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  • Pattern for loading and handling resources

    - by Enoon
    Many times there is the need to load external resources into the program, may they be graphics, audio samples or text strings. Is there a patten for handling the loading and the handling of such resources? For example: should I have a class that loads all the data and then call it everytime I need the data? As in: GraphicsHandler.instance().loadAllData() ...//and then later: draw(x,y, GraphicsHandler.instance().getData(WATER_IMAGE)) //or maybe draw(x,y, GraphicsHandler.instance().WATER_IMAGE) Or should I assign each resource to the class where it belongs? As in (for example, in a game): Graphics g = GraphicsLoader.load(CHAR01); Character c = new Character(..., g); ... c.draw(); Generally speaking which of these two is the more robust solution? GraphicsHandler.instance().getData(WATER_IMAGE) //or GraphicsHandler.instance().WATER_IMAGE //a constant reference

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  • How can I get better at explaining complex software processes to developers?

    - by Lostsoul
    I'm really struggling with my software specs. I am not a professional programmer but enjoy doing it for fun and made some software that I want to sell later but I'm not happy with the code quality. So I wanted to hire a real developer to rewrite my software in a more professional way so it will be maintainable by other developers in the future. I read and found some sample specs and made my own by applying their structure to my document and wanted to get my developer friend to read it and give me advice. After an hour and a half he understood exactly what I was trying to do and how I did it(my algorithms,stack,etc.). How can I get better at explaining things to developers? I add many details and explanations for everything(including working code) but I'm unsure the best way I can learn to pass detailed domain knowledge(my software applies big data, machine learning, graph theory to finance). My end goal is to get them to understand as much as possible from the document and then ask anything they do not understand, but right now it seems they need to extract alot of information from me. How can I get better at communicating domain knowledge to developers?

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  • Settings object with singleton pattern

    - by axis
    I need to build an object that will have only one instance because this Object is dedicated to the storage of vital settings for my application and I would like to avoid a misuse of this type or a conflict at run-time. The most popular solution for this, according to the internet, is the Singleton pattern. But I would like to know about other ideas or solutions for this; also I would like to know if other solutions can be much more easy to grasp for an user of this hypothetical library. Thanks.

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  • Should single purpose utility app use a class

    - by jmoreno
    When writing a small utility app, that does just one thing, should that one thing be encapsulated in a seperate class, or just let it be part of whatever class/module is used to start the application? I.e. Main would consist of 2 or three lines calling the constructor and then the DoIt methods, nothing else. Or should Main be the DoIt method, with whatever functions it needs added to the main class? Asking because I want to get some alternative perspective, but couldn't find a similar question. If my google-fu is bad and there's a dup, please close.

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  • Does an inventory limit in an MMORPG make sense?

    - by Philipp
    I am currently developing a simple 2d MMORPG. My current focus is the inventory system. I am currently wondering if I should implement a limit on what a player character can carry. Either in form of a maximum weight, a limited number of inventory slots, or a combination of both. Almost every MMORPG I ever played limits inventory space. But plausibility aside, is this really necessary from a gameplay point of view? Maybe it would in fact improve the game experience when I just let the players carry as much stuff as they want. tl;dr: What is the game development rationale behind limiting carrying capacity of player characters?

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  • What to do if I hate C++ header files?

    - by BlaXpirit
    I was always confused about header files. They are so strange: you include .h file which doesn't include .cpp but .cpp are somehow compiled too. NOTE: I UNDERSTAND EVERYTHING ABOUT THE HEADERS, PLEASE DON'T TELL ME I'M STUPID OR SHOULD USE OTHER LANGUAGE Recently I joined a team project, and of course, both .h and .cpp are used. I understand that this is very important, but I can't live with copy-pasting every function declaration in each of multiple classes we have. How do I handle the 2-file convention efficiently? Are there any tools to help with that, or automatically change one file that looks like example below to .h and .cpp? (specifically for MS VC++ 2010) class A { ... Type f(Type a,Type b) { //implementation here, not in another file! } ... }; Type f(Type a) { //implementation here } ...

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  • What is the most concise, unambiguous syntax for operator associated methods (for overloading etc.) that doesn't pollute the namespace?

