http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/ CodeCall is where developers can come to share programming ideas, articles, questions, answers, tips, tricks, source code, and other topics related to programming languages such as C++, Visual C++, C#, Visual Basic, ASP, ASP.NET, Java, and more. en Mon, 13 Feb 2012 12:36:08 GMT vBulletin 60 http://forum.codecall.net/images/misc/rss.jpg http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/ http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/279-programming-methodology.html Tue, 21 Apr 2009 18:32:03 GMT As you might know, I'm writing on an web application, a tool/helper to an online game, Travian. I did a version in three months spare time last spring. I painted myself into a corner as the application grew faster and bigger than expected.

This fall, I started a complete rewrite of the code and I thaught I sat up a good structure for myself. I was very confident that it will be great, and it is not bad, not bad at all. However, I started to wonder if I could do something even better, especially to the user interface. I've been looking at extjs, I was looking a bit at jquery, and I didn't feel like it was my cup of tea. I'ts probably good, but I don't feel for them. I don't feel like programming my entire site in javascript, still, I want a modern, fresh look, feel and function, and I don't know how to accomplish this in a good way, so that's why it's been on ice for a few months now, because I need to make a few very important decisions.

Still I haven't found anything that would fit me, so I have nothing to take a decsision on yet either, which makes progress impossible.

Anyone out there with any further suggestions? ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/279-programming-methodology.html http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/256-template-engines-future-web-apps.html Tue, 10 Mar 2009 23:35:25 GMT I'm coding some projects, and I can only say that I actually love the php template engine Smarty. I have had discussions here on CodeCall and several taught it is a bad idea, but I find it wonderful. I just love the two layer functionality, and that it's already made, I don't have to re invent the wheel.

It gives me a lot of advantages, as I don't have to think about any outputs when writing my pages, I only have to think about pushing the relevant data to the template engine,
then, when writing the templates, I don't have to think about the coding at all, all I need to think of is how to do the layout and data placement. sure, it is a little but of looping through data for lists and everything, but it's pretty simple.

Sure, it might be a little bit slower than outputting the html directly from the php script, but in my world, millisecond performance isn't that important when it comes to web pages. a user doesn't care if it takes 0.023 or 0.099 seconds of server time. and the computers that runs these scripts, are usually so powerful, that it handles this without any problems.

But back to the template engine. some other things I really love is that is has built in support for simplify form makings, generate a select box from an array goes in one function call, just give the array as a parameter. the same with groups of radio buttons or checkboxes. it simplifies most of the output coding.

Your designer won't have to do much more than the divs and spans and the css to make the page work perfect, just add in a few variables into the code, and it's done, and as you can link templates to each other as include files, the framework of a page layout is done in one file, and the special layout on data pages is easily inserted into the "main part" of the page. the menu is as easily inserted and treated as a module, or how you want it to work.

For me, this is taking web development to a higher level.

Sure, Web 2.0 might have outran this technology, but then, it's a client application fetching server data, it's no longer a server generated - client visualized system, it's longer from thin clients than ever, as this becomes client-server applications in a browser. I don't say it's wrong, but is it what the world needs? or is this how the computer industry wants?

The fashion in thin clients comes and goes, probably so the existing thin client hardware shall be outdated til next wave of thin cliend fashion, so they can sell a new client, and in between the thin client waves, they can sell a new desktop computer as the thin client was taken out of business. This makes me think, that Web 2.0 might not be just a new way of making web pages...

so, that's all for now! ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/256-template-engines-future-web-apps.html http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/250-unemployment-web-educations.html Thu, 05 Mar 2009 14:33:48 GMT Hello there. I'm unemployed as previous stated.

Now I'm going to tell you a bit of the opportune to get educated by governmental funds here in Sweden, and especially in the IT area. I can read programming, actually. Web programming. Then they offer MCSE certification, in windows 2000, outdated ages ago, so I believe I can't trust that the crash course in programming is more updated than 1990's. Web development and programming with HTML 3.0, I'm afraid. I guess they've never heard of PHP. How should someone who takes these courses be able to get a job today, 2009?

I believe that a updated education on web programming today should cover this:

#1: HTML 4.01, XHTML 1.1, CSS 3.0, JavaScript, AJAX
#2: PHP, MySQL, Apache 1.x & 2.x
#3: ASP.NET, C#.NET, MS-SQL, IIS

If you get a good knowledge in these "languages" and understand how to really use them, I believe you can get a great job. Anything else would be less interesting.

I hope that the managers of the unemployment educational business understand that courses needs to be updated every single year to have people educated in what’s new.

I don’t know how other countries handles education of unemployed, but I believe it’s a good thing and great if they actually can provide contemporary educations in the industries in largest need of employees

For my own part, I’d say I’m pretty good at PHP & MySQL, I know HTML 4.01, I am familiar with MS-SQL , but the rest is new to me, But I think it would be a good thing to learn. JavaScript and AJAX is close, and I think that with more and more of Web 2.0, JavaScript is more and more important to learn, unless you can use some Java toolkits that uses Java and compiles it into JavaScript, but then I can’t do Java either, more than maybe the basic syntax, but I have whatsoever knowledge of the huge libraries and what I can do with them.

