fabiochiu/medium-articles huggingface dataset:
A simple portfolio building approach for amateur stock investors
By: Soumyadeep Paul
Tags: Portfolio Management, Portfolio, Investment, Investing, Stock Market

Summary:

There is much focus on which stock to buy, but very little focus in terms of portfolio management, sizing and balancing

This sometimes results in tiny position in a winning stock, with lots of percentage gain to boast of, but little actual money made

How do we build our position gradually on a stock as the business prospect materializes

In this article we try to create a framework for portfolio management and averaging up our winner stocks. Dealing with loser stock is a different ballgame and worth another article.

Despite all our effort to identify the right stocks, fact is we cannot expect all of them to perform equally. Some goes up more than others and some actually go down. It is often said that “Ride your Winners and Cut your Losers”. Indeed this is the right way to go, but unless we have a framework in place we face many practical difficulties. For example, if one particular stock keeps rising it gathers more weight in our portfolio. And if we keep adding as it goes up, the percentage weight becomes even more skewed.

So let us define some numbers to help us. Each stock in our portfolio should have these numbers defined.

Blue (Initial weight) : We are usually not comfortable putting our entire allocation in a stock at one go. This is the initial allocation we make in a stock. However, keep in mind, this cannot be a token allocation. A token allocation or a tracking position achieve nothing. A 40–70% of the stock’s allocation can be bought as the initial purchase. Green (Intended or desired weight) : This is the theoretical number that we have in our mind for allocation to a specific stock. This number do not have much significance other than pointing out how far we are from ideal scenario. This number also helps in designing the portfolio in the beginning. Yellow (Weight up to which we are comfortable averaging up) : As we see the business prospect matures and our assumptions get validated we must increase our allocation to a stock. However as we discussed earlier, we can average up only up to a point. This number draws that line. Red (Maximum weight) : We can lose our sleep if a particular stock is weighted beyond a percentage of our portfolio. If a stock crosses this level, we must sell partially to bring down its weight and allocate the proceeds to other stocks.

For an equal weight 10 stock portfolio, these numbers can be 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% respectively for Blue, Green, Yellow and Red. Note that this is just a reference and the actual number must be decided based on individual preference and risk appetite. Also it is rare for someone to have an equal weight portfolio. Some rule of thumb for deciding these numbers
My 2021 Money Optimization Plan
By: Nic Carroll
Tags: Investing Tips, Cash Flow, Money Mindset, 2021, Portfolio

Invest Early & Often

*Not financial advise. This is just what I’m doing. Please do research, but at the same time, the important thing is to just get started. Investing earlier > investing perfectly.

Let’s talk investing.

I’m a big fan of M1 Finance for long-term investing. M1 is unique in that you can build your own custom “pies” that get automatically allocated according to the percentages you set up.

Right now, most of my excess savings (from above) are flowing into my Bridge Account, which I’ve been focused on building up aggressively. I think of this account as a HYSA on steroids (high-yield savings). I have this portfolio split between 4 main pies: Aggressive Growth, Benchmark, Passive Income, and Hedge.

Aggressive Growth (35%): FAAMG, ARKK, Tesla (2020 has obviously been an insane year. Up about 78% YTD. I’ve been trimming this position since the election.)

Benchmark (25%): Split between VOO/QQQ. (+34% YTD)

Passive Income (25%): Dividend Growth - VIG, NOBL; QYLD; REITs (+14% YTD)

Hedge/Cash (15%): Largely Bitcoin. Bonds, VXX, Cash. (Did I mention it’s been an insane year)

My Portfolio vs SPY. June-Dec 2020

Borrowing my Own Money

With M1 Plus, I’m also able to borrow at a rock-bottom 2% as a portfolio line of credit, meaning there’s no application or credit check, and I can pay it back anytime. But I can only borrow up to 35% of the portfolio value, once over $10,000.

This is how I paid for part of my car without pulling money out of the market. I pulled out $5,000 and paid it back over about 3 months, which cost me a whopping $12 in interest.

This has also taught me the benefits of a line of credit vs a normal amortized loan: namely ease of use and flexibility.

I plan to use this strategy again for a future down payment on a rental property. Never borrow to consume. But I’ll gladly borrow (wisely) for cash-flowing assets. Especially when it’s my money. Not the banks’.

