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• Why a static main method in Java and C#, rather than a constructor?

  - by Konrad Rudolph

  Why did (notably) Java and C# decide to have a static method as their entry point – rather than representing an application instance by an instance of an Application class, with the entry point being an appropriate constructor which, at least to me, seems more natural? I’m interested in a definitive answer from a primary or secondary source, not mere speculations. This has been asked before. Unfortunately, the existing answers are merely begging the question. In particular, the following answers don’t satisfy me, as I deem them incorrect: There would be ambiguity if the constructor were overloaded. – In fact, C# (as well as C and C++) allows different signatures for Main so the same potential ambiguity exists, and is dealt with. A static method means no objects can be instantiated before so order of initialisation is clear. – This is just factually wrong, some objects are instantiated before (e.g. in a static constructor). So they can be invoked by the runtime without having to instantiate a parent object. – This is no answer at all. Just to justify further why I think this is a valid and interesting question: Many frameworks do use classes to represent applications, and constructors as entry points. For instance, the VB.NET application framework uses a dedicated main dialog (and its constructor) as the entry point1. Neither Java nor C# technically need a main method. Well, C# needs one to compile, but Java not even that. And in neither case is it needed for execution. So this doesn’t appear to be a technical restriction. And, as I mentioned in the first paragraph, for a mere convention it seems oddly unfitting with the general design principle of Java and C#. To be clear, there isn’t a specific disadvantage to having a static main method, it’s just distinctly odd, which made me wonder if there was some technical rationale behind it. I’m interested in a definitive answer from a primary or secondary source, not mere speculations. 1 Although there is a callback (Startup) which may intercept this.

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• Database source control

  - by Bojan Skrchevski

  Should database files(scripts etc.) be on source control? If so, what is the best method to keep it and update it there? Is there even a need for database files to be on source control since we can put it on a development server where everyone can use it and make changes to it if needed. But, then we can't get it back if someone messes it up. What approach is best used for databases on source-control?

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• Why do people hesitate using Python 3?

  - by Ham

  Python 3 has been released in December 2008. A lot of time has passed since then but still today many developers hesitate using Python 3. Even popular frameworks like Django are not compatible with Python 3 yet but still rely on Python 2. Sure, Python 3 has some incompatibilities to Python 2 and some people need to rely on backwards-compatibility. But hasn't Python 3 been around long enough now for most projects to switch or start with Python 3? Having two competiting versions has so many drawbacks; two branches need to be maintained, confusion for learners and so on, so why is there such a big hesitation throughout the Python community in switching to Python 3?

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• jQuery + Perl CGI to vb.net transition

  - by user1257458

  I've been developing oracle database-heavy "web applications" forever by building my html by hand, adding some jquery to handle ajax requests (html inserts for forms processing etc), and always did my server side stuff in perl cgi. I really love how easy it is to read some form input, execute some select statements through dbi (SO EASY), and generate HTML to be inserted by the jquery request. That's a web application to me. However, my new boss builds everything in visual studio 2010, vb.net, usually webforms. So, for work reasons, I now need to start developing in vb.net so it can be collectively maintained, and I'm just seeking advice on where to start learning/how to approach this. I know I could at least learn ASP.net and VB.net, and create a webform, have it read parameters, return HTML, etc. which would allow me to use my previously written HTML and client-side scripts (jQuery). Although- since we're moving heavily to mobile applications I really need to reduce client-side processing load. Is there any advantage to my boss' method? Thanks a ton.

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• Best Design Pattern for Coupling User Interface Components and Data Structures