    - by Doug Treadwell
    Python tends to add double underscores before its built-in or overloadable operator methods, like __add(), whereas C++ requires declaring overloaded operators as operator + (Thing& thing) { /* code */ } for example. Personally I like the operator syntax because it seems to be more explicit and keeps these operator overloading methods separated from other methods without introducing weird prefix notation. What are your thoughts? Also, what about the case of built-in methods that are needed for the programming language to work properly? Is name mangling (like adding __ prefix or sys or something) the best solution here? What do you think about having another type of method declaration, like ... "system method" for lack of creativity at the moment. So there would be two kinds of declarations: int method_name() { ... } system int method_name() { ... } ... and the call would need to be different to distinguish between them. obj.method_name(); vs obj:method_name(); perhaps, assuming a language where : can be unambiguously used in this situation. obj.method_name() vs obj.(system method_name)() Sure, the latter is ugly, but the idea is to make the common case simple and system stuff should be kept out of the way. Maybe the Objective-C notation of method calls? [obj method_name]? Are there more alternatives? Please make suggestions.

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  • Architecture Question

    - by katie77
    I am writing a rules/eligibility Module. I have 2 sets of data, one is the customer data and the other is the customer products data. Customer data to Customer products data is one to many. Now I have to go through a set of Eligibility rules for each of this Customer product data. For each customer products data, I can say the customer is eligible for that product or decline the eligibility and should move on to the next product record. So in all the rules, I need to have access to customer and customer product data(the particular record that the rules are being executed against). Since all the rules can either approve a product or decline a product, I created an interface with those 2 methods and is implementing the this interface for all the rules. I am passing the Customer data and one product data for all the rules (because rules should be executed on each row of customer product data). An Ideal situation would be having the customer and customer product data available for the rule instead of passing them to each rule. What is the best way of doing this in-terms of architecture?

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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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  • Where, in an object oriented system should you, if at all, choose (C-style) structs over classes?

    - by Anto
    C and most likely many other languages provide a struct keyword for creating structures (or something in a similar fashion). These are (at least in C), from a simplified point of view like classes, but without polymorphism, inheritance, methods, and so on. Think of an object-oriented (or multi paradigm) language with C-style structs. Where would you choose them over classes? Now, I don't believe they are to be used with OOP as classes seem to replace their purposes, but I wonder if there are situations where they could be preferred over classes in otherwise object-oriented programs and in what kind of situations. Are there such situations?

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  • How to better explain complex software process in software specs?

    - by Lostsoul
    I'm really struggling with my software specs. I am not a professional programmer but enjoy doing it for fun and made some software that I want to sell later but I'm not happy with the code quality. So I wanted to hire a real developer to rewrite my software in a more professional way so it will be maintainable by other developers in the future. I read and found some sample specs and made my own by applying their structure to my document and wanted to get my developer friend to read it and give me advice. After an hour and a half he understood exactly what I was trying to do and how I did it(my algorithms,stack,etc.). How can I get better at explaining things to developers? I add many details and explanations for everything(including working code) but I'm unsure the best way I can learn to pass detailed domain knowledge(my software applies big data, machine learning, graph theory to finance). My end goal is to get them to understand as much as possible from the document and then ask anything they do not understand, but right now it seems they need to extract alot of information from me. How can I get better at communicating domain knowledge to developers?

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  • Efficient Algorithm for Recording gameplay's objects positions

    - by Scorch
    So, I have a game idea in mind, and for that I need to record the game around the player. I'me not talking about recording it as video, but rather recording the scene objects, and their positions within the game, and then render them, giving the player the ability to go back and forth, to stop time and move around. I've made a prototype with some data structures in C#, since this is going to be the programming language we'll be using in our game, but if we want the player to be able to go back just five minutes back with the data of just 100 NPC's, it takes almost 1GB of RAM. Right now, I'm just storing a Doubly linked list, each item with the object position. In the game, I'll need to store even more data in each node, so I need something even more ligher. Of course, this algorithm is zero optimized, but still, that is a lot. The alternatives would be create the NPC's that aren't really important to the game when the user is viewing the past, but I don't really like it very much for the sake of realism. I wonder if there is a better way to store this? Thanks in advance, Scorch

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  • Use constructor or setter method?

