of automation, multiplied many times
across different sectors of the economy. Is this going to be a threat to jobs?
Will this lead to vast improvements in productivity, freedom from mundane,
repetitive jobs, and an overall improvement in quality of life?
Benefits of implementing
automation in an IT company:
Cost reduction: Automation helps to reduce operational costs by eliminating human errors, greater efficiencies and greater output of work.
Enhanced productivity: Automation eliminates the need for manual work, so skilled workforce in the company can apply their knowledge and skills to more important tasks and projects.
Greater
availability: One of the main
priorities of an IT company is implementing the highest level of availability, can
be achieved with automation, making system monitoring and remote communication
possible and reducing network downtime.
Optimized
performance: One of the challenges
faced by IT companies is the need to perform tasks faster and more efficiently.
Automation helps ease these situations.
Reliability: IT companies need to deal with expensive errors
caused due to humans. They can be eliminated with automation thus improving
reliability.
Research shows that as high
as 46% of the repetitive tasks that individuals perform are eligible for automation.
Automation benefits are typically three to ten times the cost of implementation.
The findings prove that the future is less about automating individual jobs,
but it is more about automating the activities within the occupations and
refining roles and processes. Another advantage of automation is to provide new
opportunities to individuals to explore and adopt new skillsets by eliminating
these repetitive tasks.
The magnitude of automation
potential reflects the speed with which artificial intelligence and machine learning
are challenging our assumptions about the activities that could be automated.
It has been found that automation can sometimes exceed the average level of
human performance. Robots and artificial intelligence systems are generating
documents better that human authors and in the medical field they are suggesting
treatments for ailments.
Automation in IT industry
will necessitate significant job redefinition. For example loan officers, in
banking industry will need to spend less time on processing and examining
paperwork but will spend their quality time communicating with clients and
processing their loans, thereby improving customer engagement.
Machines can augment human
capabilities to a great extent and help amplify the human expertise by allowing
the individual to focus on tasks that require their skill. Automation can
generate leads for organizations, helping salespeople increase their
interactions with customers and convert to more opportunities.
It is argued that automation
cannot replace emotional intelligence and creativity. Research shows that the
amount of time, individuals spend on activities requiring these capabilities is
extremely low. This leads us to explore the vast possibility of time that can
be spent on doing meaningful work. Automation replaces routine and repetitive
tasks, thus allowing individuals to utilize their creativity and enhance their emotional
intelligence.
A company with strong
automated processes will be more innovative and gives them an edge over their competitors.
Automaton helps in streamlining the processes of an organization.
Organizations are usually
concerned over the short-term impacts that automation could have. It is
advisable for organizations to pay close attention on the speed and direction
of automation and then decide when and how much to invest in automation.
As technology develops, artificial intelligence and robotics will make greater inroads into activities that today have a low potential for automation. One of the biggest technological breakthroughs would come if machines were to develop an understanding of language and emotions on par with humans. This would cause disruptions in finance, insurance and healthcare industries, in-turn creating new opportunities to grow. In marketing too, artificial intelligence has helped generate leads like never before. “Today’s mantra in marketing is to disrupt and grow”. Artificial intelligence will bring in a new wave of technological disruption with accurate ads, higher ROI combined with increased trust and transparency
IT companies need to think
strategically about which parts of their existing operations could benefit from
automation and then develop a framework for implementing the automation. Every
company needs to prioritize customer service. Automated phone lines have
allowed small and big companies to look after a huge customer base with
optimized performance. Companies that use automated phone lines can take
messages for inquiries and provide customers with information that a human
operator might struggle to remember. Websites are now having Chatbots that are
able to use AI to provide instant answers to visitors and prospective clients before
human intervention.
Taking the benefits into
consideration, it is tempting to dive in head-first and automate every domain
of the business. Here are a few tips to consider before automating your
business
Completely understand the process you wish to automate
Test the
tools before fully implementing them
While
calculating the return on investment, always think long term
Plan and
discuss required security issues
Implementing automation in an IT company involves a collaborative discussion of the teams to pool in the repetitive tasks performed by individuals & teams. This has proven to enhance customer experience. It is imperative to the organisational and business heads to slowly learn to work “on the business” instead of work “in the business”. Your time is worth much more, hence all other tasks could be strategically automated.
In the simplest non-technical terms, Internet of Things ( IoT), means taking objects in the world and connecting them with the internet that can collect and exchange data.
Every sector can benefit from sensor-based devices. Some of the areas where IoT has had huge influence are as follows:
Healthcare
• Smart bed cuts down on wait-times by 50 percent. The bed helps customize care and increase efficiency.
• Hardware
monitoring Sensor keeps tabs on MRI systems and instantly alerts IT personnel
if something is amiss.
• Sensors
help track personal health and can provide doctors with important data on
factors that contribute to chronic diseases.
• Sensors being fitted at seniors’ homes that send data to machine learning programs, which identify patterns that indicate problems.
Preventive
Maintenance
Industrial and military giants are implementing IoT on a large scale. Sensors feed data to analytics software, which predicts when and why machinery will break down. This is extremely important in terms of efficiency and the cost.
Manufacturing sector
IoT can
help monitor everything that happens on the factory floor and in the shipping
process, helping reduce errors and getting products to market more quickly.