  - by szahn

  I have a windows desktop application with a tree view. Due to lack of a sound data-binding solution for a tree view, I've implemented my own layer of abstraction on it to bind nodes to my own data structure. The requirements are as follows: Populate a tree view with nodes that resemble fields in a data structure. When a node is clicked, display the appropriate control to modify the value of that property in the instance of the data structure. The tree view is populated with instances of custom TreeNode classes that inherit from TreeNode. The responsibility of each custom TreeNode class is to (1) format the node text to represent the name and value of the associated field in my data structure, (2) return the control used to modify the property value, (3) get the value of the field in the control (3) set the field's value from the control. My custom TreeNode implementation has a property called "Control" which retrieves the proper custom control in the form of the base control. The control instance is stored in the custom node and instantiated upon first retrieval. So each, custom node has an associated custom control which extends a base abstract control class. Example TreeNode implementation: //The Tree Node Base Class public abstract class TreeViewNodeBase : TreeNode { public abstract CustomControlBase Control { get; } public TreeViewNodeBase(ExtractionField field) { UpdateControl(field); } public virtual void UpdateControl(ExtractionField field) { Control.UpdateControl(field); UpdateCaption(FormatValueForCaption()); } public virtual void SaveChanges(ExtractionField field) { Control.SaveChanges(field); UpdateCaption(FormatValueForCaption()); } public virtual string FormatValueForCaption() { return Control.FormatValueForCaption(); } public virtual void UpdateCaption(string newValue) { this.Text = Caption; this.LongText = newValue; } } //The tree node implementation class public class ExtractionTypeNode : TreeViewNodeBase { private CustomDropDownControl control; public override CustomControlBase Control { get { if (control == null) { control = new CustomDropDownControl(); control.label1.Text = Caption; control.comboBox1.Items.Clear(); control.comboBox1.Items.AddRange( Enum.GetNames( typeof(ExtractionField.ExtractionType))); } return control; } } public ExtractionTypeNode(ExtractionField field) : base(field) { } } //The custom control base class public abstract class CustomControlBase : UserControl { public abstract void UpdateControl(ExtractionField field); public abstract void SaveChanges(ExtractionField field); public abstract string FormatValueForCaption(); } //The custom control generic implementation (view) public partial class CustomDropDownControl : CustomControlBase { public CustomDropDownControl() { InitializeComponent(); } public override void UpdateControl(ExtractionField field) { //Nothing to do here } public override void SaveChanges(ExtractionField field) { //Nothing to do here } public override string FormatValueForCaption() { //Nothing to do here return string.Empty; } } //The custom control specific implementation public class FieldExtractionTypeControl : CustomDropDownControl { public override void UpdateControl(ExtractionField field) { comboBox1.SelectedIndex = comboBox1.FindStringExact(field.Extraction.ToString()); } public override void SaveChanges(ExtractionField field) { field.Extraction = (ExtractionField.ExtractionType) Enum.Parse(typeof(ExtractionField.ExtractionType), comboBox1.SelectedItem.ToString()); } public override string FormatValueForCaption() { return string.Empty; } The problem is that I have "generic" controls which inherit from CustomControlBase. These are just "views" with no logic. Then I have specific controls that inherit from the generic controls. I don't have any functions or business logic in the generic controls because the specific controls should govern how data is associated with the data structure. What is the best design pattern for this?

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• Spring 3 learning curve

  - by Lucian Enache

  I'm coming from a Struts background and I was considering learning the Spring framework. How long would it usually take to get familiarity with Spring Core and Spring MVC modules, keeping in mind that I come from a Struts 1 background ? Beside those two modules are there any other modules that I should focus on ? I know that the time is relative given that everyone has a different learning curve.

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• AJAX event, prevents other page actions

