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• What is the most effective approach to learn an unfamiliar complex program? [closed]

  - by bdroc

  Possible Duplicate: How do you dive into large code bases? I have quite a bit of experience with different programming languages and writing small and functional programs for a variety of purposes. My coding skills aren't what I have a problem with. In fact, I've written a decent web application from scratch for my startup. However, I have trouble jumping into unfamiliar applications. What's the most effective way to approach learning a new program's structure and/or architecture so that I can start attacking the code effectively? Are there useful tools for their respective languages (Python and Java are my two primary languages)? Should I be starting with just looking at function names or documentation? How do you veterans approach this problem? I find this has to be with minimal help from coworkers or contributors who are already familiar with the application and have better things to do than help me. I'd love to practice this skill in an open source project so any suggestions for starting points (maybe mildly complex) would be great too!

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• How do OSes work on multiple CPUs? [on hold]

  - by user3691093

  Assumption: "OS es (atleast in some part) should be written in assembly.Assembly programs are CPU specefic." If so how can one os run on different CPUs ? For example: how is that I can load Ubuntu on different systems having different CPUs (like intel i3,i5,i7, amd a8,a6,etc) from the same bootable disk? Does the disk contain seporate assembly programs for each CPU? Are these CPUs 'similar' enough to run the same assembly program? Is my assumption wrong? Something else.... Thanks for responding. I tried to find out in what way are the CPUs that I mentioned 'similar'. I came across the concepts of Instruction Set Architecture and Microarchitecture of CPUs.A CPU will understand a program if it is combatible with its ISA. Even if CPUs are 'wired up' differently (different microarchitecture) , as long as the ISA implemented on top is same ,the program will work. ARM and x86 have different ISA ( that why there are 2 windows 8 versions, right?). And if an app program is written in an HLL with compilers for both platforms we will saved from wasting time writing 2 programs. Did I understand anything wrong? Are there programs that can take a compiled program as input and produce a program executable on another CPU as output? Is it possible? (Virtualisation?) 32 bit windows programs do install on 64 bit windows ,dont they? Arent 64 bit CPUs 'differerent' from 32 bit CPUs? They do get seporate OS versions, right? Is this backward combatibility achieved using programes mentioned in (3) ?

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• Where to Perform Authentication in REST API Server?

  - by David V

  I am working on a set of REST APIs that needs to be secured so that only authenticated calls will be performed. There will be multiple web apps to service these APIs. Is there a best-practice approach as to where the authentication should occur? I have thought of two possible places. Have each web app perform the authentication by using a shared authentication service. This seems to be in line with tools like Spring Security, which is configured at the web app level. Protect each web app with a "gateway" for security. In this approach, the web app never receives unauthenticated calls. This seems to be the approach of Apache HTTP Server Authentication. With this approach, would you use Apache or nginx to protect it, or something else in between Apache/nginx and your web app? For additional reference, the authentication is similar to services like AWS that have a non-secret identifier combined with a shared secret key. I am also considering using HMAC. Also, we are writing the web services in Java using Spring. Update: To clarify, each request needs to be authenticated with the identifier and secret key. This is similar to how AWS REST requests work.

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• Examples of limitations in IT due to different bit length by design

  - by Alaudo

  I am teaching the course "Introduction in Programming" for the first-year students and would like to find interesting examples where the datatype size in bits, chosen by design, led to certain known restrictions or important values. Here are some examples: Due to the fact that the Bell teleprinter used 7-bit-code (later accepted as ASCII) until now have we often to encode attachments in electronic messages to contain only 7 bit data. Classical limitation of 32-bit address space leads to the 4Gb maximal RAM size available for 32-bit systems and 4Gb maximal file size in FAT32. Do you know some other interesting examples how the choice of the data type (and especially its binary length) influenced the modern IT world. Added after some discussion in comments: I am not going to teach how to overcome limitations. I just want them to know that 1 byte can hold the values from -127..0..+127 o 0..255, 2 bytes cover the range 0..65535 etc by proving examples they know from other sources, like the above-mentioned base64 encoding etc. We are just learning the basic datatypes and I am trying to find a good reference for "how large" these types are.

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• How can I separate the user interface from the business logic while still maintaining efficiency?

  - by Uri

  Let's say that I want to show a form that represents 10 different objects on a combobox. For example, I want the user to pick one hamburguer from 10 different ones that contain tomatoes. Since I want to separate UI and logic, I'd have to pass the form a string representation of the hamburguers in order to display them on the combobox. Otherwise, the UI would have to dig into the objects fields. Then the user would pick a hamburguer from the combobox, and submit it back to the controller. Now the controller would have to find again said hamburguer based on the string representation used by the form (maybe an ID?). Isn't that incredibly inefficient? You already had the objects you wanted to pick one from. If you submited to the form the whole objects, and then returned a specific object, you wouldn't have to refind it later on since the form already returned a reference to that object. Moreover, if I'm wrong and you actually should send the whole object to the form, how can I isolate UI from logic?