Retailers
Utilising sensors in stores to monitor product activity, create a more visible supply chain and improve customer experiences’, reduces friction in the buying experience and helps customers to interact with products often in a virtual reality environment, before the purchase.
IoT Security issues
Despite all the benefits that IoT provides,
security issues have been a cause for concern. The reason being that every
internet-connected sensor is a potential attack point for hackers.
Multinational companies should be more concerned about the security implications
of IoT, since some countries do not monitor the types of devices or how data
can be collected by them. Without these standards in place, it’s much easier
for hackers to steal sensitive information and damage critical infrastructure.
These security issues have been preoccupying businesses, who are now setting standards to avoid the potential security breaches.
It is important to develop policies around the specifications IoT devices should have. Multinational companies should keep track of regulatory changes impacting IoT devices. Experts believe we are just on the cusp of some great advancements in business by utilising the potential of IoT. As companies add more and more of these smart devices, they gain more data to make intelligent decisions.
There have been a few widely publicised IoT related attacks that could leave the impression that IoT is highly insecure. But the actual scenario usually goes unreported. Many of these attacks were due to failures to implement even the most basic security measures.
The failure to implement basic security features should not lead us to conclude that Internet of Things is unsafe. PQube has decades of experience in IT security and hence employs the most efficient security standards to IoT.
Internet of Things does have some unique security challenges owing to the fact that the number of people who can access the devices are more. So the risk goes up. So all these aspects need to be considered while implementing the security protocols including the organisation’s broader network: clients,customers,suppliers,vendors and partners. Following are some of the factors to be considered and implemented for securing IoT.
Using data analytics
Using data analytics to anticipate when the threats are most likely to occur.
Limit device-to-device communication
By limiting the number of IoT devices that need to communicate with each other we can limit the damage in case an attack occurs.
Encrypt all data in transit
IoT devices need to incorporate industry standard encryption to ensure that the data is safe and secure during transfer.
A secure update mechanism
This mechanism involves one that receives an update from the vendor and checks the signature of the update to verify that it is valid.
Internet of things is emerging as the next big
revolution in the world of technology. .
Benefits of IoT
to businesses
Efficiency and productivity
By connecting a business’s key processes, the efficiency and productivity can be significantly boosted. This in turn boosts the revenues. It becomes easier to identify bottlenecks and eliminate/reduce them.
Reduction in wastage
IoT has been successfully adopted by several companies that have optimised the supply chain and improved efficiencies by accurately tracking and in the process reducing wastage.
Cost and downtime
Implementation of IoT has resulted in reduction in operational expenditure. For example, consider an instance when the failure of one small, but critical component could cause hours or days of downtime before the faulty component is traced and fixed. With IoT, engineers are already aware when a component would fail, several weeks in advance.
Data Sharing
Apart from offering access to consumer data,IoT devices track and record patterns in which a consumer interacts. Businesses are using this data to study buyer cycle, consumer requirements. This helps them come up with innovative inventions and methods for advertising.
The end goal for a business is achieving customer satisfaction. A platform that enables companies to get insights into their businesses and enhance customer experience will be highly beneficial.
Adoption of IoT device management platform enables organizations to create new revenue streams using insights gathered from analysing and monitoring real time data.
Businesses that are accepting the change, and are adopting the Internet of Things are seeing higher growth than the ones who still seem sceptical. The key to reap the benefits of this amazing technology called Internet of Things is balancing innovation with security.
PQube partners with your
business by understanding the challenges
and then delivers the best possible ways IoT can be implemented.
Investing in IoT, has helped in rapid expansions involving increased revenue streams and reduction in operating costs. PQube has emerged as a leader in helping businesses adopt the latest, most innovative technology standards that allow companies to make smarter products and making business decisions smarter.
The world is obsessed with productivity.
Everybody wants to know how we can get work done quickly with minimum effort,
so we can lead a fulfilling life.
There are a huge number of apps that claim to increase productivity, but research suggests something that cannot be obtained from these apps – physical vitality.
The practice of work flexibility is in sharp contrast to the traditional approach where there is a defined set of work hours for everyone.
But the most important thing to keep in mind while implementing the flexible approach in any organisation is, to very closely assess the mutual benefits to both the employees and the organisation, otherwise it may lead to chaos and failure.
A recent study reported in the International Journal of Workplace Health says that, other than a good night sleep, exercise is the most effective productivity tool at our disposal. This report also mentions that people who exercised during the day time were 22% more productive.
Restore and
Energize
It is a well known fact that the quality of work hours is more important than the quantity. Research shows that exercise build new connections among neurons of the brain that helps increase attention and focus.
Just like our smartphones, we need to recharge our batteries. This can be done through exercise, rest, play, pursuing your hobbies & passion that restores and energizes us.
As the old saying goes about the carpenter who didn’t have the time to stop and sharpen his axe ended up doing the work slower than his partner who was smart enough to take time off and sharpen his tool. This enabled him to do his work faster and more effectively.
How to Implement Work Flexibility Without Compromising on Productivity
Work flexibility does not mean coming and going as you please. It is a well-structured well planned framework . It needs to be well aligned with the values and mission of the organisation . The employees need to be tuned in and proper training provided. The first step is to choose the appropriate flexible work management based on the needs and requirements of both the organisation and the employees.