  - by cobaltduck

  Here's a fairly average scenario, using JSF as an example, but this same concept I have observed in ASP.NET, Apache Wicket, and other frameworks with ajax capabilities. <h:inputText id="text1" value="#{myBacker.myBean.myStringVar}" styleClass="goodCSS"> <f:ajax event="change" listener="#{myBacker.text1ChangeEventMethod}" update="someOtherField" /> </h:inputText> <h:selectBooleanCheckbox id="check1" value="#{myBacker.myBean.myBoolVar}" /> Let's suppose that the 'text1ChangeEventListener' is essential to 'someOtherField' and perhaps toggles its disabled attribute, or changes its available options, based on the value of 'myStringVar.' The particulars aren't important, let's just accept that for some reason we need an ajax call when the 'text1' value is changed. So Jane User is working her way down the form. She arrives at the 'text1' field and types some value. The cursor focus is still in the text field, as she moves her mouse to the 'check1' box and clicks. It appears to her that nothing has happened. She clicks again, and this time the checkbox highlights and the icon indicating a selection appears in the box. Jane has to do several entries in the form today, and sees this happen every time, and it becomes very frustrating for her. Likewise, Jeff Admin is also perusing this form, and begins to type in 'text1.' He then realizes he doesn't really want to enter this data, and so moves his mouse to the "cancel" button elsewhere on the page, and clicks. Nothing seems to happen. Jeff clicks again, and after confirming he really does want to cancel, is returned to the home page. Jeff scratches his head. The problem is simply that the first thing the system does after 'text1' looses focus is run the listener and perform the ajax operation. It may only take a fraction of a second, but still, you can click other buttons all you want, but until that ajax has finished, everything else is ignored. I've spent the morning searching and reading, and it seems no one else has even noticed this. I could find not one article, blog, past question here or at SO, or anyting that addresses this obvious and glaring deficiency in ajax. So first of all, am I truly alone in thinking this is a big problem? Second, does anyone have a solution?

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• Where can I find out the following info on python (coming from Ruby)

  - by Michael Durrant

  I'm coming from Ruby and Ruby on Rails to Python. Where can I find or find resources about: The command prompt, what is python's version of 'irb' django, what is a good resource for installing, using, etc. pythoncasts... is there anything like railscats, i.e. good video tutorials web sites with the api info about what version have what and which to use. info and recommendations on editors, plugins and IDE's common gotchas for newbies and good things to know at the outset scaling issues, common reasons what is the equivalent of 'gems', i.e. components I can plug in what are popular plugins for django authentication and forms similar to devise and simple_form testing, what's available, anything similar to rspec? database adapters - any preferences? framework info - is django MVC like rails? OO'yness. Is everything an object that gets send messages? Different paradign? syntax - anything like jslint for checking for well-formed code?

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• Where can I start learning to build web applications in C#

  - by Carson Myers

  So far I've written web sites in PHP, except for a pet project of mine written in Python. I'd like to start learning C# for use on the web, but I have no idea where to start. I know nothing of .Net. Are there any good tutorials or online books etc. which give a brief intro to the .Net environment (specifically C#, and specifically for the web)? I'm not even sure what I need to install. Visual Studio I guess, but what else? Anything special, or will VS do the trick?

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• WCF or ASMX WebService

  - by karthi

  I have been asked to create a web service that communicates with Auth.NET CIM and Shipsurance API. This web service will be used by multiple applications (one a desktop and another a web application). Am confused whether to go for WCF or asmx web service . Auth.NET CIM and Shipsurance API have asmx webservices which i would be calling in my newly created web service.So is WCF the right way to Go or can i stay with asmx? Can Some one please guide. Let me know if this question is inappropriate here and needs to be moved to stackoverflow or somewhere else.

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• Examples of permission-based authorization systems in .Net?

  - by Rachel

  I'm trying to figure out how to do roles/permissions in our application, and I am wondering if anyone knows of a good place to get a list of different permission-based authorization systems (preferably with code samples) and perhaps a list of pros/cons for each method. I've seen examples using simple dictionaries, custom attributes, claims-based authorization, and custom frameworks, but I can't find a simple explanation of when to use one over another and what the pros/cons are to using each method. (I'm sure there's other ways than the ones I've listed....) I have never done anything complex with permissions/authorization before, so all of this seems a little overwhelming to me and I'm having trouble figuring out what what is useful information that I can use and what isn't. What I DO know is that this is for a Windows environment using C#/WPF and WCF services. Some permission checks are done on the WCF service and some on the client. Some are business rules, some are authorization checks, and others are UI-related (such as what forms a user can see). They can be very generic like boolean or numeric values, or they can be more complex such as a range of values or a list of database items to be checked/unchecked. Permissions can be set on the group-level, user-level, branch-level, or a custom level, so I do not want to use role-based authorization. Users can be in multiple groups, and users with the appropriate authorization are in charge of creating/maintaining these groups. It is not uncommon for new groups to be created, so they can't be hard-coded.