Another trick that helped me pay off that balance so quickly was by “paycheck parking” which means sending my full paychecks at the line of credit, floating all my expenses on a credit card until the end of the month, then rinse and repeat. This could be considered more hassle than it’s worth, but overall the more important concept here is the idea of leveraging your own money.
Bestfolios of the Year — 2020
Tags: Design, Inspiration, Portfolio, UX, Product Design

2020 is a tough year for all of us. We hope Bestfolios helped you a little bit on landing a job or getting inspirations. Here are our editor’s pick of the best of the bestfolios.
Visualize your Portfolio in 30 lines of code.
By: Scott Andersen
Tags: Stock Analysis, Python, Data Science, Portfolio, Data Visualization

Today we will discuss how to visualize your portfolio in under 2 minutes using Python. Simply substitute the tickers listed below with the stocks in your portfolio and print a simple pie chart with live data.

import datetime as dt

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

from pandas_datareader import data as web

I wanted to give everyone a quick fun project that produces an informative graph with real time data so that you quickly update and track your portfolio.

tickers = ['PTON','CRWD','MRNA','PLTR','NVDA','PLUG','SNOW']

amounts = [12,15,20,30,8,18,5]

prices = []

total = [] # SET THE OUTLINE OF THE PIE CHART

fig, ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(10,10)) ax.set_facecolor('black')

ax.figure.set_facecolor('white')

ax.tick_params(axis='x', colors='black')

ax.tick_params(axis='y', colors='black')

Check out all of your visual options with the various styles and colors on the Matplotlib website.

PLOT YOUR PORTFOLIO:

ax.set_title("Your Portfolio", color='black', fontsize=20) _, texts, _ = ax.pie(total, labels=tickers, autopct='%1.1f%%', pctdistance=0.8)

[text.set_color('black') for text in texts] ax.text(-2,1, 'PORTFOLIO OVERVIEW:', fontsize=24, color="red", horizontalalignment='center', verticalalignment='center')

ax.text(-2,0.85, f'Total USD Amount: ${sum(total):.2f}', fontsize=18, color="green", horizontalalignment='center', verticalalignment='center')

counter = 0.15

for ticker in tickers:

ax.text(-2, 0.85 - counter, f'{ticker}: ${total[tickers.index(ticker)]:.2f}', fontsize=16, color="black",

horizontalalignment='center', verticalalignment='center')

counter += 0.15 plt.show()

Thanks for reading!

If you found this article useful, feel free to visit my GitHub to download the files used in this article or email me directly at scottandersen23@gmail.com.

Interested in learning more about data analytics, data science and machine learning applications? Follow me on Medium.

Connect with me on LinkedIn.
Researching for Design
By: Crab T
Tags: Portfolio, Eye Tracking, Research, Uvu

Next we wanted to know about where they learned about the site. We did this so we knew who was already using it the most and sharing its existence, so we knew who to cater to in later designs. Finding out that most learned about it from hearing about it through just already being in the program doesn’t seem like it gave us much to work with, but we now knew that current students are a major demographic.

Lastly, we needed to know what users deemed the most important. We found that 75% of the top two votes were Degree and Program information, something we took an educated guess on early and got confirmed to us. What took us and our stakeholders by surprise was the News/Blog page being in the bottom two for 75% of votes. They had figured people would like knowing what’s going on within the college, but it turns out that that information was only really looked at by potential donors.

At the end of our questionnaire we asked the participants if they’d be open for an interview in which we could ask some more in depth questions found here, along with the task to find scholarship information on the site. To get the gist conveyed here are highlights we found
Colin Meyn / colinwmeyn [at] gmail
By: Colin Meyn
Tags: Politics, Portfolio, Writing, Reporting

Fact-check: Vermont's police chief said cops risk death from opioid exposure. He's wrong. …

"Now there is a new threat that we're seeing up close: the risk of exposure to powerful drugs that can kill in even…
Building a Personal Website (Mini-Series Part 4)
By: Tara Krishnan
Tags: Blogging, Web Design, Portfolio, Software Development, Web Development

Configuring a Customer Domain

Ever customized your Linkedin profile URL because it looked like jumbled letters? A custom domain is a unique branded label that is connected to the IP address of a website. A domain name gives you ownership over your website’s address so that no one else can claim it. The great thing about custom domains is that they simplify how visitors find your site and reinforce your brand. When deciding on a custom domain name for you or your business, make sure it clearly positions your brand. Now that we have our website, and it’s hosted, we want a unique label where we can point our users to. We will be using Github to customize the domain name of our Github page.

Visit Google Domains to find a domain name that is available to use and register it. I have registered the domain tarakrishnan.net for my personal website. (Note: It may take up to 48 hours upon purchase for your domain to be confirmed.) Under the new <USERNAME>.github.io repository you created navigate to settings and scroll to Github pages Type your custom domain, then click Save. This will create a commit that adds a CNAME file in the root of your publishing source

4. Navigate to Google Domains and click on your domain name

5. Click on DNS and create a CNAME record that connects your subdomain to the default domain for your site

6. Add 4 separate A records. A records connect your domain name (hosted by DNS) to the IP address on the Github server. For more information see here

185.199.108.153

185.199.109.153

185.199.110.153

185.199.111.153

7. To confirm that your DNS record configured correctly, use the dig command. You can see that your custom domain points to the Github server IP address

$ dig tarakrishnan.net +nostats +nocomments +nocmd

; <<>> DiG 9.10.6 <<>> tarakrishnan.net +nostats +nocomments +nocmd

;; global options: +cmd

;tarakrishnan.net. IN A

tarakrishnan.net. 3599 IN A 185.199.109.153

tarakrishnan.net. 3599 IN A 185.199.111.153

tarakrishnan.net. 3599 IN A 185.199.110.153

tarakrishnan.net. 3599 IN A 185.199.108.153

8. Visit your new domain name to see your new Github pages displayed on your custom domain website

If you have been following along through this mini-series you should now be familiar with creating a static website, hosting a website, and creating a custom domain for your website.

