João Paulo Cercal

Staff Security Engineer at LastPass

Turning complex, cross-functional challenges into scalable systems, leading with AI-driven workflows and security-by-default engineering.

Changing the Decision Model Changes the Policy Changing the Decision Model Changes the Policy

Changing the Decision Model Changes the Policy

Jev, Laya, and Liquid d1 can share a request shape without sharing an error profile. Changing the model means revalidating the thresholds, review workload, and deployment behind the application's policy.

GPT-6 Astra Is an Operator, Not a Chatbot GPT-6 Astra Is an Operator, Not a Chatbot

GPT-6 Astra Is an Operator, Not a Chatbot

GPT-6 Astra is offered as a model that acts inside existing software. The scores I would read first are the ones that show where it stays inside the task, and where it does not win.

The Cost of the Loop Matters More Than the Score The Cost of the Loop Matters More Than the Score

The Cost of the Loop Matters More Than the Score

Anthropic says Opus 5.5 is at Fable 5.1's level on most work and 40 percent cheaper than Opus 5 at default settings; the useful question is what that does to the cost and the checks of an agent loop.

When AI Decisions Become Software Inputs When AI Decisions Become Software Inputs

When AI Decisions Become Software Inputs

A typed AI judgment can help software route work, provided the application owns the rules, checks uncertainty, and keeps people responsible for consequential decisions.

Working With AI Agents: Stay on the Loop Working With AI Agents: Stay on the Loop

Working With AI Agents: Stay on the Loop

Instead of reviewing every line an AI agent produces, design the environment — specs, tests, checks, and feedback loops — so good outcomes emerge reliably.

Understand the System Before Changing It Understand the System Before Changing It

Understand the System Before Changing It

Good architecture often starts with understanding the system you already have; how requests flow, where dependencies are, and why things ended up the way they are.

Composer clear cache Composer clear cache

Composer clear cache

If you have a problem similar to “End-of-central-directory signature not found.”, you might need to run a composer clear cache command in order to get it working.

Revisiting the layout and the Blog project Revisiting the layout and the Blog project

Revisiting the layout and the Blog project

A project/proof of concept that has been shown good results, it’s about a migration from a PHP website to a static blog, no server costs anymore and web-optimized. Check out a few implementation details.

How to delete all your Git local branches How to delete all your Git local branches

How to delete all your Git local branches

Sometimes after working for a long time, all the remaining local branches are just taking up space. Here's a small snippet to remove all your local branches in one go.

iTerm2 + Zplug = Productivity iTerm2 + Zplug = Productivity

iTerm2 + Zplug = Productivity

After spending a long time of my life using the normal terminal I met a new tool called iTerm2 because a friend of mine a few year ago. And, this week I've discovered the power of zplug. So, let me try to show you how my terminal looks like now.

MySQLDump - MySQL database backup MySQLDump - MySQL database backup

MySQLDump - MySQL database backup

The mysqldump tool backs up MySQL databases, creating a *.sql file with the statements needed to create a copy of the target database.

How to get a Page Permalink How to get a Page Permalink

How to get a Page Permalink

Learn how to get the permalink of a page in Wordpress whose post_type is "page". Combining the get_permalink() and get_page_by_path() functions.

Git Hub reaches 3 million users Git Hub reaches 3 million users

Git Hub reaches 3 million users

The web hosting service Git Hub announced that it passed the three-million-user mark. Check out this news and get to know GitHub.

What is the Blogosphere? What is the Blogosphere?

What is the Blogosphere?

You may have heard the term "Blogosphere", but its real meaning might still be unclear to you. Find out what this term means.

Excerpts on WordPress 3.0+ pages Excerpts on WordPress 3.0+ pages

Excerpts on WordPress 3.0+ pages

Add functionality to post types in Wordpress 3.0+ using the API with the following function add_post_type_support();

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO is the set of techniques aimed at enhancing and improving a site's position in organic search results on sites such as Google.

Installing PHPUnit on Windows Installing PHPUnit on Windows

Installing PHPUnit on Windows

Test-driven development (TDD) with PHP. Learn how to install PHPUnit on Microsoft's operating system, Windows Seven.

PHP 5.4 Release PHP 5.4 Release

PHP 5.4 Release

PHP 5.4 is fresh out of the oven. This version includes a large number of new features and bug fixes. Check out what's new.

CakePHP problem with mod_rewrite CakePHP problem with mod_rewrite

CakePHP problem with mod_rewrite

If you've ever faced a problem with mod_rewrite in CakePHP, know that the solution can be quite simple, check out the problem we encountered and solved.

Installing ZeosLib in Delphi XE2 Installing ZeosLib in Delphi XE2

Installing ZeosLib in Delphi XE2

Learn how to install the ZeosLib library in Embarcadero RAD Studio Delphi XE2, this guide will walk you through installation step by step.

Custom Fields in the Joomla panel Custom Fields in the Joomla panel

Custom Fields in the Joomla panel

Learn to create custom fields for the Joomla 1.6 panel, to do this you must extend a Joomla class that descends from JFormField.

Learn the basics of HTML Learn the basics of HTML

Learn the basics of HTML

Web pages are developed using plain text, which means you just need to write the code in a simple text-editing program. Learn HTML!

Web Browsers Web Browsers

Web Browsers

A Web Browser is a program that interprets HTML, CSS, Javascript files, among others.

Case Sensitive Case Sensitive

Case Sensitive

"Case sensitive" is a term indicating that text is sensitive to letter case, meaning it distinguishes between uppercase and lowercase letters.

The CamelCase Convention The CamelCase Convention

The CamelCase Convention

CamelCase is the practice of writing compound words with their elements joined, without spaces, and the first letter of each element capitalized.

Introduction to HTML Introduction to HTML

Introduction to HTML

An HTML (HyperText Markup Language) document is a set of instructions in ASCII format used to create hypertext documents that can be viewed in a WWW browser (such as Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, etc).

A brief history of the Internet A brief history of the Internet

A brief history of the Internet

The Internet was born in 1969, in the United States. It originally connected research laboratories and was called ARPAnet.

Introduction to PHP Introduction to PHP

Introduction to PHP

PHP or Hypertext Preprocessor is the most widely used server-side language on the web. Learn a little more about this excellent technology.

PHPSC Conf 2010 PHPSC Conf 2010

PHPSC Conf 2010

The coordination team of the Santa Catarina State PHP Users Group – PHPSC – is holding PHPSC Conf 2010 in Joinville/SC in partnership with SOCIESC.