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• Fast programmatic compare of "timetable" data

  - by Brendan Green

  Consider train timetable data, where each service (or "run") has a data structure as such: public class TimeTable { public int Id {get;set;} public List<Run> Runs {get;set;} } public class Run { public List<Stop> Stops {get;set;} public int RunId {get;set;} } public class Stop { public int StationId {get;set;} public TimeSpan? StopTime {get;set;} public bool IsStop {get;set;} } We have a list of runs that operate against a particular line (the TimeTable class). Further, whilst we have a set collection of stations that are on a line, not all runs stop at all stations (that is, IsStop would be false, and StopTime would be null). Now, imagine that we have received the initial timetable, processed it, and loaded it into the above data structure. Once the initial load is complete, it is persisted into a database - the data structure is used only to load the timetable from its source and to persist it to the database. We are now receiving an updated timetable. The updated timetable may or may not have any changes to it - we don't know and are not told whether any changes are present. What I would like to do is perform a compare for each run in an efficient manner. I don't want to simply replace each run. Instead, I want to have a background task that runs periodically that downloads the updated timetable dataset, and then compares it to the current timetable. If differences are found, some action (not relevant to the question) will take place. I was initially thinking of some sort of checksum process, where I could, for example, load both runs (that is, the one from the new timetable received and the one that has been persisted to the database) into the data structure and then add up all the hour components of the StopTime, and all the minute components of the StopTime and compare the results (i.e. both the sum of Hours and sum of Minutes would be the same, and differences introduced if a stop time is changed, a stop deleted or a new stop added). Would that be a valid way to check for differences, or is there a better way to approach this problem? I can see a problem that, for example, one stop is changed to be 2 minutes earlier, and another changed to be 2 minutes later would have a net zero change. Or am I over thinking this, and would it just be simpler to brute check all stops to ensure that The updated run stops at the same stations; and Each stop is at the same time

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• Java Cryptography Extension

  - by Adam Tannon

  I was told that in order to support AES256 encryption inside my Java app that I would need the JCE with Unlimited Strength Jurisdiction Policy Files. I downloaded this from Oracle and unzipped it and I'm only seeing 2 JARs: local_policy.jar; and US_export_polic.jar I just want to confirm I'm not missing anything here! My understanding (after reading the README.txt) is that I just drop these two into my <JAVA_HOME>/lib/security/ directory and they should be installed. By the names of these JARs I have to assume that its not the Java Crypto API that cannot handle AES256, but it's in fact a legal issue, perhaps? And that these two JARs basically tell the JRE "yes, it's legally-acceptable to run this level of crypto (AES256)." Am I correct or off-base?

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• Python Coding standards vs. productivity

  - by Shroatmeister

  I work for a large humanitarian organisation, on a project building software that could help save lives in emergencies by speeding up the distribution of food. Many NGOs desperately need our software and we are weeks behind schedule. One thing that worries me in this project is what I think is an excessive focus on coding standards. We write in python/django and use a version of PEP0008, with various modifications e.g. line lengths can go up to 160 chars and all lines should go that long if possible, no blank lines between imports, line wrapping rules that apply only to certain kinds of classes, lots of templates that we must use, even if they aren't the best way to solve a problem etc. etc. One core dev spent a week rewriting a major part of the system to meet the then new coding standards, throwing away several suites of tests in the process, as the rewrite meant they were 'invalid'. We spent two weeks rewriting all the functionality that was lost, and fixing bugs. He is the lead dev and his word carries weight, so he has convinced the project manager that these standards are necessary. The junior devs do as they are told. I sense that the project manager has a strong feeling of cognitive dissonance about all this but nevertheless agrees with it vehemently as he feels unsure what else to do. Today I got in serious trouble because I had forgotten to put some spaces after commas in a keyword argument. I was literally shouted at by two other devs and the project manager during a Skype call. Personally I think coding standards are important but also think that we are wasting a lot of time obsessing with them, and when I verbalized this it provoked rage. I'm seen as a troublemaker in the team, a team that is looking for scapegoats for its failings. Since the introduction of the coding standards, the team's productivity has measurably plummeted, however this only reinforces the obsession, i.e. the lead dev simply blames our non-adherence to standards for the lack of progress. He believes that we can't read each other's code if we don't adhere to the conventions. This is starting to turn sticky. Now I am trying to modify various scripts, autopep8, pep8ify and PythonTidy to try to match the conventions. We also run pep8 against source code but there are so many implicit amendments to our standard that it's hard to track them all. The lead dev simple picks faults that the pep8 script doesn't pick up and shouts at us in the next stand-up meeting. Every week there are new additions to the coding standards that force us to rewrite existing, working, tested code. Thank heavens we still have tests, (I reverted some commits and fixed a bunch of the ones he removed). All the while there is increasing pressure to meet the deadline. I believe a fundamental issue is that the lead dev and another core dev refuse to trust other developers to do their job. But how to deal with that? We can't do our job because we are too busy rewriting everything. I've never encountered this dynamic in a software engineering team. Am I wrong to question their adherence to coding standards? Has anyone else experienced a similar situation and how have they dealt with it successfully? (I'm not looking for a discussion just actual solutions people have found)