As an example, here is the source code for tarakrishnan.net (project repository, static repository).
面試官如何篩選作品集？我該如何改善作品集？看完100+份UIUX Designer作品集的微心得筆記
Tags: 作品集, Design, Uiux, Portfolio, 中文

Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more

Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore
VideoAppSuite Portfolio Website Builder
Tags: Videoappsuite Review, Portfolio, Website

One-Time Special Price upgrade Deal

Why you Buy this Website Builder?

If you buy this portfolio website builder, you can make a portfolio website for your market place.

Upgrade to your website to use this opportunity one-time upgrade deal for your websites.

What is the reason you buy this product or Upgrade the product?

There are 10 main reasons for buy or upgrade to your product

Fully Done for Video Portfolio MarketPlace Website

You can manage all of your orders in the private admin Dashboard

Website Build using this fully stocked with 100+ video template

We can provide Unlimited Amazon Cloud Hosting

100% Mobile Optimized for boosted sales

We Give offer coupon and Discounts on your boosted sales

You can create your own website and it’s connected to your own domain or build your sub-domain

Your orders are fully integrated payment process

Fully Customizable sites and your own logo and brands

3rd Party integration made easy — popup, timers, chatbox, and more.,

Six Reason how video portfolio sites can make 10x Result
Building a Personal Website (Mini-Series Part 1)
By: Tara Krishnan
Tags: Blogging, Web Design, Portfolio, Software Development, Web Development

What is a website?

People build websites to share their stories. It may be for presenting information about a business, buying and selling online, or voicing personal thoughts and opinions. Either way, a website allows you to share your information with the rest of the world. According to Internet Live Stats, there are over 1.8 billion websites in the world today.

So, what is a website really? A website is a set of related web pages located under a single domain name. There are two kinds of websites: static and dynamic.

Static Websites

Static websites are fixed and display the same content for every user. They are purely informational and the pages won’t change. The pages are typically pre-rendered, cached, and delivered via content delivery network (CDN). Static websites are best used for website portfolios, static brochures, blogs, and landing pages.

Static sites typically take little time and users don’t need to use complex software programs to build them. They are usually written in client-side languages such as HTML and CSS. Nowadays many static site generators are available which help you build these sites without even knowing the details of HTML/CSS.

Dynamic Websites

You’ve probably seen dynamic websites too. Airbnb is a perfect example. It’s interactive — a user can enter where and when they want to vacation and the display is based on the input of the user.

Dynamic websites provide users with an interactive experience and these sites require both client-side and server-side scripting languages such as Javascript and PHP. A dynamic website can be changed through the code that runs in the browser as a user interacts with the website. Dynamic sites are typically more versatile and are generated in real-time by request of the server.

Now that we know about Static vs Dynamic websites, let’s look at the lifecycle of developing these websites. The website process includes development, hosting, and presenting it to the world. At the end of this mini-series, you will learn how to create your own personal website which follows these principles. Go to Part 2 of the mini-series.
My Portfolio
By: Alex Myers
Tags: Portfolio, Journalism, Journalismjobs

Howdy, looks like you’ve stumbled on my portfolio! I’m Alex and I work as a freelance journalist in Oklahoma City. I lived in Los Angeles for nearly five years and moved back to Oklahoma, my home state, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

I am currently looking for full-time employment, so please feel free to email me at wordsbymyers@gmail.com if you have any questions about my work or would like to collaborate. You can also follow me on Twitter and LinkedIn.
Let’s Make A Free Art Portfolio!
By: Dan Brioli
Tags: Art, Free, Portfolio, Github, Tutorial

A Place You Can Call A Homepage

This is the quick-and-easy guide for anyone who needs a free hosting solution for a simple image gallery with no file compression — ideal for a visual artist. I’ve broken down all of the steps so that you will have a portfolio up and running in 30 minutes. We will be using Github Pages, which is a free service provided by a company called Github.

If you use this tutorial and would like help with adding any additional features, let me know and I will write up tutorials for them!

Enough talk — let’s make a portfolio.

Create A Github Account

Github is a site that hosts your project’s source code, images, and other files. We will need an account, so first things first — create a free account.

(If you already have an account, great! Just log in.)

Create A New Repository

A repository is a named location in your Github account that stores code for an individual project. You can have many repositories and many projects. We only need one for our portfolio, but it has to be named a specific name to take advantage of the automated hosting features of Github Pages.