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• (Abstract) Game engine design

  - by lukeluke

  I am writing a simple 2D game (for mobile platforms) for the first time. From an abstract point of view, i have the main player controlled by the human, the enemies, elments that will interact with the main player, other living elements that will be controlled by a simple AI (both enemies and non-enemies). The human player will be totally controlled by the player, the other actors will be controlled by AI. So i have a class CActor and a class CActorLogic to start with. I would define a CActor subclass CHero (the main player controlled with some input device). This class will probably implement some type of listener, in order to capture input events. The other players controlled by the AI will be probably a specific subclass of CActor (a subclass per-type, obviously). This seems to be reasonable. The CActor class should have a reference to a method of CActorLogic, that we will call something like CActorLogic::Advance() or similar. Actors should have a visual representation. I would introduce a CActorRepresentation class, with a method like Render() that will draw the actor (that is, the right frame of the right animation). Where to change the animation? Well, the actor logic method Advance() should take care of checking collisions and other things. I would like to discuss the design of a game engine (actors, entities, objects, messages, input handling, visualization of object states (that is, rendering, sound output and so on)) but not from a low level point of view, but from an high level point of view, like i have described above. My question is: is there any book/on line resource that will help me organize things (using an object oriented approach)? Thanks

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• design for supporting entities with images

  - by brainydexter

  I have multiple entities like Hotels, Destination Cities etc which can contain images. The way I have my system setup right now is, I think of all the images belonging to this universal set (a table in the DB contains filePaths to all the images). When I have to add an image to an entity, I see if the entity exists in this universal set of images. If it exists, attach the reference to this image, else create a new image. E.g.: class ImageEntityHibernateDAO { public void addImageToEntity(IContainImage entity, String filePath, String title, String altText) { ImageEntity image = this.getImage(filePath); if (image == null) image = new ImageEntity(filePath, title, altText); getSession().beginTransaction(); entity.getImages().add(image); getSession().getTransaction().commit(); } } My question is: Earlier I had to write this code for each entity (and each entity would have a Set collection). So, instead of re-writing the same code, I created the following interface: public interface IContainImage { Set<ImageEntity> getImages(); } Entities which have image collections also implements IContainImage interface. Now, for any entity that needs to support adding Image functionality, all I have to invoke from the DAO looks something like this: // in DestinationDAO::addImageToDestination { imageDao.addImageToEntity(destination, imageFileName, imageTitle, imageAltText); // in HotelDAO::addImageToHotel { imageDao.addImageToEntity(hotel, imageFileName, imageTitle, imageAltText); It'd be great help if someone can provide me some critique on this design ? Are there any serious flaws that I'm not seeing right away ?

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• Query something and return the reason if nothing has been found

  - by Daniel Hilgarth

  Assume I have a Query - as in CQS that is supposed to return a single value. Let's assume that the case that no value is found is not exceptional, so no exception will be thrown in this case. Instead, null is returned. However, if no value has been found, I need to act according to the reason why no value has been found. Assuming that the Query knows the reason, how would I communicate it to the caller of the Query? A simple solution would be not return the value directly but a container object that contains the value and the reason: public class QueryResult { public TValue Value { get; private set; } public TReason ReasonForNoValue { get; private set; } } But that feels clumsy, because if a value is found, ReasonForNoValue makes no sense and if no value has been found, Value makes no sense. What other options do I have to communicate the reason? What do you think of one event per reason? For reference: This is going to be implemented in C#.

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• Best design for a "Command Executer" class

  - by Justin984

  Sorry for the vague title, I couldn't think of a way to condense the question. I am building an application that will run as a background service and intermittently collect data about the system its running on. A second Android controller application will query the system over tcp/ip for statistics about the system. Currently, the background service has a tcp listener class that reads/writes bytes from a socket. When data is received, it raises an event to notify the service. The service takes the bytes, feeds them into a command parser to figure out what is being requested, and then passes the parsed command to a command executer class. When the service receives a "query statistics" command, it should return statistics over the tcp/ip connection. Currently, all of these classes are fully decoupled from each other. But in order for the command executer to return statistics, it will obviously need access to the socket somehow. For reasons I can't completely articulate, it feels wrong for the command executer to have a direct reference to the socket. I'm looking for strategies and/or design patterns I can use to return data over the socket while keeping the classes decoupled, if this is possible. Hopefully this makes sense, please let me know if I can include any info that would make the question easier to understand.

