WTOP • 11th December 2020

2020 – The Year of Truly Being Home for the Holidays and How To Make It Fun

2020 is the year of truly being home for the holidays. This holiday season might not be the same, but there are still ways to celebrate and enjoy this time with loved ones. Here’s a list of ideas for celebrating the holiday season at home in 2020.

WTOP • 12th November 2020

Celebrating Thanksgiving in 2020

Thanksgiving is a time to show gratitude in the company of family and friends – but how does one do that while continuing social distancing and following safety guidelines? Traditions might look a little different this year, but there are still ways you can celebrate the holiday with loved ones. Check out our list of ideas for celebrating Thanksgiving in 2020.

WTOP • 16th October 2020

Creating Halloween & Fall Magic At Home

Have you thought about how to celebrate Halloween while continuing social distancing and following safety guidelines? There are still plenty of ways to enjoy the spookiest day of the year, even without trick or treating . Check out our list of ideas for how to celebrate Halloween in your home or backyard.

WTOP • 18th September 2020

Preparing for Fall: The “To Do” List for Your Yard

Have you thought about how the colder months may affect your backyard? Get started early on repairs and maintenance to your lawn or fence. Check out this to-do list when planning for this fall season.

WTOP • 19th August 2020

Let Long Fence help you create your dream backyard

Have you been thinking about changing your backyard set up but don’t know where to start? Browse the variety of options that offers to make your backyard look brand new. Their team is here to help you decide on what you want to do or how to improve and repair anything you already have set up.

WTOP • 14th July 2020

Still on the fence about leaving your house?

Still on the fence about leaving your house? Not to worry. Your backyard oasis is the perfect place for the whole family to have fun and stay safe. Check out these fun activities you can set up on your yard or to keep yourself and the kids occupied during these hot summer days.

WTOP • 15th June 2020

On the fence about leaving your house?

In times like these, home is more than just a safe space. It’s where we find comfort, entertainment, and a place to have small gatherings. As the weather shifts from spring to summer, the backyard is essential to enjoying time outdoors.

WTOP • 5th February 2020

Drive to Dine: destination spots for romantic meals

Plan a drive to one of these restaurants to have a dining experience unlike any other. You will find the best selection of restaurants for your next date night adventure in Washington, DC, Maryland, and Virginia. Pick a Michelin star restaurant or a romantic dining destination to visit soon!

WTOP • 8th January 2020

Best winter getaways in driving distance from DC

Whether it’s a romantic weekend for two, a few days on the slopes with a group of friends or quality time and fun with family, your perfect winter vacation is only a drive away. Escape the bustle of the city and take a trip to one of these amazing winter getaways located in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, DC.

WTOP • 12th December 2019

Best holiday markets for last minute gifts

Looking to shop for those last minute gifts for your family and friends? You will be surprised at the selection of handcrafted items you can find at a holiday market. Take a drive to one of these holiday markets located in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, DC to find presents you won’t find anywhere else!

WTOP • 15th November 2019

10 must-have car accessories this holiday season- just in time for Cyber Monday!

Thanksgiving is fast approaching and soon enough holiday shopping will be in full swing. Treat yourself to one of these must-have car accessories, perfect for your morning commute or family car rides to see relatives this holiday season. From your commute to work, weekend excursions or trips to see relatives during the holidays, it’s likely you’ll be spending a lot of time in the car. Enjoy your driving experience with these must-have car accessories!

WTOP • 11th October 2019

10 hiking spots to see fall foliage around DC

Take a scenic drive to check out these hiking spots around Washington, DC. These trails should be full of autumn colors by mid-October. Make sure to take in the spectacular views and enjoy your fall hike!

WTOP • 16th September 2019

10 ways to make your screened porch feel like home

Adding elements of decor will make your screened porch feel just like another room in your home! Here are 10 ideas to turn your screened porch into an indoor-outdoor living room.

WTOP • 3rd September 2019

12 fall events within driving distance of DC

Drive a road less traveled or a main highway to one of these fun filled fall events in the DC, Maryland, and Virginia area in the coming months. Enjoy these events within driving distance and get ready to plan your next day trip!

Federal News Network • 3rd April 2019

Using a no-code approach to increase flexibility and reduce costs in federal IT

IT modernization is constantly in flux, leaving federal agencies with the problem of large systems that need to be transformed in a rapidly changing environment. The traditional approach of code-based development requires regular updating and rewriting, building and updating systems as IT needs change, slowing down productivity.

Federal News Network • 27th March 2019

Adding Zero Trust as a cybersecurity, IT modernization capability

As federal data and applications migrate to the cloud, expanding accessibility to a growing list of devices and users, federal networks face ever-increasing vulnerability to cyber threats. The security concept of Zero Trust has quickly gained traction as not just a possibility, but a necessity for mitigating cybersecurity risks alongside IT modernization. The concept is simple in theory – no person or location should be trusted by default, even if they are inside the network perimeter.