Once you are logged in, you will see a button on the page that says “Start A Project” or “New Repository” or something similar. Click it. (Github will look different depending on if you have a new account or if you have used it previously — just click whatever is available to create our portfolio’s new repository.)

In the “Create a new repository” page that opens, in the “Repository name” field, enter the new name of your repository. You’ll want to name it github-username.github.io — the Github Pages service requires this to be the format of the repo’s name.

For example, if my Github username is technicaldebtgames then my repository name should be technicaldebtgames.github.io — the repository’s name in this case is going to be the URL we use to navigate to it, so make sure your account name is appropriate for how you want your portfolio to be viewed.

You will also want to click “Add a README file” as an initialization option. You can choose to make the project public or private — this won’t change whether people can navigate to your portfolio or not, only if they can see the repository and its code.

Basic options for initializing your repository.

Create A New File Named “index.html”

In your portfolio’s main directory, click the “Add file” dropdown button, and then click the “Create new file” option.

Give this file the name index.html and enter the following HTML into it:

Enter this file name and HTML code in the New File page.

This is an HTML file, and it uses a scripting language known as HTML. It’s essentially a series of textual tags that tell browsers how to layout information on a website.

At the bottom of the page, you will see the “Commit new file” section of the page. You can either leave the fields blank, or you can fill them with useful information in case you want to know why you did something in the future.
How to Make Your Website Actually Good
By: Henry Gruett
Tags: Website, Web Design, Portfolio, Web Development, Blog

It looks . . . pretty bad

Photo from Pixabay on Pexels

Not all websites look that great. Many templates are low quality and others just are too generic. And even website builders that come with great templates shouldn’t be used without a touch-up. A good quality website is unique and has its own flair like no other website on the web.

When designing your website, you should always pay attention to the following: colors, fonts, images, and space. While I can’t tell you everything there is to know about website design within a single Medium article, I can give you some tips.

Tip 1: Avoid walls of text

You’re creating a website, not a book.

I get it. You have a lot to say. And it’s hard to convey information without just writing paragraphs (especially for the general Medium user).

The problem with large paragraphs on a homepage is that people didn’t come to the website to read. They will see paragraphs, immediately feel overwhelmed, and not read a word. And that’s not even factoring in the fact that most visitors will be on a phone where paragraphs can easily take up an entire screen.

So how do you fix it? Step 1 is to just cut the fluff. Let’s take this paragraph for example:

Our products are top of the line microphones for professionals and hobbyists. The Wall Microphone brand is recognized worldwide as a leader in microphone technology. Our patented unique technology delivers quality never seen in a microphone.

We can cut a lot of the extra words in this paragraph and make it easier on the reader:

Microphones for pros and hobbyists by the world’s leading brand. Meet the audio quality you’ve always dreamed of.

It’s a lot cleaner, isn’t it?

Make sure you also use headers and images to break up your text. They’re crucial in giving your website a good “flow”.

Tip 2: Have space. But not too much.

This one is pretty straight forward. When you’re designing your website, try to space content out so that users don’t feel overwhelmed. You’d be surprised how easy it is to get “in the zone” and not realize you have way too much content crammed in a small area. Give breathing room and make it a pleasurable journey to scroll through.

Tip 3: Put time into choosing colors.

I recommend that beginners stick to light colors. They’re happy and uplifting. There are really well-done “dark mode” websites out there but it’s a lot harder to make them look good.

I recommend you stick with whites, grays, blacks, and an accent color or two:
Branding a Music Festival (aka my first BFD project)
By: Connor Blacksher
Tags: Design, Branding, Portfolio, Event Design

“I like that one, a lot”

I actually don’t even care that I’m half spoiling it in the header. THEY WENT WITH MINE BAY BEEEEEE. I know the big thing with celebrating is to “act like you’ve been there”, but my ass hadn’t been there before. I was on cloud nine.

Work’s not over man

After the elation wears off, then the reality sinks in and it shifts to, “Oh man, we gotta make this stuff now.” The neato part of it all is that I worked on all of this the previous year, so no sweat, right? No no no. Lots of sweat. It’s one thing to take an already built system and start blowing it out. You kind of just piecemeal it together, not to diminish the beauty of the process, but that’s kind of it. Pop some hierarchy in there, keep it within the visual language, and you’re good. I felt like everything I had learned with the old Prairie Burn work was only a part of the puzzle.

Just play with it

No for real, just experiment with things.

I think I’m going to go to the grave with this advice and outlook on design, but just make stuff. One of my professors at MCAD has ironed this in my brain in such a profound way. Start making things and experimenting. Bring ten layouts, no bring twenty, to that review that’s coming up. The act of making, and making different things ends up being a lot like that memory game where you flip cards over. Each iteration/card flip reveals something new. With each new thing you gain insight into what you’re doing until you have enough knowledge to make something meaningful.