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• A generic Re-usable C# Property Parser utility [on hold]

  - by Shyam K Pananghat

  This is about a utility i have happened to write which can parse through the properties of a data contracts at runtime using reflection. The input required is a look like XPath string. since this is using reflection, you dont have to add the reference to any of your data contracts thus making pure generic and re- usable.. you can read about this and get the full c# sourcecode here. Property-Parser-A-C-utility-to-retrieve-values-from-any-Net-Data-contracts-at-runtime Now about the doubts which i have about this utility. i am using this utility enormously i many places of my code I am using Regex repeatedly inside a recursion method. does this affect the memmory usage or GC collection badly ?do i have to dispose this manually. if yes how ?. The statements like obj.GetType().GetProperty() and obj.GetType().GetField() returns .net "object" which makes difficult or imposible to introduce generics here. Does this cause to have any overheads like boxing ? on an overall, please suggest to make this utility performance efficient and more light weight on memmory

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• Layers - Logical seperation vs physical

  - by P.Brian.Mackey

  Some programmers recommend logical seperation of layers over physical. For example, given a DL, this means we create a DL namespace not a DL assembly. Benefits include: faster compilation time simpler deployment Faster startup time for your program Less assemblies to reference Im on a small team of 5 devs. We have over 50 assemblies to maintain. IMO this ratio is far from ideal. I prefer an extreme programming approach. Where if 100 assemblies are easier to maintain than 10,000...then 1 assembly must be easier than 100. Given technical limits, we should strive for < 5 assemblies. New assemblies are created out of technical need not layer requirements. Developers are worried for a few reasons. A. People like to work in their own environment so they dont step on eachothers toes. B. Microsoft tends to create new assemblies. E.G. Asp.net has its own DLL, so does winforms. Etc. C. Devs view this drive for a common assembly as a threat. Some team members Have a tendency to change the common layer without regard for how it will impact dependencies. My personal view: I view A. as silos, aka cowboy programming and suggest we implement branching to create isolation. C. First, that is a human problem and we shouldnt create technical work arounds for human behavior. Second, my goal is not to put everything in common. Rather, I want partitions to be made in namespaces not assemblies. Having a shared assembly doesnt make everything common. I want the community to chime in and tell me if Ive gone off my rocker. Is a drive for a single assembly or my viewpoint illogical or otherwise a bad idea?

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• Tales from the Trenches – Building a Real-World Silverlight Line of Business Application

  - by dwahlin

  There's rarely a boring day working in the world of software development. Part of the fun associated with being a developer is that change is guaranteed and the more you learn about a particular technology the more you realize there's always a different or better way to perform a task. I've had the opportunity to work on several different real-world Silverlight Line of Business (LOB) applications over the past few years and wanted to put together a list of some of the key things I've learned as well as key problems I've encountered and resolved. There are several different topics I could cover related to "lessons learned" (some of them were more painful than others) but I'll keep it to 5 items for this post and cover additional lessons learned in the future. The topics discussed were put together for a TechEd talk: Pick a Pattern and Stick To It Data Binding and Nested Controls Notify Users of Successes (and failures) Get an Agent – A Service Agent Extend Existing Controls The first topic covered relates to architecture best practices and how the MVVM pattern can save you time in the long run. When I was first introduced to MVVM I thought it was a lot of work for very little payoff. I've since learned (the hard way in some cases) that my initial impressions were dead wrong and that my criticisms of the pattern were generally caused by doing things the wrong way. In addition to MVVM pros the slides and sample app below also jump into data binding tricks in nested control scenarios and discuss how animations and media can be used to enhance LOB applications in subtle ways. Finally, a discussion of creating a re-usable service agent to interact with backend services is discussed as well as how existing controls make good candidates for customization. I tried to keep the samples simple while still covering the topics as much as possible so if you’re new to Silverlight you should definitely be able to follow along with a little study and practice. I’d recommend starting with the SilverlightDemos.View project, moving to the SilverlightDemos.ViewModels project and then going to the SilverlightDemos.ServiceAgents project. All of the backend “Model” code can be found in the SilverlightDemos.Web project. Custom controls used in the app can be found in the SivlerlightDemos.Controls project.   Sample Code and Slides

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• Windows Azure Use Case: Infrastructure Limits

  - by BuckWoody

  This is one in a series of posts on when and where to use a distributed architecture design in your organization's computing needs. You can find the main post here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/buckwoody/archive/2011/01/18/windows-azure-and-sql-azure-use-cases.aspx  Description: Physical hardware components take up room, use electricity, create heat and therefore need cooling, and require wiring and special storage units. all of these requirements cost money to rent at a data-center or to build out at a local facility. In some cases, this can be a catalyst for evaluating options to remove this infrastructure requirement entirely by moving to a distributed computing environment. Implementation: There are three main options for moving to a distributed computing environment. Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) The first option is simply to virtualize the current hardware and move the VM’s to a provider. You can do this with Microsoft’s Hyper-V product or other software, build the systems and host them locally on fewer physical machines. This is a good option for canned-applications (where you have to type setup.exe) but not as useful for custom applications, as you still have to license and patch those servers, and there are hard limits on the VM sizes. Software as a Service (SaaS) If there is already software available that does what you need, it may make sense to simply purchase not only the software license but the use of it on the vendor’s servers. Microsoft’s Exchange Online is an example of simply using an offering from a vendor on their servers. If you do not need a great deal of customization, have no interest in owning or extending the source code, and need to implement a solution quickly, this is a good choice. Platform as a Service (PaaS) If you do need to write software for your environment, your next choice is a Platform as a Service such as Windows Azure. In this case you no longer manager physical or even virtual servers. You start at the code and data level of control and responsibility, and your focus is more on the design and maintenance of the application itself. In this case you own the source code and can extend or change it as you see fit. An interesting side-benefit to using Windows Azure as a PaaS is that the Application Fabric component allows a hybrid approach, which gives you a basis to allow on-premise applications to leverage distributed computing paradigms. No one solution fits every situation. It’s common to see organizations pick a mixture of on-premise, IaaS, SaaS and PaaS components. In fact, that’s a great advantage to this form of computing - choice. References: 5 Enterprise steps for adopting a Platform as a Service: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/davidmcg/archive/2010/12/02/5-enterprise-steps-for-adopting-a-platform-as-a-service.aspx?wa=wsignin1.0  Application Patterns for the Cloud: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/kashif/archive/2010/08/07/application-patterns-for-the-cloud.aspx