Compressed Work Week
Compressed work week involves working the same number of hours in a week but in fewer days. Most of the organizations have five working days with eight hours working each day. Under the compressed workweek schedule, the employees could choose to work ten hours everyday for four days and take the extra day off.
FlexTime
This gives the employees complete right to choose where to work and how many hours to work. Most organizations who follow this, have set some core working hours that they expect the employees to work . They have a good system in place to track remote working, through IP based attendance that helps to maintain great culture that fosters productivity while encouraging flexibility.
Customise to Meet Your Needs
Before implementing the flexible work hours structure, talk to your team. Ask for their inputs and analyse their needs. When this is done along with the decision making process, the flexible time management can be made a success. The employees get to enjoy the benefits that come along with this while the productivity and work quality still remains the best.
Tips for the Team
to Attain Work Life Balance
Set Clear Cut Goals
This will allow us to be more focused and productive at work. Know exactly the work that needs to be completed and the timeline for the completion.
Take Ownership For Your Work
For some, total autonomy can
lead to sloppy work as they are used to someone supervising them all the time.
Be accountable and responsible towards your work.
Respect boundaries
Separate your work life from your personal life. Never discuss work related stuff at home and vice-versa.
Plan your day
Always have a to do list with you. Plan the day the night before and set priorities.
Vacations with family
Plan vacations with family. Spending quality time with family and friends will get you re-energized and come back to office with new zeal and enthusiasm.
Anger and stress
Anger and stress are hazardous to performance. As much as possible to achieve efficiency at work, we need to work on our emotional intelligence. Positive emotions build interest and energize. Negative emotions restrict thinking. A person with a positive outlook are more satisfied with work and this in turn increases productivity.
An alarming report from a
research conducted in 2018, states that people spend an average of 2.8 hours
only on productive tasks per day. The rest of the day is spent on neutral
activities and distracting activities!
It also states that only 70% of the work gets done in the normal working hours.
Biggest Threats to
Work Life Balance
Workplace distractions, wasting time and simply being inefficient are all eating into your work life balance. The biggest offender to maintaining a good work life balance is found to be the habit of Checking e-mail and IM frequently. Most people are spending quality office time on checking email and other communications tool. 21% of our working hours is spent on our devices for entertainment, news and social media.
Our Ultimate Goal
The line between work and all other things in life is becoming increasingly blurred. We have less time than we usually think, and we end up working later in the evenings and on weekends just to catch up. The more we are able to set the boundaries on our workdays and counteract the distractions, multitasking and communication overload that take away our precious productive time, the more we can stay healthier, happier and find a balance.
Life @ PQube
At PQube, we understand the significance of maintaining a work-life balance. It all starts with setting up the ground rules first viz communication and proper training. We utilize a task management software, that helps us to be accountable and encourages work-life balance. Our performance oriented work culture allows our team to spend time on their personal pursuits while still engaging in meaningful work. To accomplish this everyone in the team is aware of their goals and what is expected from them, at the same time they are accountable for those outcomes.
jQuery has been the savior for so many new and coming Web Developers, including myself. If you wanted to learn Web Development back in the day, learning jQuery was an absolute given. This was mainly because jQuery took much of the cross-browser compatibility issues out and enabled developers to write code without having to worry about whether the features that they are implementing will work on all browsers.
But with improvements in browser standards and most of jQuery’s API’s integrated into JavaScript, jQuery has become a little redundant. Moreover, with native browser API’s it is so much easier to debug code, and being native, most of these API’s offer better performance than jQuery’s API’s. Besides, you will have one less library to add to your script imports. If you’re still not sold on parting with jQuery maybe this answer will help.
So, if you’re considering a move away from jQuery, I have compiled a list of common jQuery methods and API’s that people use, with their Vanilla JS alternatives (Vanilla JS is a fancy name for plain JavaScript code without the use of any libraries). Let’s dive in!
Querying the DOM
The bread and butter of jQuery is it’s amazing ability to query DOM elements. This is demonstrated below:
jQuery('div.home')
However, you can achieve the same thing with JavaScript using it document.querySelector() and document.querySelectorAll() methods. Below is their implementation.
document.querySelector('div.home')
This method always returns the first element that matches the selector. If you’re expecting to query multiple elements, you will have to use the querySelectorAll() method.
document.querySelectorAll('img').forEach((_el, index) => {
//do stuff with _el here
})
querySelectoryAll() will return an array of matched elements, hence the use of forEach to iterate over each element.
.()html
.html() method of jQuery is used to get or set the HTML content of a node/element.
To do the same in JavaScript you can use the .innerHtml property of any HTML element.
Let’s say you need to get the HTML content of a div element with class main-div. You could do this in JavaScript like this.
var htmlContent = document.querySelector('.main-div').innerHtml;
Similarly to set the HTML content of the same div, you could do something like this:
Notice that I pass in the index to the anonymous function here. You don’t really need it in this case, but it’s a good practice to keep the index of each element of the array handy. You never know when you may need it.
.val()
.val() method of jQuery is used to get or set the value of an input element.
To get or set the value of an input element in JavaScript, you can use the value property of that element.