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• Writing cross-platforms Types, Interfaces and Classes/Methods in C++

  - by user827992

  I'm looking for the best solution to write cross-platform software, aka code that I write and that I have to interface with different libraries and platforms each time. What I consider the easiest part, correct me if I'm wrong, is the definition of new types, all I have to do is to write an hpp file with a list of typedefs, I can keep the same names for each new type across the different platforms so my codebase can be shared without any problem. typedefs also helps me to redefine a better scope for my types in my code. I will probably end up having something like this: include |-windows | |-types.hpp |-linux | |-types.hpp |-mac |-types.hpp For the interfaces I'm thinking about the same solution used for the types, a series of hpp files, probably I will write all the interfaces only once since they rely on the types and all "cross-platform portability" is ensured by the work done on the types. include | |-interfaces.hpp | |-windows | |-types.hpp |-linux | |-types.hpp |-mac | |-types.hpp For classes and methods I do not have a real answer, I would like to avoid 2 things: the explicit use of pointers the use of templates I want to avoid the use of the pointers because they can make the code less readable for someone and I want to avoid templates just because if I write them, I can't separate the interface from the definition. What is the best option to hide the use of the pointers? I would also like some words about macros and how to implement some OS-specifics calls and definitions.

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• Integrating application ad-support - best practice

  - by Jarede

  Considering the review that came out in March: Researchers from Purdue University in collaboration with Microsoft claim that third-party advertising in free smartphone apps can be responsible for as much as 65 percent to 75 percent of an app's energy consumption. Is there a best practice for integrating advert support into mobile applications, so as to not drain user battery too much. When you fire up Angry Birds on your Android phone, the researchers found that the core gaming component only consumes about 18 percent of total app energy. The biggest battery suck comes from the software powering third-party ads and analytics accounting for 45 percent of total app energy, according to the study. Has anyone invoked better ways of keeping away from the "3G Tail", as the report puts it. Is it better/possible to download a large set of adverts that are cached for a few hours, and using them to populate your ad space, to avoid constant use of the wifi/3g radios. Are there any best practices for the inclusion of adverts in mobile apps?

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• Developer Compensation System

  - by Graviton

  Joel wrote excellent articles on developer compensation system used at Fogcreek. As a team lead and business owner, I would like to device a system that would work best for my team. And here's the catch: I have no experience in managing a team before, and I don't know what works and what doesn't. So I would like to get as many references as I can on this matter. Is there other developer compensation systems that you find is working for you and your company?

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• Python web frameworks comparisons

  - by stupidLearner

  I recently asked a question on SO about Python web frameworks: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4909306/python-web-frameworks-vs-java-web-frameworks-how-is-web-development-in-python-do I want to learn one just for fun but it also has to be able to help me deliver a proper working application. I am looking for a framework with lots of features, powerful, mature, with large community, good documentation, books etc. I need something that will help me be more productive in developing my app and not waste time figuring out how to do a certain thing in the framework or how to write workaround around the limitations of the framework. I was thinking one of the following: django, zope, turbogears, pylons. Off course the war is raging out there and there are other alternatives but seems Django is at the top... or is it just hype? I am interested in pros and cons of each. What was the best feature you think the framework has? What is the thing it lacks? What could have been done differently. Help me chose one to learn for starters.