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• Should I be using a JavaScript SPA designed when security is important

  - by ryanzec

  I asked something kind of similar on stackoverflow with a particular piece of code however I want to try to ask this in a broader sense. So I have this web application that I have started to write in backbone using a Single Page Architecture (SPA) however I am starting to second guess myself because of security. Now we are not storing and sending credit card information or anything like that through this web application but we are storing sensitive information that people are uploading to us and will have the ability to re-download too. The obviously security concern that I have with JavaScript is that you can't trust anything that comes from JavaScript however in a Backbone SPA application, everything is being sent through JavaScript. There are two security features that I will have to build in JavaScript; permissions and authentication. The authentication piece is just me override the Backbone.Router.prototype.navigate method to check the fragment it is trying to load and if the JavaScript application.session.loggedIn is not set to true (and they are not viewing a none authenticated page), they are redirected to the login page automatically. The user could easily modify application.session.loggedIn to equal true (or modify Backbone.Router.prototype.navigate method) but then they would also have to not so easily dynamically embedded a link into the page (or modify a current one) that has the proper classes, data-* attributes, and href values to then load a page that should only be loaded when they user has logged in (and has the permissions). So I have an acl object that deals with the permissions stuff. All someone would have to do to view pages or parts of pages they should not be able to is to call acl.addPermission(resource, permission) with the proper permissions or modify the acl.hasPermission() to always return true and then navigate away and then back to the page. Now certain things is EMCAScript 5 like Object.seal() or Object.freeze() would help with some of this however we have to support IE 8 which does not support those pieces of functionality. Now the REST API also performs security checks on every request so technically even if they are able to see parts of the interface that they should not be able to, they still should not be able to actually affect any data. The main benefits for me in developing a JavaScript SPA application is that the application is a lot more responsive since it is only transferring the minimum amount of JSON data for the requested action and performing the minimum amount of work too. There are also other things that I think are beneficial like you are going to have to develop an API for the data (which is good if you want expand your application to different platforms/technologies) or their is more of a separation between front-end and back-end however if security is a concern, it is really wise to go down the road of a JavaScript SPA application for the front-end?

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• Characteristics of a Web service that promote reusability and change

  Characteristics of a Web service that promote reusability and change:  Standardized Data Exchange Formats (XML, JSON) Standardized communication protocols (Soap, Rest) Promotes Loosely Coupled Systems  Standardized Data Exchange Formats (XML, JSON) XML W3.org defines Extensible Markup Language (XML) as a simplistic text format derived from SGML. XML was designed to solve challenges found in large-scale electronic publishing. In addition,  XML is playing an important role in the exchange of data primarily focusing on data exchange on the web. JSON JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) is a human-readable text-based standard designed for data interchange. This format is used for serializing and transmitting data over a network connection in a structured format. The primary use of JSON is to transmit data between a server and web application. JSON is an alternative to XML. Standardized communication protocols (Soap, Rest) Soap W3Scools.com defines SOAP as a simple XML-based protocol. This protocol lets applications exchange data over HTTP.  SOAP provides a way to communicate between applications running on different operating systems, with different technologies and programming languages. Rest In 2007, Stefan Tilkov defines Representational State Transfer (REST) as a set of principles that outlines how Web standards are supposed to be used.  Using REST in an application will ensure that it exploits the Web’s architecture to its benefit. Promotes Loosely Coupled Systems “Loose coupling as an approach to interconnecting the components in a system or network so that those components, also called elements, depend on each other to the least extent practicable. Coupling refers to the degree of direct knowledge that one element has of another.” (TechTarget.com, 2007) “Loosely coupled system can be easily broken down into definable elements. The extent of coupling in a system can be measured by mapping the maximum number of element changes that can occur without adverse effects. Examples of such changes include adding elements, removing elements, renaming elements, reconfiguring elements, modifying internal element characteristics and rearranging the way in which elements are interconnected.” (TechTarget.com, 2007) References: W3C. (2011). Extensible Markup Language (XML). Retrieved from W3.org: http://www.w3.org/XML/ W3Scools.com. (2011). SOAP Introduction. Retrieved from W3Scools.com: http://www.w3schools.com/soap/soap_intro.asp Tilkov, Stefan. (2007). A Brief Introduction to REST. Retrieved from Infoq.com: http://www.infoq.com/articles/rest-introduction TechTarget.com. (2011). loose coupling. Retrieved from TechTarget.com: http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/definition/loose-coupling

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• How do you manage extensibility in your multi-tenant systems?