To set the value of an input element with class input-box to ‘new’
var inputValue = document.querySelector('.input-box').value;
.text()
jQuery offers .text() method to get all the content of an element without the markup. e.g., using jQuery to get the text of <p>Hi</p> element will return the string ‘Hi’. This can be very useful when you’re trying to get the content actually visible in the web-page.
That being said, every HTML element has a property “innerText” that essentially holds the same value.
let textValue = document.querySelector('.main-div').innerText;
Styling the DOM
One of the most exciting features of jQuery is the ability to modify the styling of our DOM. This is highly useful when you’re trying to have a visual feedback to a user interaction.
Modifying styles can be done by one of two ways:
Adding/Removing Classes: To add or remove a class you will most definitely use .addClass() or .removeClass() methods that ship with jQuery. To do the same thing in JavaScript, you can use the classList property of an element. This can be done as shown below. To add the class testClass to an element with Id testElement document.querySelector('#testElement').classList.add('testClass');
To remove the class testClass from the element with Id testElement document.querySelector('#testElement').classList.remove('testClass');
Adding/Modifying CSS: To directly change the CSS of an element we use the .css() method provided by jQuery. Once again, this is fairly simple to do in JavaScript. To set a style for an element, we simply set the value of that style as exposed by the style property of that element. document.querySelector('#testElement').style.color = '#ffffff';
This will set the color of the element with Id testElement to white. Note: Since the styles of element are exposed as JavaScript object properties, you won’t be able to use properties such as background-color directly as there is a “-” in the property name. In these situations, you should simply use the camelCased version of these properties. e.g., document.querySelector('#testElement').style.backgroundColor = '#000000';
This will set the background-color of element with Id testElement to black.
.attr()
Setting and retrieving values of the attributes of HTML elements is once again very useful when developing a web application. You may need to get the value of a data- attribute that is storing important data while working with your application. jQuery provides this ability by exposing .attr() method. You can use it with one parameter to get the value of an attribute or use an overload with two parameters to set the value of an HTML attribute.
In JavaScript every attribute of an HTML element is exposed as a property of that element. This means that to set the value of the src attribute of an img element, you can simply do the following:
The getAttribute() and setAttribute() bear a striking resemblance to jQuery’s attr() method. So, getting used to these shouldn’t be that difficult.
.show() / .hide()
Once again, two of the most widely used jQuery methods are the .show() and .hide() methods. These methods do exactly what they say they do, hide or show HTML elements. In their essence, these methods are simply modifying the display style property of elements. So, we can use simple style modification to achieve the same thing.
One of my favorite and most used jQuery functionality is sending HTTP requests using AJAX. However, we have to understand that jQuery.ajax() is a wrapper around existing JavaScript functionality. There is no doubt that jQuery makes using AJAX a breeze, but it’s not why we’re here, is it?
To send a POST request to the URL ‘home/sendmessage’ with the data {id: 23, name: ‘faisal’}, we’d do the following:
let request = new XMLHttpRequest();
// Set a event handler when the status of the request changes
request.onreadystatechange = function(response) {
if (request.readystate == 4 && request.status == 200) {
// do stuff with the response object
}
}// Open a Post request to the url home/sendmessage asynchronously.
request.open('POST', 'home/sendmessage', true);// Set the request header/s
request..setRequestHeader('Content-type', 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded');//Send parameterized data as part of the Post request
request.send('id=23&name=faisal');
That’s it. You post request will be sent to the server.
If you’re a jQuery developer, you will know that these aren’t all the methods and features that jQuery ships with. There are definitely more, but I’ve simply tried to address the most common ones just to give you an idea that life without jQuery in the browser is possible.
I hope that it’s enough to push you towards using more and more JavaScript.
Managing
recruitment and selection process is one of the most critical, time consuming
tasks. It is essential for any organization to recruit well qualified and suitable
employees. As a growing company, you need the right tools to manage your hiring
process. A significant amount of time and resource can be taken up with the
hiring process unless you automate.
According to LinkedIn, the most important
recruiting KPIs are:
* Quality of hire
* Time to hire
Experts believe that by streamlining some
aspects of the recruiting process, recruitment automation will enhance a human
recruiter’s capabilities.
Here are some major ways recruitment
automation is changing recruiting
Assess them Before You Interview Them
You could
assess or gauge prioritization abilities, IQ and other relevant qualities even
before the aspiring candidates step into your office. A
vast majority of talent acquisition leaders say the hardest part of recruitment
is identifying the right candidates from a large pool of applicants. The system
assesses prospective candidates by surfacing key data points that cannot be
found on resumes. It can be used to track the candidates’ career highlights,
likelihood of switching jobs, company fit and aptitude.
Ensure Consistency in Hiring Process
The
recruitment process involves a number of steps and when done manually there are
huge mistakes created due to human error. The entire process can be streamlined
and automated.
Free Yourself for More Productive
Tasks
Free
yourself or your team from mundane tasks that can be automated and utilize the
same resources for other productive tasks, thus increasing efficiency and
productivity.
Automate Screening Questions
Filter through
hundreds of applicants and end up with only those candidates who are apt for
your organizations vision and values, in the process helping you weed out the
candidates who do not meet your requirements. Just imagine the number of hours
you would have otherwise spent interviewing these candidates, setting up
infrastructure for assessment tests and multiple rounds of interviews.