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• Need recommendation for transferring ASP.NET MVC skills to PHP

  - by Tuck

  I am looking to translate my skills in .NET to PHP - specifically in regards to ASP.NET MVC. At work I am currently using .NET MVC 2.0 on a variety of projects and thoroughly enjoy the platform. Specifically I enjoy the very minimal configuration required to get a project up and running (just create the project, define routes, and start coding), as well as the ability for controller actions to return different items (i.e. ActionResult, JsonResult). Another piece I really like is the way the view/model interaction can be handled. For example I like being able to call return View(model) and having a view page (.aspx) load and having the full model object available to the view, regardless of the model type. I'm looking for a PHP implementation of MVC that is the most similiar to what I am already familiar with. I don't anything apart from the MVC functionality. I've looked at Zend, Symfony, CodeIgniter, etc. and, while they look like they'll be fun to play with in the future, they provide much more functionality than I need. I'd prefer to write my own DAL, form helpers, delegate handlers, authentication/ACL pieces, etc. In short, I just need something to handle the routing and view interactions and will worry about the model implementation myself. Can someone please point me to some lightweight code that accomplishes or comes close to accomplishing my objectives above. Or, can someone identify just the portions of a larger framework that do the same (again, I'm not currently interested in implementing something on a big framework, just the MVC portion and want to implement the model portion myself as much as possible). Thanks in advance.

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• What have we lost from computers 20 years ago

  - by Martin Beckett

  Following the theme of - I can't believe computers used floppy disks and did you have debuggers 20 years ago - questions (and because even putting my age in hex I don't look young anymore). What have we lost from computers 20years ago? VMS versioning file system. Make a mistake, no problem myprog.cpp;5 is still there. Home computers that powered up to give you a wordprocessor or a basic prompt in <0.5sec User ports, serial ports and ADCs that you could control things with - without an arduino APIs that actually did what they said (even DOS interrupts), without having to guess and experiment your way through layers of frameworks.

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• Design Code Outside of an IDE (C#)?

  - by ryanzec

  Does anyone design code outside of an IDE? I think that code design is great and all but the only place I find myself actually design code (besides in my head) is in the IDE itself. I generally think about it a little before hand but when I go to type it out, it is always in the IDE; no UML or anything like that. Now I think having UML of your code is really good because you are able to see a lot more of the code on one screen however the issue I have is that once I type it in UML, I then have to type the actual code and that is just a big duplicate for me. For those who work with C# and design code outside of Visual Studio (or at least outside Visual Studio's text editor), what tools do you use? Do those tools allow you to convert your design to actual skeleton code? It is also possible to convert code to the design (when you update the code and need an updated UML diagram or whatnot)?

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• Questions re: Eclipse Jobs API

  - by BenCole

  Similar to http://stackoverflow.com/questions/8738160/eclipse-jobs-api-for-a-stand-alone-swing-project This question mentions the Jobs API from the Eclipse IDE: ...The disadvantage of the pre-3.0 approach was that the user had to wait until an operation completed before the UI became responsive again. The UI still provided the user the ability to cancel the currently running operation but no other work could be done until the operation completed. Some operations were performed in the background (resource decoration and JDT file indexing are two such examples) but these operations were restricted in the sense that they could not modify the workspace. If a background operation did try to modify the workspace, the UI thread would be blocked if the user explicitly performed an operation that modified the workspace and, even worse, the user would not be able to cancel the operation. A further complication with concurrency was that the interaction between the independent locking mechanisms of different plug-ins often resulted in deadlock situations. Because of the independent nature of the locks, there was no way for Eclipse to recover from the deadlock, which forced users to kill the application... ...The functionality provided by the workspace locking mechanism can be broken down into the following three aspects: Resource locking to ensure multiple operations did not concurrently modify the same resource Resource change batching to ensure UI stability during an operation Identification of an appropriate time to perform incremental building With the introduction of the Jobs API, these areas have been divided into separate mechanisms and a few additional facilities have been added. The following list summarizes the facilities added. Job class: support for performing operations or other work in the background. ISchedulingRule interface: support for determining which jobs can run concurrently. WorkspaceJob and two IWorkspace#run() methods: support for batching of delta change notifications. Background auto-build: running of incremental build at a time when no other running operations are affecting resources. ILock interface: support for deadlock detection and recovery. Job properties for configuring user feedback for jobs run in the background. The rest of this article provides examples of how to use the above-mentioned facilities... In regards to above API, is this an implementation of a particular design pattern? Which one?