  - by Brian MacKay

  I've got a few big web based multi-tenant products now, and very soon I can see that there will be a lot of customizations that are tenant specific. An extra field here or there, maybe an extra page or some extra logic in the middle of a workflow - that sort of thing. Some of these customizations can be rolled into the core product, and that's great. Some of them are highly specific and would get in everyone else's way. I have a few ideas in mind for managing this, but none of them seem to scale well. The obvious solution is to introduce a ton of client-level settings, allowing various 'features' to be enabled on per-client basis. The downside with that, of course, is massive complexity and clutter. You could introduce a truly huge number of settings, and over time various types of logic (presentation, business) could get way out of hand. Then there's the problem of client-specific fields, which begs for something cleaner than just adding a bunch of nullable fields to the existing tables. So what are people doing to manage this? Force.com seems to be the master of extensibility; obviously they've created a platform from the ground up that is super extensible. You can add on to almost anything with their web-based UI. FogBugz did something similiar where they created a robust plugin model that, come to think of it, might have actually been inspired by Force. I know they spent a lot of time and money on it and if I'm not mistaken the intention was to actually use it internally for future product development. Sounds like the kind of thing I could be tempted to build but probably shouldn't. :) Is a massive investment in pluggable architecture the only way to go? How are you managing these problems, and what kind of results are you seeing? EDIT: It does look as though FogBugz handled the problem by building a fairly robust platform and then using that to put together their screens. To extend it you create a DLL containing classes that implement interfaces like ISearchScreenGridColumn, and that becomes a module. I'm sure it was tremendously expensive to build considering that they have a large of devs and they worked on it for months, plus their surface area is perhaps 5% of the size of my application. Right now I am seriously wondering if Force.com is the right way to handle this. And I am a hard core ASP.Net guy, so this is a strange position to find myself in.

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• Single Responsibility Principle Implementation

  - by Mike S

  In my spare time, I've been designing a CMS in order to learn more about actual software design and architecture, etc. Going through the SOLID principles, I already notice that ideas like "MVC", "DRY", and "KISS", pretty much fall right into place. That said, I'm still having problems deciding if one of two implementations is the best choice when it comes to the Single Responsibility Principle. Implementation #1: class User getName getPassword getEmail // etc... class UserManager create read update delete class Session start stop class Login main class Logout main class Register main The idea behind this implementation is that all user-based actions are separated out into different classes (creating a possible case of the aptly-named Ravioli Code), but following the SRP to a "tee", almost literally. But then I thought that it was a bit much, and came up with this next implementation class UserView extends View getLogin //Returns the html for the login screen getShortLogin //Returns the html for an inline login bar getLogout //Returns the html for a logout button getRegister //Returns the html for a register page // etc... as needed class UserModel extends DataModel implements IDataModel // Implements no new methods yet, outside of the interface methods // Haven't figured out anything special to go here at the moment // All CRUD operations are handled by DataModel // through methods implemented by the interface class UserControl extends Control implements IControl login logout register startSession stopSession class User extends DataObject getName getPassword getEmail // etc... This is obviously still very organized, and still very "single responsibility". The User class is a data object that I can manipulate data on and then pass to the UserModel to save it to the database. All the user data rendering (what the user will see) is handled by UserView and it's methods, and all the user actions are in one space in UserControl (plus some automated stuff required by the CMS to keep a user logged in or to ensure that they stay out.) I personally can't think of anything wrong with this implementation either. In my personal feelings I feel that both are effectively correct, but I can't decide which one would be easier to maintain and extend as life goes on (despite leaning towards Implementation #1.) So what about you guys? What are your opinions on this? Which one is better? What basics (or otherwise, nuances) of that principle have I missed in either design?

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• How to keep a data structure synchronized over a network?