Evaluating Common Sense, Emotional Intelligence, Communication, Fluency and
many important KPI’s are key to “Quality of Hire” while screening for
prospective team members, and this can be fully automated with industry
standard baselines.
Keep Candidates Informed via
Automated Emails
Recruiters
waste a lot of time responding to calls/emails from candidates they have
interviewed. Use automated emails to let them know the status of their
application.
Automate the Offer Process
The system
can generate automatic offer letters, contracts and other documents along with
rejection letters based on customizable workflows tailored to each organization’s
recruiting standards.
Automate Employee Onboarding
Aspiring applicants have already gone
through the process of application and filling in details and majority of the
organizations have to go through the same basic information to be filled in
again with the employees who join. By connecting the Recruiting Platform with
Company Portal systems, a vast majority of the data can be copied over and will
assist in speeding up the on boarding process from Day One. There are some
MNC’s who have even adopted completing paperwork via digital transformations
even before the employee show up on Day One. Automation can help with a number of activities
such as setting up IT access, notifying Product/Project stakeholders,
operations workflow for new joiners and so on.
Screening resumes: Automate score | rating
Industry experts consider screening resumes is still the most time consuming part of recruiting. Upto, 88% of resumes received for a role are considered unqualified. On an average, a recruiter spends 23 hours screening resumes for a single hire. Through the hiring automation platform, the score/ rating is allocated to the candidates based on the inputs they provide. They are assessed on several levels such as aptitude, technical skills and other relevant skills. A filter incorporated in the system helps to select only relevant skill assessment categories for a particular role.
Helps in having a pipeline of
Talent
Using the hiring automation platform helps
in creating a database of the qualified candidates you were not able to hire,
but is suitable for another role, down the road.
Looking Ahead…
In 2019, finding top talent will depend on the recruiters’ ability to intelligently automate their work flow.
It is
imperative to ensure that the recruitment process is conducted in a smooth and
consistent manner so as to ensure that we hire the best talent in the market. Just as salespeople and marketers have benefited from software enabled
automation in recent years, recruiters are increasingly turning to automated
platforms for hiring the best talents
Armed with cutting edge tools and
insights, recruiters can refine the process, eliminate inefficiencies, mitigate
biases and get across to the top talent in minimum time. According to a survey
conducted, 75% of recruiters say technology will play a big role in their
company hiring process in 2019.
Majority of recruiters worldwide are happy to
consider a more data driven approach, most of them do not have time to turn the
data to actionable insights. It is found that data driven recruiting teams are
far outperforming their peers. Leveraging these insights, to optimise the
recruiting strategy, increases the team productivity and gives the organisation
a competitive advantage. Intelligent and smart way of recruiting through hiring
automation helps to analyse candidates’ data quickly and make decisions faster.
It helps to ensure that all the best fit candidates were identified and
engaged, resulting in better quality hires and a higher performing organisation
Adopting automation platforms is helping
recruiters screen candidates and shortlist quality applicants in record time.
Research also suggests that most companies
depend on employee referrals for some important roles to avoid hiring misfits.
This could negatively impact their ability to attract the best talent.
Utilising automation, increases efficiency, offloads tedious mundane and
repetitive tasks. As a result of this, it helps in reducing time-to-fill and
cost-per-hire.
PQube has been in the forefront to address these pain points of sourcing and recruiting process. Get yourself a top notch, best in class, custom made hiring automation platform and some peace of mind. Through our end-to- end automation platform, you can speed up candidate discovery and qualification processes and float best-fit candidates to the top of your talent pipeline. Work Smarter, Not harder!
“Technology is not a tool. It can give learners a voice that they might not have had before“ – George Couros
Writing small puzzle games is a nice way of improving your programming skills as those games tend to present you with challenge after challenge and force you to really put tremendous thought into writing your code.
One such game is the classic Tic-Tac-Toe.
In this little walk-through (read long and descriptive) about writing an unbeatable tic-tac-toe, I will be using Vanilla JavaScript for logic and HTML/CSS for UI. I won’t be concentrating much on UI part of it, because, duh!
Another little disclaimer – we will be concentrating on logic primarily and code will come second to that. Again, if you want to skip the “walk-through” and jump right to the code, I have a public repository on GitHub at https://github.com/FaisalST32/tic-tac-toe. I also have a live version of the game available at https://games.faisalrashid.online/tictactoe/
So, let’s dive in.
First of all you need to create the UI. Just use simple HTML to create 9 input boxes, or divs even to hold your X’s and O’s. The id’s of these input boxes are important as they will be our reference to the X’s and O’s. To keep it consistent with the positioning of our boxes, I have given the input boxes the id’s “0-0” to “2-2”. To visualize:
0-0
0-1
0-2
1-0
1-1
1-2
2-0
2-1
2-2
This will give us an easy to use 3×3 matrix. You can design your UI whatever way you want. It should simply employ this form of queryable HTML elements.
Here’s a screenshot of my UI. Simple boxes with a little gloss of CSS.
Now, the logic! First of all, whenever a user, or a participant in this case, clicks or taps an empty box, the value of that box should change to either an X or an O, depending upon whose turn it is.