In that exploration to activate the updated Prairie Burn brand I started playing some more textural and collage-like elements. These layered layouts started, uh, not suck, and it was so exciting to see it happen. We also started playing with the mantra of “Camp on”. It was just a great rally cry for everything that this event was about. Plus, it looks good in all caps.

The Facebook cover + profile combo.

This mentality of play evolved into the main promo poster that was going to be sent all around town. After I had done some of these more digital tactics that were fairly easy to iterate on, it was time to do something a little more notable for the promo poster. Tricia had mentioned something about experimenting with being more tactile about it. One trip to Michaels, and suddenly the fox logo is now in felt.

Side note: the orange felt was an almost perfect color, and the white was…white? The tan/cream for the face started off as white and was dyed using coffee. Also photographed fairly quickly. No funk arose because of the coffee dyeing process to my knowledge.
Amplus Fund November Update
By: Wealhouse Capital Management
Tags: Credit, Investment, Portfolio, Hedge Funds, Investing

As we highlighted in our previous newsletter, November was off to a hot start. The rally in most asset classes was underpinned by a wave of positive vaccine news, as well as a strong earnings season highlighting the strength and resilience of the consumer. The U.S. election came and left without affecting the overall market tone. Avoiding a “Blue Wave” outweighed Trump’s stubbornness to admit defeat. Investors finally had many reasons to overlook near-term economic and political headwinds for a brighter path forward. Fixed income indices recovered from last month’s losses and gained generally 1% for the month of November. Equities played catch-up, gaining just over 10.5%.

We would like to spend some time reminding investors that the goal of Amplus is to consistently participate in market upside while protecting investors from market risk on the downside. So far, we have achieved just that. While returns from most equity indices are now comparable to Amplus, one must remind themselves that Amplus saw steady, consistent gains since its inception.

Reinforcing this goal was our decision to remain prudent and play defensive going into November’s uncertainty surrounding the U.S. elections. Despite that, we managed to produce great returns for our investors. Our security selection paid dividend and outperformed the general market. In the beginning of the month, we chose to highlight one of those investments — CT REIT. Since publishing the article, CT REIT debt has rallied close to 75 basis point (bps) outperforming the general market by 3x in just over one month. We are delighted by the results it produced for our investors.

We remain cautiously optimistic on credit going into 2021: fundamentals remain strong, consumer spending remains strong, central banks remain accommodative with many tools at their disposal to ensure markets remain upbeat. Biden at the helm is a good change for the market at this stage of the pandemic. We expect more stimulus, more social aid, and more awareness towards limiting the spread of COVID-19. Including the help of vaccines, I am hopeful that we will reach the peak of COVID-19 soon.

Let us end this newsletter rehashing last month’s comment. Negative yielding debt globally remains at record highs, still close to $17 trillion, making the incentive to recycle overseas cash into USD and CAD fixed income an obvious choice for international buyers. Since mentioning it, markets have seen consistent overnight buying of Canadian and U.S. denominated debt. We remain confident that international buyers with deep pockets can keep the momentum going well into 2021. This is very good for the positioning of our portfolio.

Thank you for your support and interest in Amplus. I would love the opportunity to answer your questions and discuss investing further with you.
Checking Into Class Almost On Time
By: Connor Blacksher
Tags: Design, UX, UX Design, Portfolio

Before we started doing any design work, Ali and I talked about how people would use this kiosk. Not just “they go up and tap it and start dancing”, but legitimately what are they doing before? What is their mindset? What would streamline this for them? Real questions. This little iPad outside the classes would likely be used for 30 seconds or less as a means to check-in to class, or gather information. So let’s treat it like that.

We had established some guidelines and flows that we knew we needed, so then I started creating those screens and wiring them out in Adobe XD.

Do you have like 5 minutes?

Do you know what spot number you are? No really, do you?

After churning out an iteration we wanted to get some eyes on it. Once a prototype was mildly acceptable, we would walk around the office looking for someone that looked like they weren’t too busy and ambush them.

“Heyo, do you have like 5 minutes to test this out for us?”

If someone agreed, we would sit down with our computer and give them two simple tasks that we had deemed as fairly important: Check-in for a class, and register for a class. Prior to this project, I haven’t done a ton of formal UX work like this. Seeing people use our design and taking notes on common struggles was enlightening. Things that I had presumed as “painfully obvious” weren’t. It’s one thing for me to think that a series of interactions is a natural progression. It’s another to realize and see my misconceptions right in front of me.

Each different batch of test users resulted in a chance to correct oversights. A chance to create something that actually worked how people would use it. Turns out that users aren’t the enemy, they’re just using the thing you made. So why not make it great, and why not make it work for them?

Preso Time Baby

After all the revisions and reviews it was time to show this puppy off. At Life Time we have a review meeting called Experience Review Board as an opportunity for designers around the company insight into what is being made. It lets LT Creative see what Technology is working on and vice versa.

My time was up, I had presented this at least…3–5 times already before this, so no actual nerves or anything like that. I made my way through the setup slides in the deck and switched my screen over to the prototype. After about the first screen one of the developers popped their hand up.