    - by user633600
    I am working on a UI code where I have an Action class, something like this - public class MyAction extends Action { public MyAction() { setText("My Action Text"); setToolTip("My Action Tool tip"); setImage("Some Image"); } } When this Action class was created it was pretty much assumed that the Action class wont be customizable (in a sense- its text, tooltip or image will be not be changed anywhere in the code). Of late, now we are in need of changing the action text at some location in code. So I suggested my co-worker to remove the hardcoded action text from the constructor and accept it as an argument, so that everybody is forced to pass the action text. Something like this code below - public class MyAction extends Action { public MyAction(String actionText) { setText(actionText); setTooltip("My Action tool tip); setImage("My Image"); } } He however thinks that since setText() method belongs to base class. It can be flexibly used to pass the action text wherever action instance is created. That way, there is no need to change the existing MyAction class. So his code would look something like this. MyAction action = new MyAction(); //this creates action instance with the hardcoded text action.setText("User required new action text"); //overwrite the exisitng text. I am not sure if that is a correct way to deal with problem. I think in above mentioned case user is anyway going to change the text, so why not force him while constructing the action. The only benefit I see with the original code is that user can create Action class without much thinking about setting text.

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  • How can I better manage far-reaching changes in my code?

    - by neuviemeporte
    In my work (writing scientific software in C++), I often get asked by the people who use the software to get their work done to add some functionality or change the way things are done and organized right now. Most of the time this is just a matter of adding a new class or a function and applying some glue to do the job, but from time to time, a seemingly simple change turns out to have far-reaching consequences that require me to redesign a substantial amount of existing code, which takes a lot of time and effort, and is difficult to evaluate in terms of time required. I don't think it has as much to do with inter-dependence of modules, as with changing requirements (admittedly, on a smaller scale). To provide an example, I was thinking about the recently-added multi-user functionality in Android. I don't know whether they planned to introduce it from the very beginning, but assuming they didn't, it seems hard to predict all the areas that will be affected by the change (apps preferences, themes, need to store account info somehow, etc...?), even though the concept seems simple enough, and the code is well-organized. How do you deal with such situations? Do you just jump in to code and then sort out the cruft later like I do? Or do you do a detailed analysis beforehand of what will be affected, what needs to be updated and how, and what has to be rewritten? If so, what tools (if any) and approaches do you use?

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  • Is it a good idea to dynamically position and size controls on a form or statically set them?

    - by CrystalBlue
    I've worked mostly with interface building tools such as xCode's Interface Builder and Visual Studio's environment to place forms and position them on screens. But I'm finding that with my latest project, placing controls on the form through a graphical interface is not going to work. This more has to do with the number of custom controls I have to create that I can't visually see before hand. When I first tackled this, I began to position all of my controls relative to the last ones that I created. Doing this had its own pros and cons. On the one hand, this gave me the opportunity to set one number (a margin for example) and when I changed the margin, the controls all sized correctly to one another (such as shortening controls in the center while keeping controls next to the margin the same). But this started to become a spiders-web of code that I knew wouldn't go very far before getting dangerous. Change one number and everything re sizes, but remove one control and you've created many more errors and size problems for all the other controls. It became more surgery then small changes to controls and layout. Is there a good way or maybe a preferred way to determine when I should be using relative or absolute positioning in forms?

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  • When creating a GUI wizard, should all pages/tabs be of the same size? [closed]

    - by Job
    I understand that some libraries would force me to, but my question is general. If I have a set of buttons at the bottom: Back, Next, Cancel?, (other?), then should their location ever change? If the answer is no, then what do I do about pages with little content? Do I stretch things? Place them in the lone upper left corner? According to Steve Krug, it does not make sense to add anything to GUI that does not need to be there. I understand that there are different approaches to wizards - some have tabs, others do not. Some tabs are lined horizontally at the top; others - vertically on the left. Some do not show pages/tabs, and are simply sequences of dialogs. This is probably a must when the wizard is "non-linear", e.g. some earlier choices can result in branching. Either way the problem is the same - sacrifice on the consistency of the "big picture" (outline of the page/tab + location of buttons), or the consistency of details (some tabs might be somewhat packed; others having very little content). A third choice, I suppose is putting extra effort in the content in order to make sure that organizing the content such that it is more or less evenly distributed from page to page. However, this can be difficult to do (say, when the very first tab contains only a choice of three things, and then branches off from there; there are probably other examples), and hard to maintain this balance if any of the content changes later. Can you recommend a good approach? A link to a relevant good blog post or a chapter of a book is also welcome. Let me know if you have questions.