Implementing that is simple. I use a global variable to hold the ‘currentPlayer‘. This variable has a value of either X or O. Then I simply write a method to toggle current player, whenever a box is tapped. I call the method changePlayer.
All this is started by tapping a box. So, we need a function to get us started. We write a function that marks the box with X or O and changes player. We call the function onCheckBox. So far, the function checks a box and and then changes player.
Now, while the boxes are being tapped, we need to keep track of the checked boxes. Using an array should help us get this job done. Simply holding the id’s of all the boxes is useful, but it’s not enough. We will definitely need to hold the id’s (co-ordinates in this case) as well as the player who checked the box. So, our checkedBoxes array will be an array of objects of this form:
We now have two global variables – one to hold currentPlayer and other to hold checkedBoxes.
Another thing that I like to keep track of is the Turn Count. I can get that from the chekedBoxes array, but this way it’s simpler and very useful if I’m manipulating the checkedBoxes array.
Since we will be writing a Player vs CPU mode only (github repo contains both 1p and 2p modes), these are all the global variables that we are going to need – checkedBoxes, currentPlayer and turnCount.
NOTE: It’s always good practice to keep your global variables at a minimum to avoid dependencies and unexpected behavior within functions.
I believe our onCheckBox method is now ready. This is what it looks like
function onCheckBox(element) {
checkedBoxes.push({ box: element.id, player: currentPlayer });
checkElement(element);
turnCount++;
var gameStatus =checkWinner(); //Will come to this method in a bit
switchPlayer();
}function checkElement(element){
element.value = currentPlayer;
element.disabled ="disabled";
}function switchPlayer() {
currentPlayer = currentPlayer =="X"?"O":"X";
document.querySelector('.current-player').textContent = currentPlayer;
}
We are passing the clicked Html element as one of the parameters to the method to access it’s id for coordinates. Everytime we check a box we need to check whether there is a winner or whether the game is drawn.
This brings us to our the checkWinner method. This method simply checks whether the X’s or O’s are in a single line (rules of tic-tac-toe) to determine whether there is a winner. It’s not very difficult to build that logic. We query the checkedBoxes array and find all the coordinates with player X. If the coordinates follow the pattern (a-0, a-1, a-2) or (0-a, 1-a, 2-a) where a = 0 or 1 or 2, then we have a horizontal or vertical line checked. Well, diagonal lines are a little tricky. For right to left diagonal, we use (a-a, b-b, c-c) and for left to right diagonal we use (0-2, 1-1, 2-0). If we find any of these patterns in the checkedBox matrix then the ‘player’ having the pattern is the winner. If none of these patterns match, then we simply check whether one of the two players has checked 5 boxes to determine that it’s a draw.
function checkWinner(isCheckOnly=false) {
if (currentPlayer =="X") {
//Get all the boxes marked by Player X
var xs = checkedBoxes.filter(item=> item.player =="X").map(value=> {
return { x: Number(value.box.split("-")[0]), y: Number(value.box.split("-")[1]) }
});
returncalculateScore(xs);
}
else if (currentPlayer =="O") {
//Get all the boxes marked by Player O
var os = checkedBoxes.filter(item=> item.player =="O").map(value=> {
return { x: Number(value.box.split("-")[0]), y: Number(value.box.split("-")[1]) }
});
returncalculateScore(os);
}
}function calculateScore(positions) {
//Check right diagonalif (positions.filter(i=> { return i.x == i.y }).length ==3) {
return'game over';
}//Check Left diagonal
if (positions.filter(i=> { return (i.x ==0&& i.y ==2)
|| (i.x ==1&& i.y ==1)
|| (i.x ==2&& i.y ==0) }).length ==3) {
return'game over';
}
//check horizontal match
for (var i =0; i <3; i++) {
var consecutiveHorizontal = positions.filter(p=> p.x == i);
if (consecutiveHorizontal.length ==3) {
return'game over';
}
//check vertical match
var consecutiveVertical = positions.filter(p=> p.y == i);
if (consecutiveVertical.length ==3) {
return'game over';
}
}
//check draw
if (positions.length ==5) {
return'game drawn';
}
//if none of the conditions match 'game on'
return'game on';
}
Here I’m delegating the responsibility of finding result to calculateScore method. These two methods are essentially translating what we said above to JavaScript code. Nothing fancy here.
Let’s try something now. Shall we? I believe our game is now ready to handle all the tic-tac-toe logic. What remains is making it unbeatable. To make the game unbeatable, I want to set some ground rules to avoid making this post excruciatingly long (you’re kidding, right). The CPU will always play second and will be primarily focused on not letting the opponent win. So, our onCheckBoxmethod will see the addition of the method computerPlays for CPU’s turn.
function onCheckBox(element) {
checkedBoxes.push({ box: element.id, player:
currentPlayer });
checkElement(element);
turnCount++;
var
gameStatus = checkWinner();
switchPlayer();
if (turnCount %2 == 1&&
gameStatus == 'game on'){
computerPlays();
}
}
As you can see the computerPlays method will only be called if the turnCount is odd, ie, it’s 2nd, 4th, 6th or 8th turn, and if gameStatus returned by the checkWinner method is ‘game on’ as there is no point in continuing the game, if the game is already over. To understand how to counter a human move, I came up with 5 cases. These five cases in the order of their priority are:
First Move
Finishing Move that allows CPU to win the game.