“Hey, I’ve actually got a ticket to start building this tomorrow.”

🤦‍♂️

Cool cool cool. I kept going through the prototype and afterward we all had a little chuckle about things.

Yes, the work ended up dying. Yes, I’m more than kinda bummed. Even more importantly though, it was a fun project. There aren’t a lot of times in design that you get to hear someone critique your work, as they use it, to your face. It was still a blast though.

I’ll link the prototype below, have fun with it, I sure did.
Importance of User Testing
By: Umair Jeelani
Tags: UI, User Testing, Portfolio, UX, Design Process

User testing is a process used in UX/UI designing in which some volunteer users test the interface or function of the app or website. Through this we are able gather realistic results from the users to find out if there are any bugs and/or flaws in our product. User testing improves the customer experience of the product in the long run. User testing is considered one of the essential parts of UX design process which helps to find problems in the early stage and fix it sooner.

What was the hardest thing about user testing?

Sometimes if the product is complicated, contains extra details or has clutter content then it may confuse the user and make it difficult to complete the task. That is why, user testing is more important before launching the product in the market because we do not know how user will react or respond.

User testing depends heavily on the users and if the users are not relevant or from the targeted audience then it will give you mixed or confusing results. Test participants must belong to the target audience so the testing data can be accurate to the actual product.

How many users should we include in user testing?

The answer is as many as possible, but not just anyone can test the product. It should be reliable users or neutral so the result will not be biased. Another major point is the users may differ because they are from different countries, region, culture so that is why we need to be more detail oriented towards product and who are the consumers.

Writing the test scripts or creating scenarios to complete the task will help the users stay more focused in completing the task. Before giving the task or scenario to them, it’s helpful to tell them to freely explore the app or website and record their first reactions and have observers to watch, listen and take notes on user testing.

Lastly, I would like to say that we need to do user testing on every step of design process to validate the product from the start so the end product has more chances to be successful. Keep making iterations until you, your client, and the users are satisfied to a certain extent, at least.

Umair Jeelani

UX/UI Designer
Data Scientist Job Recommendation System
By: Anish Nitin Somaiah
Tags: Data Science, Machine Learning, Data Science Projects, Portfolio, Recommendation System

Objective

Recommendation systems are a class of data science utilities that involve suggesting a product to a user based on a user’s or multiple users’ activities. This project is a similar approach that recommends data science jobs to users based on their activity by applying a classification machine learning based recommender system.

Steps involved

Data Extraction Data Cleaning Exploratory data analysis Data Preparation for Modeling Machine learning classifier model implementation Optimizing model for better validation Hyperparameter Tuning Prediction using the best fit model and checking validation metrics Recommendation system based on predictions for different users Productionalizing into a web application (future scope)

Step 1: Data Extraction

For this data science job recommendation project, I am extracting 1000 data science jobs in the USA from multiple states, and creating a pandas data frame. The scraper code has been referenced from the following article

And the data extraction process looks like below

Our extracted data frame looks as follows:

Please Note: Download the exact chrome driver for the chrome version that you have installed on your local PC using the following link https://chromedriver.chromium.org/downloads
Kitaba Dair Akılda Kalanlar: Borsayı Yenmek
By: Tümay Solak
Tags: Kitap, Portfolio, Yorum, Invest, Stock Market

Platform Manager at SUNUM | Podcast Producer at Solak Media | Advisory Board at Enerji Analiz
Stock Portfolio Automatization with Python
By: Flavio Valerio Roncagliolo
Tags: Python, Portfolio, Investment, Technical Indicator, Stock Market

Now we have the 30 stocks that are listed within the DJI Index and we can download the historical information of their prices.

Creating functions to test the strategies

Before continuing with the application of the general strategy, we need to create some functions that allow us to analyze how good the strategy is. In this case, we will use 4 methods that will help us verify how well the portfolio performs.

1.- Volatility Function

Because we are not going to take into account the weights of the portfolio’s stocks, we are going to take volatility as if it were that of a single stock, but taking into account the portfolio’s performance. The function would be given by:

2.- Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR)

The Compound Annual Growth Rate allows us to see the annual performance of an asset or portfolio to obtain its current market value from its initial value. The CAGR assumes that the earnings obtained by the portfolio are reinvested at the end of each year and allows an easy comparison between different strategies. The function would by given by:

Where N is the number of years that have passed since the stock was purchased.

3.- Sharpe Ratio

The Sharpe ratio allows us to analyze the return obtained for each unit of risk assumed within the portfolio. On the other hand, the risk-free rate is used to isolate the returns associated with investments. We can use the 2 measures mentioned above to calculate the performance and volatility of the portfolio. The function formula is given by:

Getting historical price data

Now that we have the necessary tickers from the DJI Index, we can begin to download the historical information of each of the companies listed in the index and calculate their returns. The database will be the prices on a weekly basis from January 1, 2015 to January 1, 2020.