ParkMyCloud • 12th September 2017

Interview: Hybrid Events Group + to Automate EC2 Instance Scheduling and Optimize AWS Infrastructure

We talked with Jedidiah Hurt, DevOps and technical lead at Hybrid Events Group, about how his company is using ParkMyCloud to automate EC2 instance scheduling, saving hours of development work. Below is a transcript of our conversation.

ParkMyCloud • 19th September 2017

How to Optimize Cloud Spend with

The focus on how to optimize cloud spend is now as relentless as the initial surge was to migrate workloads from ‘on-prem’ to public cloud. A lot of this focus, and resultant discussions, were in regards to  options related to the use of Reserved Instances (RI’s), Spot Instances,or other pre-pay options. The pay-up-front discount plan makes sense  when you have some degree of visibility on future needs, and when there is no ‘turn-if-off’ option, which we here at ParkMyCloud call “parking”.

ParkMyCloud • 26th September 2017

Reduce RDS Costs with

Thanks to the ability to shut down instances with a start/stop scheduler, users of Amazon’s database service can finally save time and reduce RDS costs. Until June 2017, the only way to accomplish this feat was by copying and deleting instances, running the risk of losing transaction logs and automatic backups. While Amazon’s development of the start/stop scheduler is useful and provides a level of cost savings, it also comes with issues of its own.

ParkMyCloud • 3rd October 2017

Managing Microsoft Azure VMs with

Microsoft has made it easy for companies to get started using Microsoft Azure VMs for development and beyond. However, as an organization’s usage grows past a few servers, it becomes necessary to manage both costs and users and can become complex quickly. ParkMyCloud simplifies cloud management of Microsoft Azure VMs by giving you options to create teams of users, groups of instances, and schedule resources easily.

ParkMyCloud • 5th October 2017

Why We Love the AWS IoT Button

The AWS IoT button is a simple wi-fi device with endless possibilities. If you’re an Amazon Prime member, you’re probably familiar with the hardware that inspired the IoT button – the Amazon Dash button. The wi-fi connected Dash Button can be used to reorder your favorite Amazon products automatically, making impulse buys with the click of a button.

ParkMyCloud • 8th November 2017

Launches App to Meet Demand for Mobile Cloud Cost Optimization

November 8, 2017 (Dulles, VA) – ParkMyCloud, the leading enterprise platform for continuous cost control in public cloud, announced today the release of a new iOS app that allows users to park idle instances directly from their mobile devices. The app makes it easy for ParkMyCloud customers to reduce cloud waste and cut monthly cloud spend by 65% or more, now with even more capability and ease of use.

ParkMyCloud • 1st December 2017

Cloud Service Provider Comparison - Part Two: IBM vs Oracle

For the second part of our cloud service provider comparison, we’ll continue our discussion of “secondary” cloud providers with two longtime tech industry giants: IBM vs Oracle.

ParkMyCloud • 8th December 2017

Three Big AWS re:Invent Announcements from 2017

AWS re:Invent announcements were in full swing at the conference last week. In addition to all the sessions, workshops, pub crawl, DJ-spinning and all sorts of educational experiences and entertainment options, the technology announcements are really what drive the buzzl. While it’s impossible to cover them all, we picked three big announcements from this year’s AWS re:Invent that will certainly be game-changers.

ParkMyCloud • 14th December 2017

New in ParkMyCloud: Visualize AWS Usage Data Trends

We are excited to share the latest release in ParkMyCloud: animated heat map displays. This builds on our previous release of static heat maps displaying AWS EC2 instance utilization metrics from CloudWatch. Now, this utilization data is animated to help you better identify usage patterns over time and create automated parking schedules.

ParkMyCloud • 20th December 2017

Amazon’s EC2 Scheduler - How Does it Compare with ?

Amazon recently announced updates to their EC2 scheduler, responding to the already-answered question: “How do I automatically start and stop my Amazon EC2 instances?” Been there, done that. ParkMyCloud has been scheduling instances and saving our customers 65% or more on their monthly cloud bills from Amazon, Azure, and Google since 2015. It looks like Amazon is stepping up to the plate with their EC2 scheduler, but are they?

ParkMyCloud • 21st December 2017

Spot Instance Hibernation - What It Means For You

At AWS re:Invent 2017, one of the announcements that was made is that spot instance hibernation is now available. This change to how AWS spot instances works can mean some tweaks to how you approach this instance type. Let’s explore the ramifications of this and see what it means for you and your infrastructure.

ParkMyCloud • 27th December 2017

ParkMyCloud’s Top 5 Blog Posts of 2017

Before we ring in the new year, ParkMyCloud is taking a look back at 2017. We get a lot of great feedback on our blogs so we decided to summarize our top 5 blog posts, as indicated by our readers (views and shares). In case you missed them, please take a moment and enjoy our most popular posts of 2017!

ParkMyCloud • 4th January 2018

Why is the leader in Automated Cloud Cost Control - It’s About the Platform: 2017 Year in Review

2017 was a big year for ParkMyCloud and automated cloud cost control. From working closely with our customers and understanding industry trends, we continued to strengthen and grow our cloud cost control platform, continuously innovating and adding new features to make ParkMyCloud easier to use, more automated, and continue doing what we do best: saving you money on your cloud costs. Here are the highlights of what improved in ParkMyCloud during 2017.