Saving Move that allows CPU to save the game.
Predicting a move that will trap the CPU and avoiding it.
And if none of these fit, a Random move.
Here’s a sneak preview of our computerPlays method.
function computerPlays() {
var nextBoxCoords;
if(turnCount ==1){
nextBoxCoords =computeFirstMove();
}
if (!nextBoxCoords){
nextBoxCoords =computeFinishingMove();
} if (!nextBoxCoords) {
nextBoxCoords =computeSavingMove();
}
if (!nextBoxCoords)
nextBoxCoords =predictTrappingMove();
if (!nextBoxCoords) {
nextBoxCoords =computeRandomMove();
}
var nextBox = document.querySelector(`[id='${nextBoxCoords}']`);
onCheckBox(nextBox);
}
1. First Move
Computing first move is out of experience, although, I could have written an algorithm for it. But to avoid complexity, I just went with past experience. If it’s CPU’s first move, we need to find where the opponent played. If it’s center box, we return a corner box. Similarly, if he played a corner box, we return an edge box adjacent to it and finally if he played an edge box, we return the center box. By the way, 1-1 is the center box, 0-1, 1-0, 1-2, 2-1 are the edge boxes and, you guessed it, 0-0, 0-2, 2-0, 2-2 are the corner boxes.
Here it is,
function computeFirstMove(){
var playedMove = checkedBoxes.map(b=> b.box)[0];
var edgeMoves = ['0-1', '1-0', '1-2', '2-1'];
var cornerMoves = ['0-0', '0-2', '2-0', '2-2'];
var centerMove = ['1-1'];
if(edgeMoves.find(m=> m == playedMove))
returnedgeMoveResponse(playedMove);
else if(cornerMoves.find(m=> m == playedMove))
return'1-1';
else if(centerMove.find(m=> m == playedMove))
return cornerMoves[Math.floor(Math.random()*cornerMoves.length)];
}function edgeMoveResponse(playedMove){
if(playedMove =='1-2')
return'0-2';
else if (playedMove =="0-1")
return"0-0";
else if (playedMove =="1-0")
return"2-0";
else if(playedMove =='2-1')
return'2-0';
}
To avoid cramming up the computeFirstMove method, I moved out the edgeMoveResponse method. Now, that we got the first move sorted, let’s move to the next check – computeFinishingMove.
2. Finishing Move that allows CPU to win the game.
If the opponent is there for the taking we would prioritize taking him. Let’s say we have the following situation:
Since, it’s CPU’s turn (O) we would definitely want to check the lower-right box. That’s where our computeFinishingMove method comes in. It simply iterates over all the remaining boxes and checks them one by one. It then calls the checkWinner method on each iteration and if there’s a winner, just returns the box of that iteration as the ‘nextBoxCoords‘ to the computerPlays method. Here’s the code:
function computeFinishingMove() {
var remainingMoves =getRemainingMoves();
var finishingMoveCoords;
for (var move of remainingMoves) {
checkedBoxes.push({ box: move, player: currentPlayer });
var nextBox = document.querySelector(`[id='${move}']`)
if (checkWinner() =='game over') {
finishingMoveCoords = move;
onUncheckBox(nextBox, true);
break;
}
onUncheckBox(nextBox, true);
}
if(finishingMoveCoords){
console.log('Playing Finishing Move')
return finishingMoveCoords;
}
else{
return'';
}
}function getRemainingMoves() {
var allMoves = ['0-0', '0-1', '0-2',
'1-0', '1-1', '1-2',
'2-0', '2-1', '2-2',]
var playedMoves = checkedBoxes.map(b=> b.box);
return allMoves.filter(m=>!playedMoves.find(move=> move == m));
}
function onUncheckBox(element, isImplicit=false) {
checkedBoxes = checkedBoxes.filter(b=> b.box != element.id);
if (!isImplicit) {
element.value ='';
element.removeAttribute("disabled");
turnCount--;
switchPlayer();
}
}
While checking a box to check for winner, we have to make sure that we uncheck that box after the iteration completes to avoid bad data in checkedBoxes array. For that matter, we employ the onUncheckBox method above. If there is no ‘finishing move’ available, we check for the next condition – computeSavingMove.
3. Saving Move that allows CPU to save the game.
Consider the following scenario:
Here it’s CPU’s (O) turn to play. Clearly playing anywhere other than top middle box will cause the game to end in the next turn. So, we have to definitely check that box. To do this, we write a method similar to previous method where we this time iterate over all the remaining boxes and during each iteration fill them with opponent’s mark and then call the checkWinner method. If it returns ‘game over’ in any of the iterations then that is our desired box. Here’s what this translates to in JavaScript.
function computeSavingMove() { var remainingMoves =getRemainingMoves(); switchPlayer(); var savingMoveCoords; for (var move of remainingMoves) { checkedBoxes.push({ box: move, player: currentPlayer }); var nextBox = document.querySelector(`[id='${move}']`) if (checkWinner() =='game over') { savingMoveCoords = move; onUncheckBox(nextBox, true); break;} onUncheckBox(nextBox, true);} switchPlayer(); if(savingMoveCoords){ console.log('Playing Saving Move') return savingMoveCoords;}}
You might argue that this is a clear violation of the DRY (Don’t Repeat Yourself) principle. But, sometimes, to keep the code readable and avoid complexities, you may want to take a rain check on the DRY. To make sure that I’m iterating with opponent’s move and note CPU’s, I’m calling the switchPlayer method before iterating over remainingMoves. If none of the remaining moves is a saving move we then turn our attention to the trickiest condition – predictTrappingMove.