  - by David Gouveia

  Context In the game I'm working on (a sort of a point and click graphic adventure), pretty much everything that happens in the game world is controlled by an action manager that is structured a bit like: So for instance if the result of examining an object should make the character say hello, walk a bit and then sit down, I simply spawn the following code: var actionGroup = actionManager.CreateGroup(); actionGroup.Add(new TalkAction("Guybrush", "Hello there!"); actionGroup.Add(new WalkAction("Guybrush", new Vector2(300, 300)); actionGroup.Add(new SetAnimationAction("Guybrush", "Sit")); This creates a new action group (an entire line in the image above) and adds it to the manager. All of the groups are executed in parallel, but actions within each group are chained together so that the second one only starts after the first one finishes. When the last action in a group finishes, the group is destroyed. Problem Now I need to replicate this information across a network, so that in a multiplayer session, all players see the same thing. Serializing the individual actions is not the problem. But I'm an absolute beginner when it comes to networking and I have a few questions. I think for the sake of simplicity in this discussion we can abstract the action manager component to being simply: var actionManager = new List<List<string>>(); How should I proceed to keep the contents of the above data structure syncronized between all players? Besides the core question, I'm also having a few other concerns related to it (i.e. all possible implications of the same problem above): If I use a server/client architecture (with one of the players acting as both a server and a client), and one of the clients has spawned a group of actions, should he add them directly to the manager, or only send a request to the server, which in turn will order every client to add that group? What about packet losses and the like? The game is deterministic, but I'm thinking that any discrepancy in the sequence of actions executed in a client could lead to inconsistent states of the world. How do I safeguard against that sort of problem? What if I add too many actions at once, won't that cause problems for the connection? Any way to alleviate that?

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• Keeping your options open in a cloud solution

  - by BuckWoody

  In on-premises solutions we have the full range of options open for a given computing solution – but we don’t always take advantage of them, for multiple reasons. Data goes in a Relational Database Management System, files go on a share, and e-mail goes to the Exchange server. Over time, vendors (including ourselves) add in functionality to one product that allow non-standard use of the platform. For example, SQL Server (and Oracle, and others) allow large binary storage in or through the system – something not originally intended for an RDBMS to handle. There are certainly times when this makes sense, of course, but often these platform hammers turn every problem into a nail. It can make us “lazy” in our design – we sometimes don’t take the time to learn another architecture because the one we’ve spent so much time with can handle what we want to do. But there’s a distinct danger here. In nature, when a population shares too many of the same traits, it can cause a complete collapse if a situation exploits a weakness shared by that population. The same is true with not using the righttool for the job in a computing environment. Your company or organization depends on your knowledge as a professional to select the best mix of supportable, flexible, cost-effective technologies to solve their problems, whether you’re in an architect role or not.  So take some time today to learn something new. The way I do this is to select a given problem, and try to solve it with a technology I’m not familiar with. For instance – create a Purchase Order system in Excel, then in Hadoop or MongoDB, or even in flat-files using PowerShell as an interface. No, I’m not suggesting any of these architectures are the proper way to solve the PO problem, but taking something concrete that you know well and applying that meta-knowledge to another platform will assist you in exercising the “little grey cells” and help you and your organization understand what is open to you. And of course you can do all of this on-premises – but my recommendation is to check out a cloud platform (my suggestion would of course be Windows Azure :) ) and try it there. Most providers (including Microsoft) provide free time to do that.

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• Separating logic and data in browser game

  - by Tesserex

  I've been thinking this over for days and I'm still not sure what to do. I'm trying to refactor a combat system in PHP (...sorry.) Here's what exists so far: There are two (so far) types of entities that can participate in combat. Let's just call them players and NPCs. Their data is already written pretty well. When involved in combat, these entities are wrapped with another object in the DB called a Combatant, which gives them information about the particular fight. They can be involved in multiple combats at once. I'm trying to write the logic engine for combat by having combatants injected into it. I want to be able to mock everything for testing. In order to separate logic and data, I want to have two interfaces / base classes, one being ICombatantData and the other ICombatantLogic. The two implementers of data will be one for the real objects stored in the database, and the other for my mock objects. I'm now running into uncertainties with designing the logic side of things. I can have one implementer for each of players and NPCs, but then I have an issue. A combatant needs to be able to return the entity that it wraps. Should this getter method be part of logic or data? I feel strongly that it should be in data, because the logic part is used for executing combat, and won't be available if someone is just looking up information about an upcoming fight. But the data classes only separate mock from DB, not player from NPC. If I try having two child classes of the DB data implementer, one for each entity type, then how do I architect that while keeping my mocks in the loop? Do I need some third interface like IEntityProvider that I inject into the data classes? Also with some of the ideas I've been considering, I feel like I'll have to put checks in place to make sure you don't mismatch things, like making the logic for an NPC accidentally wrap the data for a player. Does that make any sense? Is that a situation that would even be possible if the architecture is correct, or would the right design prohibit that completely so I don't need to check for it? If someone could help me just layout a class diagram or something for this it would help me a lot. Thanks. edit Also useful to note, the mock data class doesn't really need the Entity, since I'll just be specifying all the parameters like combat stats directly instead. So maybe that will affect the correct design.