Do you think this is a reasonable plan of a course in web programming today? ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/250-unemployment-web-educations.html http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/222-beeing-conservative.html Sun, 08 Feb 2009 01:42:18 GMT I think this is the largest problems for programmers of today. To be too conservative. The programming languages evolves, new programming languages are created, and others maybe not be obsolete, but will sink back in usage at least. The only language that actually has stood in this windy... I think this is the largest problems for programmers of today. To be too conservative.

The programming languages evolves, new programming languages are created, and others maybe not be obsolete, but will sink back in usage at least. The only language that actually has stood in this windy business is C/C++. It has lasted for more than most languages has, and especially with such a competitor as java taking place on the programming scene.

The older programming languages has otherwise almost fallen into sleep, almost only used in a few systems where it's compulsory needed, something like FORTRAN, COBOL and so on. Other languages has been trying to keep up with the new developments, as Pascal being revived into Delphi.

For programmers who learned to program in the 80's or early 90's, the programming isn't like anything learned as a beginner. The base structure is there, yes, with conditional statements, loops and variables, but performed a little bit different.

Different programming languages needs different tactics in how you write your program. Scripting languages I guess has generally easier methods to be written than a compiled languages, but of course it's a matter of knowledge as well.

Back to the real topic. Conservative. After have learn programming in the ancient days, you know the old school stuff and it's so easy to fall back on that. new methods, new languages, new programming environments or even only new modules or libraries that makes the programmers life easier.

How easy is it really to take on these new inventions that lies ahead of us? how easy is it to change language, methods, or are we generally stuck in the past, while beginners takes on the new and runs ahead of us? Or do we use our experiences and learn and adept easier because of that?

I think as I started out, that beginners has an advantage, as you easily get stuck in old ways. If you are led in on a road, it's harder to break it. Things as OOP is harder to adapt to if you're blown into Procedural Programming. CSS/XHTML/JS is harder if you've been lost on tables for a decade. But it's still not impossible, absolutely not. But mentally it's harder in my world.

I like changes, I like development. I usually have no problems with my world developing. it's just that sometimes, I don't catch up developing in the same speed. doesn't bother me really either. but when you aim for somethings to be in pace with, others need to be let gone... ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/222-beeing-conservative.html http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/219-python.html Sat, 07 Feb 2009 01:29:52 GMT Wow. I have had an great experience lately. I've been working with a python script and been customizing it for a few days. And Python does have potential, oh yeah!

I find the language easy to program in, most of the time, but it has many special things that isn't so easy. I have troubles finding good documentation. python.org is not especially good source for good python documentation, if you compare it to php.net for example.

It's understandable as it's more third party contributions and another project set up, but I think, that to help improving this language, a clear documentation site, where all contributors can add in a normalized documentation on their module, then the eaze will rise tremendously.

The module system isn't that bad actually, and might be something that even could be something for php in the future, as the interpretor should become lots faster with less loaded, but it needs to be performed in a great way, with a standardized installation matter etc. there are modules today, like PEAR^Wiki and PECL^Wiki, but it feels a lot like they are less worth in the php community, besides what's included into core php. The feeling is that what wasn't approves as built in functions in php, was created in a PEAR or PECL version, which really not comes up to the normal standards of php.

PHP could also modulirize better. I see no reason to automatically load all modules for every thinkable database each run, but instead easily add in them in the start of the script, even though they are shipped as standard.

But back to the language it self.
Being easier to write and read, compulsory indents instead of opening and closing brackets actually worked really great. just make sure the editor don't intent with spaces. Disadvantages is that it seems to have many special meaning characters that I'm not that used to with php. a colon seems to have special meanings. You end a list of variables with a comma, and the whole thing gets another meaning. the print command adds a newline unless you end the line with a comma. made me crazy trying to make a reasonable output before realizing that.

The language seems to be object oriented, but still not really. maybe it is but you don't think of it that way.

Well well, on the whole, I think it has great potentials, but I think needs to be better and easier accessed documentation. ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/219-python.html http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/207-programming-skills-outdated.html Wed, 04 Feb 2009 04:17:06 GMT I'm realizing I'm outdated. Totally. at least when it comes to programming

I started off with Pascal. Not the worlds most famous language perhaps, but it did what we wanted to,and pretty easy to learn. Then I jumped on to C and C++ (combined, in the same high school course sadly enough) And I got most of it, but never really got deeply in love with OOP, as I've blogged about before.

Then the web arrived. (yes, I'm that old so I were programming before Internet boom.) HTML was the new thing everyone should learn. It's no real programming language in that way, but still a language to learn. I did some stuff in mid 90's style, and knew the most valuable about it at least. Went on to college, and more C/C++, now in structured programming, JSP was the way. Nonono, not what you think. Jackson Structured Programming was this meaning. not Java Server Pages. They were hardly invented. Very Well, structured programming there were. Java was spoken about but no-one really knew what it was.