4. Predicting a move that will trap the CPU and avoiding it.
A ‘Trapping Move’, as I like to call it is when the opponent checks a box that leaves you with two Finishing boxes to fill, ultimately leading you to lose the game. Here’s a screenshot to show exactly that:
In the image, it’s Player O’s turn and he is in a lose-lose situation. If he check tile 0-0, Player’s X will check 2-2 to win the game and vice versa. So, the only way out of this situation is to avoid it. That’s where our next method, predictTrappingMove comes in.
This method isn’t complicated in terms of execution but the planning needs to be spot on. So, what we do is, every time the opponent plays a move, we check for the possibility of a trapping move, the next time he plays. To achieve this, we will have to one by one check every box with our move. On each turn, we will then have to check each remaining box with the opponents move. Then, we check whether more than one winning move was created as a result of that. I know, I know, what the hell, right? Okay let’s break it down. Suppose we are in this situation:
The opponent is playing for O’s. If I, for instance, play 1-0, the opponent can easily play 0-2 and trap me like this.
Since, there was no finishing or saving move available, I wasn’t able to detect this. To detect this, I will have to check every single box till I find one that’s safe. I can accomplish that by first checking box. Then I will play opponent’s turn on each of the remaining boxes.
This way, I can determine whether any of his moves will result in a trapping move. Any of my turns that I don’t find a trapping move anywhere, will be my next move. For some turns, it won’t be possible for the opponent to play all the available boxes, eg, a turn where he has to play a saving move. In those cases, I won’t be iterating over all his possible moves, but just the saving ones. I’ll be making the assumption that the opponent will try to save himself if I play a move that forces him to do so. Okay, this is how it all translates to JavaScript.
function predictTrappingMove() {
var checkedBoxesBackup = checkedBoxes.slice();
var remainingMoves =getRemainingMoves();
var nextMove;
var moveFound;
for(var move of remainingMoves){
checkedBoxes.push({box: move, player: currentPlayer})
switchPlayer();
//Check if the opponent needs to play a saving move
var savingMove = computeSavingMove();
if(savingMove){
checkedBoxes.push({box: savingMove, player: currentPlayer});
if(checkTrap() =='no trap'){
checkedBoxes.pop();
switchPlayer();
nextMove = move;
break;
}
checkedBoxes.pop();
switchPlayer();
continue;
}
//If no saving move is required, check each position
else{
switchPlayer();
for(var opponentMove ofgetRemainingMoves()){
switchPlayer();
moveFound =true;
checkedBoxes.push({box: opponentMove, player: currentPlayer});
if(checkTrap() =='trapped'){
moveFound =false;
checkedBoxes.pop();
switchPlayer();
break;
}
checkedBoxes.pop();
switchPlayer();
}
}
checkedBoxes.pop();
if(moveFound){
nextMove = move;
break;
}
}checkedBoxes = checkedBoxesBackup;
return nextMove;
}
function checkTrap(){
var boxes =getRemainingMoves();
var winningMoveCount =0;
for(var freeMove of boxes){
checkedBoxes.push({box: freeMove, player: currentPlayer});
var result = checkWinner(true);
if(result =='game over')
winningMoveCount++
checkedBoxes.pop();
}
if(winningMoveCount >1){
return 'trapped';
}
else{
return 'no trap';
}
}
Here, predictTrappingMove is first checking a box on my behalf. Then, it’s checking whether the opponent needs to play a saving move to counter that. If yes, it’s calling the checkTrap method to see whether more than one saving conditions were created on that opponent move.
If not, that is the move that will be returned and played. If that’s not the case, however, and the opponent’s saving move created a trap for us, we need to move forward and check the remaining boxes for ourselves, and then in each turn check the remaining boxes on the opponent’s behalf and call the checkTrap method each time. If any of the boxes creates a ‘trapping move’, we avoid that move and keep iterating over remaining moves, till we find a safe move to play.
It may be a little confusing still, but if you go over the code a few times, it should all be clear.
5. Random move
I wrote the computeRandomMove in the first versions of the game to calculate a move if all checks don’t return a move. However, it’s not relevant now as checkTrappingMove will always return a move, irrespective of everything. Here’s the code still if you need it.
function computeRandomMove() { var remainingMoves =getRemainingMoves(); return remainingMoves[Math.floor(Math.random()*remainingMoves.length)]}
It’s simply leveraging the Math.random() method of JavaScript and returning a box based on that from the remainingMoves. So, that’s it. You’re ready to create your unbeatable tic-tac-toe. You can go ahead and write your own with the same principles or even improve over these.
You can even try to write a method that forcesTrappingMove on the opponent making your player a little more aggressive. If you got this far, thanks for your patience. Till next time!
TL;DR Writing code to create an unbeatable tic-tac-toe is simple, but coming up with the logic is what matters.
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