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• How does mysql define DISTINCT() in reference documentation

  - by goran

  EDIT: This question is about finding definitive reference to MySQL syntax on SELECT modifying keywords and functions. /EDIT AFAIK SQL defines two uses of DISTINCT keywords - SELECT DISTINCT field... and SELECT COUNT(DISTINCT field) ... However in one of web applications that I administer I've noticed performance issues on queries like SELECT DISTINCT(field1), field2, field3 ... DISTINCT() on a single column makes no sense and I am almost sure it is interpreted as SELECT DISTINCT field1, field2, field3 ... but how can I prove this? I've searched mysql site for a reference on this particular syntax, but could not find any. Does anyone have a link to definition of DISTINCT() in mysql or knows about other authoritative source on this? Best EDIT After asking the same question on mysql forums I learned that while parsing the SQL mysql does not care about whitespace between functions and column names (but I am still missing a reference). As it seems you can have whitespace between functions and the parenthesis SELECT LEFT (field1,1), field2... and get mysql to understand it as SELECT LEFT(field,1) Similarly SELECT DISTINCT(field1), field2... seems to get decomposed to SELECT DISTINCT (field1), field2... and then DISTINCT is taken not as some undefined (or undocumented) function, but as SELECT modifying keyword and the parenthesis around field1 are evaluated as if they were part of field expression. It would be great if someone would have a pointer to documentation where it is stated that the whitespace between functions and parenthesis is not significant or to provide links to apropriate MySQL forums, mailing lists where I could raise a question to put this into reference. EDIT I have found a reference to server option IGNORE SPACE. It states that "The IGNORE SPACE SQL mode can be used to modify how the parser treats function names that are whitespace-sensitive", later on it states that recent versions of mysql have reduced this number from 200 to 30. One of the remaining 30 is COUNT for example. With IGNORE SPACE enabled both SELECT COUNT(*) FROM mytable; SELECT COUNT (*) FROM mytable; are legal. So if this is an exception, I am left to conclude that normally functions ignore space by default. If functions ignore space by default then if the context is ambiguous, such as for the first function on a first item of the select expression, then they are not distinguishable from keywords and the error can not be thrown and MySQL must accept them as keywords. Still, my conclusions feel like they have lot of assumptions, I would still be grateful and accept any pointers to see where to follow up on this.

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• not sure if this is my mistake ~~ vs2010 Add Service Reference fails

  - by gerryLowry

  https://tbe.taleo.net/MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter the above is from Taleo's API guide. I'm trying to create a WCF Client (e.g.: " Creating Your First WCF Client" http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Endpoint/Endpoint-Screencasts-Creating-Your-First-WCF-Client/ ) The tbe.taleo... link is from Taleo's API documentation. Likely my understanding is flawed. My assumption is that when the link from Taleo is entered into the vs2010 "Add Service Reference" dialog and GO is clicked, then vs2010 should retrieve a proper WSDL/SOAP envelope back from the Taleo link. That does not happen; instead an error occurs. Fiddler2 (http://fiddler2.com) displays the status code 500 "HTTP/1.1 500 Internal Server Error". [FULL DETAILS BELOW] "WcfTestClient.exe" gives a similar error: [WcfTestClient DETAILS BELOW] QUESTION: is it me, or is the Taleo link flawed? Thank you, Gerry [FULL DETAILS "Add Service Reference"] The HTML document does not contain Web service discovery information. Metadata contains a reference that cannot be resolved: 'https://tbe.taleo.net/MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter'. The content type text/xml;charset=utf-8 of the response message does not match the content type of the binding (application/soap+xml; charset=utf-8). If using a custom encoder, be sure that the IsContentTypeSupported method is implemented properly. The first 544 bytes of the response were: ' SOAP-ENV:Protocol Unsupported content type "application/soap+xml; charset=utf-8", must be: "text/xml". /MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter '. The remote server returned an error: (500) Internal Server Error. If the service is defined in the current solution, try building the solution and adding the service reference again. [WcfTestClient DETAILS] Error: Cannot obtain Metadata from https://tbe.taleo.net/MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter If this is a Windows (R) Communication Foundation service to which you have access, please check that you have enabled metadata publishing at the specified address. For help enabling metadata publishing, please refer to the MSDN documentation at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=65455.WS-Metadata Exchange Error URI: https://tbe.taleo.net/MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter Metadata contains a reference that cannot be resolved: 'https://tbe.taleo.net/MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter'. The content type text/xml;charset=utf-8 of the response message does not match the content type of the binding (application/soap+xml; charset=utf-8). If using a custom encoder, be sure that the IsContentTypeSupported method is implemented properly. The first 544 bytes of the response were: 'SOAP-ENV:ProtocolUnsupported content type "application/soap+xml; charset=utf-8", must be: "text/xml"./MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter'. The remote server returned an error: (500) Internal Server Error.HTTP GET Error URI: https://tbe.taleo.net/MANAGER/dispatcher/servlet/rpcrouter The HTML document does not contain Web service discovery information.