Shell scripting and Perl became famous now among my co-students, as my college had implemented shtml, ssi pages, server parsed html. wow, I could let the user know what time it is. A year went on and I did military service (it was compulsory for a year here in Sweden back then, it is now too, but hardly 10% does it any longer, cause of costs), and after that, I heard of java applets.

Wow, tremendous. interactive bits and pieces on the web page. I actually created an applet. it was to look like someone was typing on a typewriter, bot in different speed and stuff. It looked good, to be 1996, I mean. But Java were nothing much back then. I skip it.

I started working, skipped out college, as I got fed up with studying. coudn't do anything about it. I started work with network stuff, no programming. Hardware, Software. Hardly any programming. Web design opened up, and I got a little bit more interested again. PHP came to me, how I don't know, but it did.

Now I've been programming PHP and MySQL for a few years, spare time projects. CSS came as something new, oh well, something for the layouters, I skip it. JavaScript came. something for the layouters that wanted activity on the pages. I skip it.

So, here I am today, 2009 I can write and understand. I can program PHP/MySQL, and I have knowledge ow how to program. but what are people looking for today, to get a job in computer business, now with financial crisis and everything.

Java. Javascript. I was just out on the swedish governmental-run job agency looking for jobs. 800 advertisments in the IT sector. For the whole country. (we are only 8 million, so the amount isn't too bad, seldom been over 1500). Out of these advertisments, almost 150 wanted java programmers. 90 wanted HTML/CSS Layouters with Javascript knowledge. 10 wanted PHP programmers. yey. I'm not in the two largest citys, so I need to move a few hundred miles to those jobs.

All I can conclude now is that I have skipped out parts that outdated me totally from the job market. big time. So here I am, confronting the unemployment I'm in with no real future on the job market. The only thing to do today is to learn Java. Or you won't get a programming job. not in Sweden at least.

My next step is to try to learn java. and I actually thing of going back to college and do a proper education. graduating at 37. not 27 as most people. Ten years lost cause of that darn fed up situation. cause of skipping the trends not suiting me or my current jobs. Sure, I have work experience. but no education or knowledge as people wants.not now, when they fire thousand after thousand everywhere. So I'll apply to restart college this fall. Hopefully I do the right thing this time. ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/207-programming-skills-outdated.html http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/183-procedural-programming-vs-object-oriented-programming.html Sun, 09 Nov 2008 05:00:00 GMT Just giving a few thaugts on this subject, sitting up and can't sleep, 3:37am...To start with, I mainly code PHP, just to let you get a feeling on what I'm talking about in some ways.I know the basics in OOP, that's not a problem. I've written a few classes here and there, when I have found it useful. The problem I have is that in most cases, I find the OOP less useful than procedural programming (PP now on)Is that because my codings are lacking of reusable objects? Or is this because old habits and difficulties to truly understand OOP?In one of my projects, I have an object, a coordinate, which is rather central, but I still can't see the extra gain in making this to an class. I'll take a very specific example of this to see if you follow my thaugts.If I were doing this the OOP way, I can think of several member functions, such as SetCoord, GetCoord, GetCoordX, GetXCoordY, Distance (another coord), and there might be loads of other possibilities anyway.now, I've used PP for this. having my variable containing the coordinate as a string "(0|0)" for origo (mainly because a close connected unchangeable system uses the same writing style), och as a small array coord[x] and coord[y] and for this i've done a few procedures instead, joincoord(x,y) which returns the string, splitcoord(coord) which returns the array (and errorchecks the string material), distance(coord1, coord2) wich calculates the distance inbetween the twothe life of a coordinate is usually very short. I read the information from the userform, does the calculation necesary and then outputs the result, then nothing.Am I just lazy not to convert this to an class, or isn't there  a need to do it? How much use and gain should it be to do it the OOP way instead of the PP?Surely, I use this in many scripts and many places in a script maybe in this application, but the life of an object would last for maybe up to 5-10 rows and then obsolete for the rest of the code.my example is truly adaptable according to the OOP rule of Abstraction, a coordinate is what it is. The Encapsulation part is neither a problem with this, not Decoupling either, but Polymorpthism is not adaptable on this as I can see it, and neither is Inheritance, as I can't find out anything which would inherit this, or this could be inherited from.How do other people think about this? shall one tyry to OOP as much as possible, or should we skip it totally, especially in scripting languages as php, or is a balanced mix the answer? I mean, with php, we mostly just reads data from either a database, or a user posting, and then rebuilds it and sends it away to again either a database or a new user presentation. It's merely a long term work with data, as in a formal application/executable, where a value can last forever, but here we have a millisecond of lifetime of the information handling, and next time anything is done, we still need to start from scratch with everything.Sure, you could write a OOP-based calculator, but for what cause? php has a built in calculation on variables, just to add and subtract directly, running it through a memoryneeding objects which needs to be instanced first, you loose performance (no critics for ones who actually has made one, it's probably a great way of learning a basic class build) and you would be running the procedures many times if to add several numbers. I'd be very happy to recieve comments on this, what do you think I lack as I have a problem going towards OOP? am I just avoiding the fact that OOP is the future, or what is it I don't see? