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  • Question about creating a sprite based 2-D Side Scroller with scaling/zooming

    - by Arthur
    I'm just wondering if anyone can offer any advice on how best to go about creating a 2-D game with zooming/scaling features akin to the early Samurai Showdown games. In this case it would be a side scroller a la Metal Slug, the zooming would come in as more enemy sprites entered the screen, or when facing a large sized boss. A feature that would be both cosmetic as well as functional to the game. I've done some reading and noticed a few suggestions that included drawing different sized sprites, a standard size and zoomed out size. Any thoughts? Thanks for your time.

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  • Ranking players depending on decision making during a game

    - by tabchas
    How would I go about a ranking system for players that play a game? Basically, looking at video games, players throughout the game make critical decisions that ultimately impact the end game result. Is there a way or how would I go about a way to translate some of those factors (leveling up certain skills, purchasing certain items, etc.) into something like a curve that can be plotted on a graph? This game that I would like to implement this is League of Legends. Example: Player is Level 1 in the beginning. Gets a kill very early in the game (he gets gold because of the kill and it increases his "power curve"), and purchases attack damage (gives him more damage which also increases his "power curve". However, the player that he killed (Player 2), buys armor (counters attack damage). This slightly increases Player 2's own power curve, and reduces Player 1's power curve. There's many factors I would like to take into account. These relative factors (example: BECAUSE Player 2 built armor, and I am mainly attack damage, it lowers my OWN power curve) seem the hardest to implement. My question is this: Is there a certain way to approach this task? Are there similar theoretical concepts behind ranking systems that I should read up on? I've seen the ELO system, but it doesn't seem what I want since it simply takes into account wins and losses.

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  • How is it possible to write the compiler of a programming language with that language itself [closed]

    - by tugberk
    Possible Duplicate: How could the first C++ compiler be written in C++? You probably heard that Microsoft released a new language called TypeScript which is a the typed superset of JavaScript. The most interesting thing that makes me wonder is the fact that its compiler writen in TypeScript itself. Call me ignorant but I really couldn't figure out in my head how that is possible. This is just like chicken and egg problem in my head because there is no compiler to compile TypeScript's compiler in the first place. How is it possible to write a compiler of the compiler of a programming language with that language?

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  • Passing functions into other functions as parameters, bad practice?

    - by BlueHat
    We've been in the process of changing how our AS3 application talks to our back end and we're in the process of implementing a REST system to replace our old one. Sadly the developer who started the work is now on long term sick leave and it's been handed over to me. I've been working with it for the past week or so now and I understand the system, but there's one thing that's been worrying me. There seems to be a lot of passing of functions into functions. For example our class that makes the call to our servers takes in a function that it will then call and pass an object to when the process is complete and errors have been handled etc. It's giving me that "bad feeling" where I feel like it's horrible practice and I can think of some reasons why but I want some confirmation before I propose a re-work to system. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this possible problem?

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  • Maya and Game Engines (i.e. Environment Testing)

    - by DiscreteGenius
    What does it mean if I'm designing an environment and I want to test it in the game engine, to see what its like to "run" [or fly] around my environment? I heard an instructor say that exact thing in a Maya training video and I'd like to know more about "How Game Engines and Maya are related to each other." He stated this would be done to see how things look in "size" (e.g. I assume he meant: 'How big is the cathedral, bridge, wall, building, etc.'). I've tried to research such information but it's too complicated, and detailed. I just want a simplistic response to my query. Thanks to everyone willing to help and not criticize my question.

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  • How can I designed multi-threaded application for larger user base

    - by rokonoid
    Here's my scenario, I need to develop a scalable application. My user base may be over 100K, every user has 10 or more small tasks. Tasks check every minute with a third party application through web services, retrieving data which is written in the database, then the data is forwarded to it's original destination. So here's the processing of a small task: while(true){ Boolean isNewInformationAvailable = checkWhetherInformationIsAvailableOrNot(); If(isNewInformationAvailable ==true){ fetchTheData(); writeToDatabase(); findTheDestination(); deliverTheData(); isAvailable =false; } } Here is the question: as the application is large, how should I approach designing this. I'm going to use Java to write it. Should I use concurrency, and how would you manage the concurrency?

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  • I know of three ways in which SRP helps reduce coupling. Are there even more? [closed]

    - by user1483278
    I'd like to figure all the possible ways SRP helps us reduce coupling. Thus far I can think of three: 1) If class A has more than one responsibility, these responsibilities become coupled and as such changes to one of these responsibilities may require changes to other of A's responsibilities. 2) Related functionality usually needs to be changed for the same reason and by grouping it togerther in a single class, the changes can be made in as few places as possible ( at best changes only need be made to the class which groups together these functionalities) 3) Assuming class A performs two tasks ( thus may change for two reasons ), then number of classes utilising A will be greater than if A performed just a single task ( reason being that some classes will need A to perform first task, other will need A for second task, and still others will utilise it for both tasks ).This also means that when A breaks, the number of classes ( utilising A ) being impaired will be greater than if A performed just a single task. Can SRP also help reduce coupling in any other way, not described above? Thank you

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  • Is it okay to introduce LESS to not so savvy UI Designers?

    - by Jason Nathan
    I just got a job as lead developer and I thought it would be best to seek the expertise of my peers (that's you) before proceeding! I had the opportunity to review my designers and they are mostly photoshop pros with dreamweaver as their main HTML/CSS editor. A more visual experience. I, on the other hand, have had much experience hand-writing all my code. From HTML markup to CSS. From my understanding, my designers have basic CSS knowledge and I am considering a simple 101 style set of tutorials for them to get a better grasp of markup before I moved into more advanced topics like accessibility and microformat markup. We need to get started up quickly. Do you think it's okay to dive into LESS from the get-go?

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  • django/python: is one view that handles two separate models a good idea?