Portfolio Strategy

First, we need to take into account how many X stocks will make up the portfolio and how many Y stocks we want to remove from the portfolio each week. Second, we will review weekly which are the X best stocks with the highest returns and we will see which are the Y worst stocks within the portfolio, then we will eliminate Y stocks from the portfolio and replace them with the X best stocks from the DJI index, this process will be repeated weekly.

Strategy vs DJI Index

Now that we have the strategy for the portfolio, we will analyze its performance using the functions mentioned above. It is worth mentioning that in the case of the risk-free rate, I have considered an approximate of 2% for the 3 Month Treasury Bill Rate.

To have a point of comparison, we are going to use the returns of the DJI Index to see its volatility and performance over the same period of time.

The results of the tests performed on the portfolio strategy and the DJI index show that although the portfolio volatility is higher, the CAGR and the Sharpe ratio are higher in the strategy used. Finally we are going to graph the performance of the DJI index versus the portfolio performance to get a better view of both.
Design Process: Board Game Banker
By: Gabriel Rivarola
Tags: Portfolio, UI Design, UX Design, UX Research

Origin

Board Game Banker is a personal project that results from a night of board games with friends, when in a Monopoly game nobody wanted to be the banker.

Possible problem

The players argued that whoever plays the banker does not enjoy the game, having a greater responsibility and mental load. The use of paper for money management complicates this even more, since the bank is also obliged to intervene in transactions between players when they need “change” (change banknotes of a higher denomination for others of a lower one to pay an exact amount to another player).

Empathize

An investigation was conducted focused on user reviews of similar iOS, Android and Web applications in order to know their expectations and frustrations.

Insights:

The problem does not only exist in Monopoly, but also in other board games that use physical money or other scoring systems .

. Users value saving money by not having to buy the money management kits that are sold in games separately.

Users need to be aware of the status of transactions at all times.

It is tedious for the user to perform mathematical operations to determine the transaction amount according to the rules of each game.

Definition of the problem

How can we develop a product that makes it easier for users to manage and keep track of money or scores in board games?

Principles of design

It must be a general solution to board games and not specific to just one.

to board games to just one. It must prioritize readability and knowledge of the current state of the game by all players seated at a table.

by all players seated at a table. It must allow the user the assurance that transactions made are correct.

It must facilitate transactions that involve mathematical calculations.

Competitive analysis

When reading user reviews on similar products I found many recurring topics, including:

The user may in some cases need to resume a previous game in interrupted sessions.

in interrupted sessions. The user appreciates being able to use long names and that these are seen properly.

and that these are seen properly. The lack of separators (thousands and millions) in the numbers of interest complicates readability and hinders the experience.

Some users cast the phone screen to the television during gaming sessions.

This information became useful to build the product in later phases.

Sketching
ConTe.it, la nuova identità visiva
By: Federico Parrella
Tags: Typography, Logo Design, Portfolio, Redesign, Branding

Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more

Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore
Behance — платформа для творческих специалистов и продвижение на ней
Tags: Portfolio, Behance Promo, Likes For Behance, Activity, Behance Promotion

Sound Off Co-Founder. Design/ux, philosophy, gardening, meditation, magic, startups, well-being, some other words.
The best design portfolios of November 2020 made with Semplice
By: Tobias Van Schneider
Tags: UX Design, Design, Portfolio, UX, Design Portfoliio

Browse the best portfolios of the month below to see fresh new work and get inspired for your own site. And if you’ve created your own portfolio with Semplice, be sure to submit it to our Showcase here. We might feature your site next.
How To Share Ghostwriting Samples With Clients
By: Daniel Rosehill
Tags: Writing, Writing Tips, Freelance Writing, Ghostwriting, Portfolio

How To Share Ghostwriting Samples With Clients

Building a writing portfolio is easy… unless all your work is unaccredited. Source: author

For most freelance writers, a strong portfolio is just about the best asset we have — minus our writing website.

But what happens if you ghostwrite? After all, ghostwriting — by definition — involves not getting credit for your work in the form of a byline.

Although I have no empirical evidence with which to back up this claim, I also think it’s fair to assume that ghostwriting is on the rise.

What was once a writing relationship almost exclusively undertaken for book authors has morphed into a gargantuan industry manned by freelance writers, PR firms, and communications consultants.

These days, the end product of a ghostwriting relationship is as likely to be an article in a trade media website as it is to be an item on the bestsellers lest.

Because there is so much being written, and so many hands writing it, I would argue that more writers than ever before are finding themselves in the unenviable position of being experienced writers without much to show for it in the form of attributed work.

This — the quandary of the modern ghostwriter — is a repeat fixture of discussion in freelance writing groups.