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  • Is there a better way to organize my module tests that avoids an explosion of new source files?

    - by luser droog
    I've got a neat (so I thought) way of having each of my modules produce a unit-test executable if compiled with the -DTESTMODULE flag. This flag guards a main() function that can access all static data and functions in the module, without #including a C file. From the README: -- Modules -- The various modules were written and tested separately before being coupled together to achieve the necessary basic functionality. Each module retains its unit-test, its main() function, guarded by #ifdef TESTMODULE. `make test` will compile and execute all the unit tests, producing copious output, but importantly exitting with an appropriate success or failure code, so the `make test` command will fail if any of the tests fail. Module TOC __________ test obj src header structures CONSTANTS ---- --- --- --- -------------------- m m.o m.c m.h mfile mtab TABSZ s s.o s.c s.h stack STACKSEGSZ v v.o v.c v.h saverec_ f.o f.c f.h file ob ob.o ob.c ob.h object ar ar.o ar.c ar.h array st st.o st.c st.h string di di.o di.c di.h dichead dictionary nm nm.o nm.c nm.h name gc gc.o gc.c gc.h garbage collector itp itp.c itp.h context osunix.o osunix.c osunix.h unix-dependent functions It's compile by a tricky bit of makefile, m:m.c ob.h ob.o err.o $(CORE) itp.o $(OP) cc $(CFLAGS) -DTESTMODULE $(LDLIBS) -o $@ $< err.o ob.o s.o ar.o st.o v.o di.o gc.o nm.o itp.o $(OP) f.o where the module is compiled with its own C file plus every other object file except itself. But it's creating difficulties for the kindly programmer who offered to write the Autotools files for me. So the obvious way to make it "less weird" would be to bust-out all the main functions into separate source files. But, but ... Do I gotta?

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  • Moving multiple objects on a map

    - by Dave
    I have multiple objects on my isometric game, for example, NPC's doing path finding automatically to walk around the map. Now there could be any number of them from 0 to infinity (hypthetical as no PC could handle that). My question is: is simply looping each one individually the smartest way to animate them all? Surely as the number of units increases you will notice a lag occuring on units near the end of loop still "waiting" for their next animation movement. The alternative is a swarm algorithm to move all objects together. Is that a smarter idea or do both situations apply depending on the circumstances of the game?

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  • A separate solution for types, etc?

    - by hayer
    I'm currently in progress updating some engine-code(which does not work, so it is more like creating a engine). I've decided to swap over to SFML(instead of my own crappy renderer, window manager, and audio), Box2d(since I need physics, but have none), and some small utils I've built myself. The problem is that each of the project mentioned over use different types for things like Vector2, etc. So to the question; Is it a good idea to replace box2d and SFML vectors with my own vector class? (Which is one of my better implementations) My idea then was to have a seperate .lib with all my classes that should be shared between all the projects in the solution.

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  • Top X tips to code & debug efficiently [closed]

    - by user1510230
    I'm starting a big Java project and I wanted to have some advices that could benefit us all. What are the X (X could be 5 / 10 / ... or even 100 :) most important tips to code and debug efficiently in general (and in particular with java / javascript) ? I'll start with some basic ones : Use functions everytime a portion of code is used more than twice. Try not to code features with more than 15 lines of code in one shot. Rather write 5 lines of code then check if they work correctly then write 5 more... and so on start with the outcome of the function and then code it backwards (bottom-top approach) ... Thanks everybody

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  • How to implement string matching based on a pattern