    - by clime
    I am using django multi-table inheritance: Video and Image are models derived from Media. I have implemented two views: video_list and image_list, which are just proxies to media_list. media_list returns images or videos (based on input parameter model) for a certain object, which can be of type Event, Member, or Crag. It alters its behaviour based on input parameter action, which can be either "edit" or "view". The problem is that I need to ask whether the input parameter model contains Video or Image in media_list so that I can do the right thing. Similar condition is also in helper method media_edit_list that is called from the view. I don't particularly like it but the only alternative I can think of is to have separate logic for video_list and image_list and then probably also separate helper methods for videos and images: video_edit_list, image_edit_list, video_view_list, image_view_list. So four functions instead of just two. That I like even less because the video functions would be very similar to the respective image functions. What do you recommend? Here is extract of relevant parts: http://pastebin.com/07t4bdza. I'll also paste the code here: #urls url(r'^media/images/(?P<rel_model_tag>(event|member|crag))/(?P<rel_object_id>\d+)/(?P<action>(view|edit))/$', views.video_list, name='image-list') url(r'^media/videos/(?P<rel_model_tag>(event|member|crag))/(?P<rel_object_id>\d+)/(?P<action>(view|edit))/$', views.image_list, name='video-list') #views def image_list(request, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, action): return media_list(request, Image, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, action) def video_list(request, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, action): return media_list(request, Video, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, action) def media_list(request, model, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, action): rel_model = tag_to_model(rel_model_tag) rel_object = get_object_or_404(rel_model, pk=rel_object_id) if model == Image: star_media = rel_object.star_image else: star_media = rel_object.star_video filter_params = {} if rel_model == Event: filter_params['media__event'] = rel_object_id elif rel_model == Member: filter_params['media__members'] = rel_object_id elif rel_model == Crag: filter_params['media__crag'] = rel_object_id media_list = model.objects.filter(~Q(id=star_media.id)).filter(**filter_params).order_by('media__date_added').all() context = { 'media_list': media_list, 'star_media': star_media, } if action == 'edit': return media_edit_list(request, model, rel_model_tag, rel_model_id, context) return media_view_list(request, model, rel_model_tag, rel_model_id, context) def media_view_list(request, model, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, context): if request.is_ajax(): context['base_template'] = 'boxes/base-lite.html' return render(request, 'media/list-items.html', context) def media_edit_list(request, model, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id, context): if model == Image: get_media_record = get_image_record else: get_media_record = get_video_record media_list = [get_media_record(media, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id) for media in context['media_list']] if context['star_media']: star_media = get_media_record(star_media, rel_model_tag, rel_object_id) star_media['starred'] = True else: star_media = None json = simplejson.dumps({ 'star_media': star_media, 'media_list': media_list, }) return HttpResponse(json, content_type=json_response_mimetype(request)) # models class Media(models.Model, WebModel): title = models.CharField('title', max_length=128, default='', db_index=True, blank=True) event = models.ForeignKey(Event, null=True, default=None, blank=True) crag = models.ForeignKey(Crag, null=True, default=None, blank=True) members = models.ManyToManyField(Member, blank=True) added_by = models.ForeignKey(Member, related_name='added_images') date_added = models.DateTimeField('date added', auto_now_add=True, null=True, default=None, editable=False) def __unicode__(self): return self.title def get_absolute_url(self): return self.image.url if self.image else self.video.embed_url class Image(Media): image = ProcessedImageField(upload_to='uploads', processors=[ResizeToFit(width=1024, height=1024, upscale=False)], format='JPEG', options={'quality': 75}) thumbnail_1 = ImageSpecField(source='image', processors=[SmartResize(width=178, height=134)], format='JPEG', options={'quality': 75}) thumbnail_2 = ImageSpecField(source='image', #processors=[SmartResize(width=256, height=192)], processors=[ResizeToFit(height=164)], format='JPEG', options={'quality': 75}) class Video(Media): url = models.URLField('url', max_length=256, default='') embed_url = models.URLField('embed url', max_length=256, default='', blank=True) author = models.CharField('author', max_length=64, default='', blank=True) thumbnail = ProcessedImageField(upload_to='uploads', processors=[ResizeToFit(width=1024, height=1024, upscale=False)], format='JPEG', options={'quality': 75}, null=True, default=None, blank=True) thumbnail_1 = ImageSpecField(source='thumbnail', processors=[SmartResize(width=178, height=134)], format='JPEG', options={'quality': 75}) thumbnail_2 = ImageSpecField(source='thumbnail', #processors=[SmartResize(width=256, height=192)], processors=[ResizeToFit(height=164)], format='JPEG', options={'quality': 75}) class Crag(models.Model, WebModel): name = models.CharField('name', max_length=64, default='', db_index=True) normalized_name = models.CharField('normalized name', max_length=64, default='', editable=False) type = models.IntegerField('crag type', null=True, default=None, choices=crag_types) description = models.TextField('description', default='', blank=True) country = models.ForeignKey('country', null=True, default=None) #TODO: make this not null when db enables it latitude = models.FloatField('latitude', null=True, default=None) longitude = models.FloatField('longitude', null=True, default=None) location_index = FixedCharField('location index', length=24, default='', editable=False, db_index=True) # handled by db, used for marker clustering added_by = models.ForeignKey('member', null=True, default=None) #route_count = models.IntegerField('route count', null=True, default=None, editable=False) date_created = models.DateTimeField('date created', auto_now_add=True, null=True, default=None, editable=False) last_modified = models.DateTimeField('last modified', auto_now=True, null=True, default=None, editable=False) star_image = models.OneToOneField('Image', null=True, default=None, related_name='star_crags', on_delete=models.SET_NULL) star_video = models.OneToOneField('Video', null=True, default=None, related_name='star_crags', on_delete=models.SET_NULL)

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  • Is there any CSS selector to reach an element outside of the current container?

    - by acidrums4
    (And excuse me for my bad english, for starters...) Sorry if this is a noob question, but I really don't know if the following is possible. I'm doing a html5 portfolio. I'm following a tuto from codrops to visually filter works with only css3 (http://tympanus.net/codrops/2012/01/09/filter-functionality-with-css3/). There, user can select which category want to see with some <input type="radio">'s. But those selectors are under the same container (a <section>) and give visibility for the elements via CSS using a general sibling combinator (~). So in that example, the CSS code goes like this: .ff-container input.ff-selector-type-all:checked ~ label.ff-label-type-all, .ff-container input.ff-selector-type-1:checked ~ label.ff-label-type-1, .ff-container input.ff-selector-type-2:checked ~ label.ff-label-type-2, .ff-container input.ff-selector-type-3:checked ~ label.ff-label-type-3{ background: linear-gradient(top, #646d93 0%,#7c87ad 100%); color: #424d71; text-shadow: 0px 1px 1px rgba(255,255,255,0.3); box-shadow: 0px 0px 0px 1px #40496e, 0 1px 2px rgba(0,0,0,0.1) inset; } The thing is I want to put those <input type="radio">'s on the <head> section of my portfolio, but obviously the ~ selector won't work there. So my question is that is there any selector, hack or something that can do that? Something like .ff-container input.ff-selector-type-all:checked $ header > label.ff-label-type-all { awesomeness:100%; } I really don't want to use Javascript/Jquery for that... Thank you so much in advance!

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  • How to control messages to the same port from different emitters?

    - by Alex In Paris
    Scene: A company has many factories X, each emits a message to the same receive port in a Biztalk server Y; if all messages are processed without much delay, each will trigger an outgoing message to another system Z. Problem: Sometimes a factory loses its connection for a half-day or more and, when the connection is reestablished, thousands of messages get emitted. Now, the messages still get processed well by Y (Biztalk can easily handle the load) but system Z can't handle the flood and may lock up and severely delay the processing of all other messages from the other X. What is the solution? Creating multiple receive locations that permits us to pause one X or another would lose us information if the factory isn't smart enough to know whether the message was received or not. What is the basic pattern to apply in Biztalk for this problem? Would some throttling parameters help to limit the flow from any one X? Or are their techniques on the end part of Y which I should use instead ? I would prefer this last one since I can be confident that the message box will remember any failures, which could then be resumed.

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  • reference list for non-IT driven algorithmic patterns

    - by Quicker
    I am looking for a reference list for non-IT driven algorithmic patterns (which still can be helped with IT implementations of IT). An Example List would be: name; short desc; reference Travelling Salesman; find the shortest possible route on a multiple target path; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travelling_salesman_problem Ressource Disposition (aka Regulation); Distribute a limited/exceeding input on a given number output receivers based on distribution rules; http://database-programmer.blogspot.de/2010/12/critical-analysis-of-algorithm-sproc.html If there is no such list, but you instantly think of something specific, please 'put it on the desk'. Maybe I can compile something out of the input I get here (actually I am very frustrated as I did not find any such list via research by myself). Details on Scoping: I found it very hard to formulate what I want in a way everything is out that I do not need (which may be the issue why I did not find anything at google). There is a database centric definition for what I am looking for in the section 'Processes' of the second example link. That somehow fits, but the database focus sort of drifts away from the pattern thinking, which I have in mind. So here are my own thoughts around what's in and what's out: I am NOT looking for a foundational algo ref list, which is implemented as basis for any programming language. Eg. the php reference describes substr and strlen. That implements algos, but is not what I am looking for. the problem the algo does address would even exist, if there were no computers (or other IT components) the main focus of the algo is NOT to help other algo's chances are high, that there are implementions of the solution or any workaround without any IT support out there in the world however the algo could be benefitialy implemented/fully supported by a software application = means: the problem of the algo has to be addressed anyway, but running an algo implementation with software automates the process (that is why I posted it on stackoverflow and not somewhere else) typically such algo implementations have more than one input field value and more than one output field value - which implies it could not be implemented as simple function (which is fixed to produce not more than one output value) in a normalized data model often times such algo implementation outputs span accross multiple rows (sometimes multiple tables), whereby the number of output rows depends on the input paraters and rows in the table(s) at start time - which implies that any algo implementation/procedure must interact with a database (read and/or write) I am mainly looking for patterns, not for specific implementations. Example: The Travelling Salesman assumes any coordinates, however it does not say: You need a table targets with fields x and y. - however sometimes descriptions are focussed on examples with specific implementations very much - no worries, as long as the pattern gets clear

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  • Full Text Search Strategy For My Website

    - by Hosea146
    I have a website that allows users to search for items in various categories. Each category is a separate area (page) of my website. For example, some categories might be cars, bikes, books etc. At the moment a user has to search for an item by going to the page (for example, cars) and searching for the car they want. I would like to allow the user to search for anything on my site, from my main home page. At the moment, each page (category) has its own set of tables, and I don't really want to turn Full Text Search on for each table (20+ of them) and search each table individually when a search is done. This is going to be slow and tedious. What I'm thinking of doing is creating a single table that will hold all searchable information for each category of item (when an item is saved in its respective table, I would copy all searchable information over to my 'Search' table). I would then turn Full Text Search on for that table, and search that table. Does this sound reasonable? Is there a better way? I've never used Full Text Search before, so this is new to me.

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  • When decomposing a large function, how can I avoid the complexity from the extra subfunctions?

    - by missingno
    Say I have a large function like the following: function do_lots_of_stuff(){ { //subpart 1 ... } ... { //subpart N ... } } a common pattern is to decompose it into subfunctions function do_lots_of_stuff(){ subpart_1(...) subpart_2(...) ... subpart_N(...) } I usually find that decomposition has two main advantages: The decomposed function becomes much smaller. This can help people read it without getting lost in the details. Parameters have to be explicitly passed to the underlying subfunctions, instead of being implicitly available by just being in scope. This can help readability and modularity in some situations. However, I also find that decomposition has some disadvantages: There are no guarantees that the subfunctions "belong" to do_lots_of_stuff so there is nothing stopping someone from accidentally calling them from a wrong place. A module's complexity grows quadratically with the number of functions we add to it. (There are more possible ways for things to call each other) Therefore: Are there useful convention or coding styles that help me balance the pros and cons of function decomposition or should I just use an editor with code folding and call it a day? EDIT: This problem also applies to functional code (although in a less pressing manner). For example, in a functional setting we would have the subparts be returning values that are combined in the end and the decomposition problem of having lots of subfunctions being able to use each other is still present. We can't always assume that the problem domain will be able to be modeled on just some small simple types with just a few highly orthogonal functions. There will always be complicated algorithms or long lists of business rules that we still want to correctly be able to deal with. function do_lots_of_stuff(){ p1 = subpart_1() p2 = subpart_2() pN = subpart_N() return assembleStuff(p1, p2, ..., pN) }

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  • How can I get non-programmer colleagues on board with bespoke software rather than Dynamics CRM + Sharepoint?

    - by Bendos
    I am working with a company which designs and builds one-off machines. They have been 'dabbling' with hosted Dynamics CRM and Sharepoint (on different servers!) in an attempt to centralise their data and help colleagues collaborate more effectively across projects. They haven't used either system to their potential. Now we are looking at the engineering department who already use a form of version control software for the various CAD files (Autodesk Vault) however it is becoming increasingly necessary to implement more of a generic file version control system as they use many more files than can be managed in Vault (sometimes just photos or scans of paper documents), hence why they were looking at using Sharepoint. However... as the 'programmer' of the bunch, I can see several scenarios which don't seem to fit well with the Dynamics + Sharepoint approach; simple reports based on cross-table queries, exporting certain metrics as a spreadsheet, defining project hierarchies and many-many relationships, and as such I have been pushing for an in-house developed 'ECM' / 'ERP' software package (perhaps in .NET or php). Some colleagues seem to attach a greater value to the MS software (perhaps becuase it has a logo!) but don't see that it's just a framework, not a solution. Can anyone provide a good example of when custom software would actually be better than using Dynamics + Sharepoint and how do I relate that to non-technical staff?

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  • Creating a Application in Winrt that requires Internet

    - by wtsang02
    I am making a paid App for Windows 8, c#. I am wondering which is better? If my application doesn't need internet connection normally but does requires internet connection for the first time to download content data. --Makes my life easier Load the default data when installing. Then ask the user if he wants to update in app. -- Making the default data will be pain. Now my big question is, is it safe to assume user has access to internet now-a-days when using application that shouldn't require internet?

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  • Chapters Two, Three, and Four

    - by drsql
    I am trying to blog all of the chapters of the book, but due to deadlines and a lot of shuffling about, I never got around it for these three chapters, two of which I have added since I wrote the original table of contents. All of these contain mostly material from previous editions of the book, updated a good amount, but nothing tremendously different if you had memorized the material from the previous edition. As such, the pre-writing blog ritual wasn’t as necessary (for me at least) as it is going...(read more)

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  • Set modified date = created date or null on record creation?

    - by User
    I've been following the convention of adding created and modified columns to most of my database tables. I also have been leaving the modified column as null on record creation and only setting a value on actual modification. The other alternative is to set the modified date to be equal to created date on record creation. I've been doing it the former way but I recent ran into one con which is seriously making me think of switching. I needed to set a database cache dependency to find out if any existing data has been changed or new data added. Instead of being able to do the following: SELECT MAX(modified) FROM customer I have to do this: SELECT GREATEST(MAX(created), MAX(modified)) FROM customer The negative being that it's a more complicated query and slower. Another thing is in file systems I believe they usually use the second convention of setting modified date = created date on creation. What are the pros and cons of the different methods? That is, what are the issues to consider?

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  • Too complex/too many objects?

    - by Mike Fairhurst
    I know that this will be a difficult question to answer without context, but hopefully there are at least some good guidelines to share on this. The questions are at the bottom if you want to skip the details. Most are about OOP in general. Begin context. I am a jr dev on a PHP application, and in general the devs I work with consider themselves to use many more OO concepts than most PHP devs. Still, in my research on clean code I have read about so many ways of using OO features to make code flexible, powerful, expressive, testable, etc. that is just plain not in use here. The current strongly OO API that I've proposed is being called too complex, even though it is trivial to implement. The problem I'm solving is that our permission checks are done via a message object (my API, they wanted to use arrays of constants) and the message object does not hold the validation object accountable for checking all provided data. Metaphorically, if your perm containing 'allowable' and 'rare but disallowed' is sent into a validator, the validator may not know to look for 'rare but disallowed', but approve 'allowable', which will actually approve the whole perm check. We have like 11 validators, too many to easily track at such minute detail. So I proposed an AtomicPermission class. To fix the previous example, the perm would instead contain two atomic permissions, one wrapping 'allowable' and the other wrapping 'rare but disallowed'. Where previously the validator would say 'the check is OK because it contains allowable,' now it would instead say '"allowable" is ok', at which point the check ends...and the check fails, because 'rare but disallowed' was not specifically okay-ed. The implementation is just 4 trivial objects, and rewriting a 10 line function into a 15 line function. abstract class PermissionAtom { public function allow(); // maybe deny() as well public function wasAllowed(); } class PermissionField extends PermissionAtom { public function getName(); public function getValue(); } class PermissionIdentifier extends PermissionAtom { public function getIdentifier(); } class PermissionAction extends PermissionAtom { public function getType(); } They say that this is 'not going to get us anything important' and it is 'too complex' and 'will be difficult for new developers to pick up.' I respectfully disagree, and there I end my context to begin the broader questions. So the question is about my OOP, are there any guidelines I should know: is this too complicated/too much OOP? Not that I expect to get more than 'it depends, I'd have to see if...' when is OO abstraction too much? when is OO abstraction too little? how can I determine when I am overthinking a problem vs fixing one? how can I determine when I am adding bad code to a bad project? how can I pitch these APIs? I feel the other devs would just rather say 'its too complicated' than ask 'can you explain it?' whenever I suggest a new class.

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  • PHP I am pulling my hair out trying to find the best! [closed]

    - by darga33
    PULLING MY HAIR OUT I have heard of Martin Fowler's book PoEAA and the other book Head First OOA OOD but those are not in PHP. I DESPERATELY WANT TO READ THEM, but ONLY in PHP utilizing SOLID principles! Does anyone know of the absolute best, most recent PHP book that utilizes the SOLID principles and GRASP, and all the other best practices? I want to learn from the best possible source! Not beginner books! I already understand OOP. This seems like an almost impossible question to find the answer to and so I thought, hey, might as well post on stackexchange!! Surely someone out there must know!!!!!!!!!! Or if noone knows Maybe they know of an open source application that utilizes these principles that is relatively small that is not a framework. Something that I can go through every single class, and spend time understanding the insides and outs of how the program was developed. Thanks so much in advance! I really really really really appreciate it!

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  • Beginner's steps to game programming [on hold]

    - by CodeTrasher
    I have graduated from university less than 6 months ago and became a B.Eng in Software Engineering. I have moderate understanding of programming experience from languages like C++, Java and C#. But mostly on simple desktop and mobile applications. I've tried some simple Pong-like games but never finished even the smallest game. I have a couple of nice ideas growing (IMO, at least...) in my mind but don't really know where to begin. 2D is way to go, of course, at the beginning. I just want to hear from more experienced game devs how they started out. Should I make a rough outline of the core idea and mechanics and start working on a prototype of core gameplay? Or should I just practice more by making Pong, Asteroids and that sort of games and get an understanding of those before moving on? Thanks to all!