Having ghostwritten for five years, and spoken to many other ghostwriters, here are the ‘fixes’ I have seen.
How to create an astonishing portfolio
Tags: Art, How Create Portfolio, Create Art Portfolio, realistic pencil drawings, Portfolio

An art portfolio is the best method to make way into top art schools. Students can include all their works in a portfolio, maybe painting, pencil portrait, sculptures and other artworks. For getting into art schools, this portfolio plays a vital role. It is necessary to make your portfolio stand out unique from others. It gives you an advantage for the application.

So, how to make an art portfolio is an essential part to discuss. This article will take you through tips and ideas for an astonishing portfolio. It will also include a few online sketching courses that will prepare you for the best.

Characteristics of a Good Portfolio

An art portfolio is self-explanatory that brings out the skills of a student. Some will exhibit excellent painting skills while some may be good in realistic pencil drawings. Irrespective of this, the portfolio should include the following.

● Skills

As a professional or an amateur artist, it is essential to display the skills in the portfolio. It should be technically correct and provide every detail. Drawing skills are more important than presentation skills in a portfolio.

● Uniqueness

As an artist, the person will have a unique stroke or presentation skills. Your Uniqueness should be highlighted in the portfolio. If you are an expert in a pencil sketch, that can be displayed as your unique skill set.

● Variety in art

The portfolio creates the first impression and that’s why it should be the best. It is a good thing to try out new things and explore. Learning a new way of art and including them in the portfolio is a big plus point. This can include varieties like glass painting, carvings and doodling too.

These tips can help you create a commendable art portfolio.

Use of resources

Other than these ideas, other sources can help you in sharpening your skills. You can make use of websites to master your existing skills. Our website has several online courses for pencil sketching and realistic drawings. This will surely reflect on your portfolio and make it eligible for most applications. Many students have benefited from these courses to make their portfolios excellent.

You can enrol in these online sketching courses to create good strokes. These courses provide you with guidance that can make even a simple drawing look realistic. These are the kinds of skills that art schools lookout for the most.

Things to remember

Other than all the mentioned tips, there are a few more things to remember.

● Make sure to keep the portfolio precise and excellent. You can include 15–20 artworks that you think is the best.

● Bring out variety in your portfolio.

● Ensure to have a good depth of skill display. Technical skills are widely appreciated.

This concludes how to make an art portfolio. Your portfolio becomes an identity wherever you go. That is why it carries such significance. This can be complemented with our online courses for sketching. In turn, you get an advantage for the portfolio over others while applying.
Tere tulemast (=Welcome) Modularbank!
By: Blackfin Tech
Tags: Banking, Financial Services, Portfolio, Venture Capital, Core Banking Solutions

The banking business model does not look as shiny as it was 20 years ago. Banks’ earnings are shrinking as their legacy model witness diminishing revenues, often consumed by thick cost structures. While traditional banks struggle, newcomers are blooming and see their business growing rapidly. Those players managed to use technology to innovate and better manufacture and distribute their financial products.

Today, and especially in these times of pandemic, financial institutions have been cornered and are urged to “to fly to the cloud” if they want to remain relevant for their customers. On the other side the demand for embedded finance solutions, by non-financial parties, is surging. There are clear signals we are approaching a level of “market serendipity” for new core banking solutions.

Nevertheless, a great challenge remains. Who has all that it takes to build a product capable of catering financial products to non-financial players, while meeting the scrutiny of banks as well?

Enter Modularbank, a new generation, API-first, core-banking provider.

Modularbank was founded back in 2018 by a stellar team of 5 co-founders that previously founded and led Icefire, an Estonian software house known for its high-quality footprint in the banking and financial sector. The team at Modularbank has developed an elegant cloud-based banking platform to help traditional banks and new challengers in delivering financial services at the point of customer need. Modularbank’s core banking stack offers a broad range of banking modules including consumer finance, personal finance management, risk management, financial reporting and payment cards.

In Modularbank’s team we have found the perfect mix of…

🎓Experience / 5 founder, 110 years of experience in financial services

💻Technology / in only 18 months they have built a full-blown core banking platform

🔦Vision / consumer banking is just the tip of the iceberg

💸 Business traction / 2 banks, 1 corporate, 1 payment processor, more to come

…to convince the whole team to invest.

We are therefore proud to lead Modularbank’s first external round alongside the Estonian fund Karma Ventures and other followers among which Ott Kaukver (ex CTO of Twilio) and Plug & Play.

Congrats to Vilve, Rivo, Ove, Jan, and Jüri. The whole BlackFin ecosystem is happy to support you along the way!
Best Stories of 2020
By: Diana Bernardo
Tags: Articles, Stories, 2020, Portfolio, Best Of

As the year-end approaches, here are some of the highlights of my writing on Medium during 2020. I hope you enjoy them!
Gatsby.js Portfolio (with Contentful)
By: Evan Magnusson
Tags: Portfolio, CMS, Gatsbyjs, Software Development

I’m making a portfolio that has built-in Medium integration, effectively syndicating my blog with my web-based portfolio.

Contenful’s architecture for a basic portfolio using Gatsby.js and Netlify (or Heroku)