    - by Vincent Rischmann
    I was asked to build a tool that can identify if a string match a pattern. Example: {1:20} stuff t(x) {a,b,c} would match: 1 stuff tx a 20 stuff t c It is a sort of regex but with a different syntax Parentheses indicate an optional value {1:20} is a interval; I will have to check if the token is a number and if it is between 1 and 20 {a,b,c} is just an enumeration; it can be either a or b or c Right now I implemented this with a regex, and the interval stuff was a pain to do. On my own time I tried implementing some kind of matcher by hand, but it turns out it's not that easy to do. By experimenting I ended up with a function that generates a state table from the pattern and a state machine. It worked well until I tried to implement the optional value, and I got stuck and how to generate the state table. After that I searched how I could do this, and that led me to stuff like LL parser, LALR parser, recursive-descent parser, context-free grammars, etc. I never studied any of this so it's hard to know what is relevant here, but I think this is what I need: A grammar A parser which generates states from the grammar and a pattern A state machine to see if a string match the states So my first question is: Is this right ? And second question, what do you recommend I read/study to be able to implement this ?

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  • Is it correct to add booleans in order to count the number of true values in a vector?

    - by gerrit
    Is it conceptually correct to sum a vector of booleans? From a mathematical point of view, I would argue it's not: True + True != 2. But it's quite practical to do so still! Example using the vectorised Python library numpy: In [1]: X = rand(10) In [2]: large = X>0.6 In [3]: large.dtype Out[3]: dtype('bool') In [4]: large.sum() Out[4]: 7 I don't like it, but it's very practical. Is this a good practice? Update: the aim is to count the number of true values in a vector.

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  • Managing different utility classes between engine and libraries

    - by hayer
    I'm currently in updating some engine code (which does not work, so it is more like creating a engine). I've decided to swap over to SFML (instead of my own crappy renderer, window manager, and audio), Box2D (since I need physics, but have none), and some small utilities I've built myself. The problem is that each of the project mentioned over use different types for things like Vector2, etc. So to the question: is it a good idea to replace Box2D and SFML vectors with my own vector class (which is one of my better implementations)? My idea then was to have a separate .lib with all my classes that should be shared between all the projects in the solution.

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  • share code between check and process methods

    - by undu
    My job is to refactor an old library for GIS vector data processing. The main class encapsulates a collection of building outlines, and offers different methods for checking data consistency. Those checking functions have an optional parameter that allows to perform some process. For instance: std::vector<Point> checkIntersections(int process_mode = 0); This method tests if some building outlines are intersecting, and return the intersection points. But if you pass a non null argument, the method will modify the outlines to remove the intersection. I think it's pretty bad (at call site, a reader not familiar with the code base will assume that a method called checkSomething only performs a check and doesn't modifiy data) and I want to change this. I also want to avoid code duplication as check and process methods are mostly similar. So I was thinking to something like this: // a private worker std::vector<Point> workerIntersections(int process_mode = 0) { // it's the equivalent of the current checkIntersections, it may perform // a process depending on process_mode } // public interfaces for check and process std::vector<Point> checkIntersections() /* const */ { workerIntersections(0); } std::vector<Point> processIntersections(int process_mode /*I have different process modes*/) { workerIntersections(process_mode); } But that forces me to break const correctness as workerIntersections is a non-const method. How can I separate check and process, avoiding code duplication and keeping const-correctness?

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  • Should I use my real name in my open source project?

    - by Jardo
    I developed a few freeware programs in the past which I had signed with my pseudonym Jardo. I'm now planning to release my first open source project and was thinking of using my full real name in the project files (as the "author"). I thought it would be good to use my name as my "trademark" so if someone (perhaps a future headhunter) googles my name, they'll find my projects. But on the other side, I feel a bit paranoid about disclosing my name (in the least case I could be getting a lot of spam to my email, its not that hard to guess your private email from your name). What do you think can be "dangerous" on disclosing your full name? What are the pros and cons? Do you use your real name or a pseudonym in your projects? I read this question: What are the advantages and disadvantages to using your real name online? but that doesn't apply to me bacause it's about using your real name online (internet discussions, profiles, etc.) where I personally see no reason to use my real name... And there is also this question: Copyrighting software, templates, etc. under real name or screen name? which deals with creating a business or a brand which also doesn't apply to me because I will never sell/give away my open source project and if someone else joins in, they can write their name as co-author without any problems...

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