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• Architecture for Qt SIGNAL with subclass-specific, templated argument type

  - by Barry Wark

  I am developing a scientific data acquisition application using Qt. Since I'm not a deep expert in Qt, I'd like some architecture advise from the community on the following problem: The application supports several hardware acquisition interfaces but I would like to provide an common API on top of those interfaces. Each interface has a sample data type and a units for its data. So I'm representing a vector of samples from each device as a std::vector of Boost.Units quantities (i.e. std::vector<boost::units::quantity<unit,sample_type> >). I'd like to use a multi-cast style architecture, where each data source broadcasts newly received data to 1 or more interested parties. Qt's Signal/Slot mechanism is an obvious fit for this style. So, I'd like each data source to emit a signal like typedef std::vector<boost::units::quantity<unit,sample_type> > SampleVector signals: void samplesAcquired(SampleVector sampleVector); for the unit and sample_type appropriate for that device. Since tempalted QObject subclasses aren't supported by the meta-object compiler, there doesn't seem to be a way to have a (tempalted) base class for all data sources which defines the samplesAcquired Signal. In other words, the following won't work: template<T,U> //sample type and units class DataSource : public QObject { Q_OBJECT ... public: typedef std::vector<boost::units::quantity<U,T> > SampleVector signals: void samplesAcquired(SampleVector sampleVector); }; The best option I've been able to come up with is a two-layered approach: template<T,U> //sample type and units class IAcquiredSamples { public: typedef std::vector<boost::units::quantity<U,T> > SampleVector virtual shared_ptr<SampleVector> acquiredData(TimeStamp ts, unsigned long nsamples); }; class DataSource : public QObject { ... signals: void samplesAcquired(TimeStamp ts, unsigned long nsamples); }; The samplesAcquired signal now gives a timestamp and number of samples for the acquisition and clients must use the IAcquiredSamples API to retrieve those samples. Obviously data sources must subclass both DataSource and IAcquiredSamples. The disadvantage of this approach appears to be a loss of simplicity in the API... it would be much nicer if clients could get the acquired samples in the Slot connected. Being able to use Qt's queued connections would also make threading issues easier instead of having to manage them in the acquiredData method within each subclass. One other possibility, is to use a QVariant argument. This necessarily puts the onus on subclass to register their particular sample vector type with Q_REGISTER_METATYPE/qRegisterMetaType. Not really a big deal. Clients of the base class however, will have no way of knowing what type the QVariant value type is, unless a tag struct is also passed with the signal. I consider this solution at least as convoluted as the one above, as it forces clients of the abstract base class API to deal with some of the gnarlier aspects of type system. So, is there a way to achieve the templated signal parameter? Is there a better architecture than the one I've proposed?

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• Precise explanation of JavaScript <-> DOM circular reference issue

  - by Joey Adams

  One of the touted advantages of jQuery.data versus raw expando properties (arbitrary attributes you can assign to DOM nodes) is that jQuery.data is "safe from circular references and therefore free from memory leaks". An article from Google titled "Optimizing JavaScript code" goes into more detail: The most common memory leaks for web applications involve circular references between the JavaScript script engine and the browsers' C++ objects' implementing the DOM (e.g. between the JavaScript script engine and Internet Explorer's COM infrastructure, or between the JavaScript engine and Firefox XPCOM infrastructure). It lists two examples of circular reference patterns: DOM element → event handler → closure scope → DOM DOM element → via expando → intermediary object → DOM element However, if a reference cycle between a DOM node and a JavaScript object produces a memory leak, doesn't this mean that any non-trivial event handler (e.g. onclick) will produce such a leak? I don't see how it's even possible for an event handler to avoid a reference cycle, because the way I see it: The DOM element references the event handler. The event handler references the DOM (either directly or indirectly). In any case, it's almost impossible to avoid referencing window in any interesting event handler, short of writing a setInterval loop that reads actions from a global queue. Can someone provide a precise explanation of the JavaScript ↔ DOM circular reference problem? Things I'd like clarified: What browsers are effected? A comment in the jQuery source specifically mentions IE6-7, but the Google article suggests Firefox is also affected. Are expando properties and event handlers somehow different concerning memory leaks? Or are both of these code snippets susceptible to the same kind of memory leak? // Create an expando that references to its own element. var elem = document.getElementById('foo'); elem.myself = elem; // Create an event handler that references its own element. var elem = document.getElementById('foo'); elem.onclick = function() { elem.style.display = 'none'; }; If a page leaks memory due to a circular reference, does the leak persist until the entire browser application is closed, or is the memory freed when the window/tab is closed?

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• nTop RRD file architecture

  - by Seanny123

  I have a gig of nTop RRD files and I would like to start graphing them with rrdtool (but not with nTop, since I'm hoping to do this with a separate backup of the database as workaround to the impossibility of limiting the RRD files by size), but I don't know how the files are structured. I've tried reading the RRD documentation from SourceForge and the nTop FAQ, but I'm not finding the information I need. Does anyone know of any documentation I should be looking at or how the files are structured? Here https://dl.dropbox.com/u/669437/file%20structure.png is a screenshot of the file structure. At first I thought it was organized by IP address (so the rrd files for address 1.1.2.3 would be stored in folder 1-1-2-3 or even the reverse order), but that doesn't seem to be the case. It isn't organized by MAC address either, although some hosts are saved that way. Any help would be appreciated.

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