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  • Is it dangerous for me to give some of my Model classes Control-like methods?

    - by Pureferret
    In my personal project I have tried to stick to MVC, but I've also been made aware that sticking to MVC too tightly can be a bad thing as it makes writing awkward and forces the flow of the program in odd ways (i.e. some simple functions can be performed by something that normally wouldn't, and avoid MVC related overheads). So I'm beginning to feel justified in this compromise: I have some 'manager programs' that 'own' data and have some way to manipulate it, as such I think they'd count as both part of the model, and part of the control, and to me this feels more natural than keepingthem separate. For instance: One of my Managers is the PlayerCharacterManager that has these methods: void buySkill(PlayerCharacter playerCharacter, Skill skill); void changeName(); void changeRole(); void restatCharacter(); void addCharacterToGame(); void createNewCharacter(); PlayerCharacter getPlayerCharacter(); List<PlayerCharacter> getPlayersCharacter(Player player); List<PlayerCharacter> getAllCharacters(); I hope the mothod names are transparent enough that they don't all need explaining. I've called it a manager because it will help manage all of the PlayerCharacter 'model' objects the code creates, and create and keep a map of these. I may also get it to store other information in the future. I plan to have another two similar classes for this sort of control, but I will orchestrate when and how this happens, and what to do with the returned data via a pure controller class. This splitting up control between informed managers and the controller, as opposed to operating just through a controller seems like it will simplify my code and make it flow more. My question is, is this a dangerous choice, in terms of making the code harder to follow/test/fix? Is this somethign established as good or bad or neutral? I oculdn't find anything similar except the idea of Actors but that's not quite why I'm trying to do. Edit: Perhaps an example is needed; I'm using the Controller to update the view and access the data, so when I click the 'Add new character to a player button' it'll call methods in the controller that then go and tell the PlayerCharacterManager class to create a new character instance, it'll call the PlayerManager class to add that new character to the player-character map, and then it'll add this information to the database, and tell the view to update any GUIs effected. That is the sort of 'control sequence' I'm hoping to create with these manager classes.

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  • Should I always encapsulate an internal data structure entirely?

    - by Prog
    Please consider this class: class ClassA{ private Thing[] things; // stores data // stuff omitted public Thing[] getThings(){ return things; } } This class exposes the array it uses to store data, to any client code interested. I did this in an app I'm working on. I had a ChordProgression class that stores a sequence of Chords (and does some other things). It had a Chord[] getChords() method that returned the array of chords. When the data structure had to change (from an array to an ArrayList), all client code broke. This made me think - maybe the following approach is better: class ClassA{ private Thing[] things; // stores data // stuff omitted public Thing[] getThing(int index){ return things[index]; } public int getDataSize(){ return things.length; } public void setThing(int index, Thing thing){ things[index] = thing; } } Instead of exposing the data structure itself, all of the operations offered by the data structure are now offered directly by the class enclosing it, using public methods that delegate to the data structure. When the data structure changes, only these methods have to change - but after they do, all client code still works. Note that collections more complex than arrays might require the enclosing class to implement even more than three methods just to access the internal data structure. Is this approach common? What do you think of this? What downsides does it have other? Is it reasonable to have the enclosing class implement at least three public methods just to delegate to the inner data structure?

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  • Bluetooth push application

    - by Paul Kassey
    I am considering the technical viability of software that I want to write. Is there a way that I can push data to a phone (iPhone or Andriod) via Bluetooth without pairing with it? I want to be able to walk into a room and have a computer push data to my phone when I get a certain distance from it, or push data to any phone automatically when it comes within a certain distance to a Bluetooth-ready device?

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  • Law of Demeter in MVC regarding Controller-View communication

    - by Antonio MG
    The scenario: Having a Controller that controls a view composed of complex subviews. Each one of those subviews is a separated class in a separate file. For example, one of those subviews is called ButtonsView, and has a bunch of buttons. The Controller has to access those buttons. Would accessing those buttons like this: controllerMainView.buttonsView.firstButton.state(); be a violation of the LOD? On one hand, it could be yes because the controller is accessing the inner hierarchy of the view. On the other, a Controller should be aware of what happens inside the view and how is composed. Any thoughts?

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