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• Should one always know what an API is doing just by looking at the code?

  - by markmnl

  Recently I have been developing my own API and with that invested interest in API design I have been keenly interested how I can improve my API design. One aspect that has come up a couple times is (not by users of my API but in my observing discussion about the topic): one should know just by looking at the code calling the API what it is doing. For example see this discussion on GitHub for the discourse repo, it goes something like: foo.update_pinned(true, true); Just by looking at the code (without knowing the parameter names, documentation etc.) one cannot guess what it is going to do - what does the 2nd argument mean? The suggested improvement is to have something like: foo.pin() foo.unpin() foo.pin_globally() And that clears things up (the 2nd arg was whether to pin foo globally, I am guessing), and I agree in this case the later would certainly be an improvement. However I believe there can be instances where methods to set different but logically related state would be better exposed as one method call rather than separate ones, even though you would not know what it is doing just by looking at the code. (So you would have to resort to looking at the parameter names and documentation to find out - which personally I would always do no matter what if I am unfamiliar with an API). For example I expose one method SetVisibility(bool, string, bool) on a FalconPeer and I acknowledge just looking at the line: falconPeer.SetVisibility(true, "aerw3", true); You would have no idea what it is doing. It is setting 3 different values that control the "visibility" of the falconPeer in the logical sense: accept join requests, only with password and reply to discovery requests. Splitting this out into 3 method calls could lead to a user of the API to set one aspect of "visibility" forgetting to set others that I force them to think about by only exposing the one method to set all aspects of "visibility". Furthermore when the user wants to change one aspect they almost always will want to change another aspect and can now do so in one call.

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• How do I handle 3rd party search result data (via cache)

  - by reikyoushin

  I have a search function on my site and it is taking data from 6 different 3rd party resources. The problem is, it takes too long requesting the data over and over again on the results page. I've read for questions like this on SO about session not being a good choice but for me 'memcache' is not an option, because the server doesn't have memcached installed and I have no way to install it now. Is there any other approach to do this? Storing in the database seem inappropriate because the data depends on the search terms requested. What I've been thinking is writing a file on the server that would act as a cache for this file but I don't know how I would know when to delete it after.

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• Binary on the Coat of Arms of the Governor General of Canada

  - by user132636

  Can you help me further this investigation? Here is about 10% of the work I have done on it. I present it only to see if there are any truly curious people among you. I made a video a few weeks ago showing some strange things about the Governor General's Coat of Arms and the binary on it. Today, I noticed something kinda cool and thought I would share. Here is the binary as it appears on the COA: 110010111001001010100100111010011 As DEC: 6830770643 (this is easily found on the web) Take a close look at that number. What do you notice about it? It has a few interesting features, but here is the one no one has pointed out... Split it down the middle and you have 68307 70643. The first digit is double the value of the last digit. The second digit is double the second last digit. The third digit is half of the third to last digit. And the middle ones are even or neutral. At first, I thought of it as energy. ++-nnnn+-- But actually you can create something else with it using the values. 221000211. See how that works. You may be asking why that is significant. Bare with me. I know 99% are rolling their eyes. 221000211 as base3 gives you this as binary: 100011101000111 100011101000111 as HEX is 4747, which converts to "GG". Initials of Governor General. GG.ca is his website. When you convert to base 33 (there are 33 digits in the original code) you get "GOV" Interesting? :D There is a lot more to it. I'll continue to show some strange coincidences if anyone is interested. Sorry if I am not explaining this correctly. By now you have probably figured out that I have no background in this. Which is why I am here. Thank you.

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