ParkMyCloud • 16th January 2018

Reviews - Customer Video Testimonials

A few weeks ago at the 2017 AWS re:Invent conference in Las Vegas, we had the opportunity to meet some of our customers at the booth, get their product feedback, and a few shared their ParkMyCloud reviews as video testimonials. As part of our ongoing efforts to save money on cloud costs with a fully automated, simple-to-use SaaS platform, we rely on our customers to give us insight into how ParkMyCloud has helped them. Here’s what they had to say.

ParkMyCloud • 28th February 2018

SysAdmin vs. DevOps: 4 Ways That the Cloud is Redefining IT

SysAdmin vs. DevOps? IT Operations Management vs. Cloud Operations Management? Unless your head has been under a rock, you’re probably aware that the cloud has been rapidly reshaping and redefining IT as we know it — from the language we use to describe it to the management models and infrastructure itself.

ParkMyCloud • 22nd March 2018

Interview: Empowers Sysco Foods’ Cloud-Only Strategy

We talked with Kurt Brochu, Senior Manager of the Cloud Enablement Team at Sysco Foods, about how his company has been using ParkMyCloud to empower end users to keep costs in check with the implementation of their cloud-only strategy.

ParkMyCloud • 26th April 2018

How to: ChatOps Cloud Cost Control

The latest time-saving automation to add to your DevOps tool belt: ChatOps cloud cost control. That’s right – you may already be using ChatOps to make your life easier, but did you know that amongst the advantages, you can also use it to control your cloud resources?

ParkMyCloud • 1st May 2018

AWS vs Azure vs Google Cloud Market Share 2018: Is AWS Still in the Lead?

Q1 earnings are in for the ‘big three’ cloud providers and you know what that means – it’s time for an AWS vs Azure vs Google Cloud market share comparison. Let’s take a look at all three providers side-by-side to see where they stand.

ParkMyCloud • 3rd May 2018

Qcentive Controls AWS Costs & Enables Cloud Computing in Healthcare

Qcentive is a 2-year-old healthcare startup founded in Massachusetts. They build systems for the healthcare industry to help reduce costs and provide efficiencies in contract and payment management for healthcare companies.

ParkMyCloud • 8th May 2018

Alibaba Cloud Market Share 2018: The Next Big Cloud Provider?

After reviewing Q1 earnings for the ‘big three’ cloud providers last week, it’s obvious AWS is still number one overall. While the other CSPs are growing faster than expected, what about the Alibaba cloud market share? Alibaba made big waves in Asia, dominating in China with accelerating cloud revenue. Here’s the deal with Alibaba Cloud, and why it should not be overlooked in 2018.

The Princeton Group • 3rd May 2018

Top trending technologies and careers of 2018!

When it comes to the job market, technology is the place to be. Among the top 20 most promising jobs of 2017 according to LinkedIn Data, 12 of the positions were in tech - more than half! The growth of the tech industry has attracted job candidates to the point where people are choosing to switch career paths completely, with top reasons including a stronger career path, higher salaries, and better access to opportunities within their organization.

The Princeton Group • 3rd May 2018

Tech Jobs in NYC, Part 1

Why it’s the Best Time of Year for Job Hunting (and what the new salary law does for job search candidates! It’s been two months since the new salary law in New York City came into effect on November 1st, 2017, and it’s been buzzed about as a game changer for the hiring process. Employers are now banned from asking about a topic most candidates wish to avoid: salary history.

The Princeton Group • 3rd May 2018

Tech Jobs in NYC, Part 2

What the new salary law means for employers: 2018 is in full swing and with the new salary law in New York City in full effect, every employer knows the one thing that can’t be brought up in interviews: salary history. In Part 1 of this blog, we addressed the salary law’s impact on job candidates. For Part 2, we’ll examine the impact on employers.

The Princeton Group • 3rd May 2018

5 Signs That The Company You’re Interviewing For is a Good Match

The tech industry is brimming with opportunities. Every company needs an IT department, New York is the East Coast’s largest tech hub, and there’s no shortage of growth if you’re looking for a position in IT/tech. But with such a broad range of companies to choose from, how do you know if the one you’re interviewing for is a good match? Here are 5 things to look for.

The Princeton Group • 3rd May 2018

5 Signs That The Company You’re Interviewing For is Not a Good Match

In Part I of this blog post, we talked about the booming tech industry in New York and what IT/tech candidates should look for when deciding if a company is going to be a good match for your skill set, interests, and career path. In this post, we’ll turn things around to examine the telltale signs that a company is not a good match. Here are 5 things to look for.

The Princeton Group • 3rd May 2018

Women in Tech: Why New York is A Haven for Progress

Women in tech is a hot-button topic. Media headlines point to statistics about the lack of women in the tech field and lack of opportunities for women to advance. However, while progress is still being made, the idea that women do not have a place in tech is being actively challenged in NYC.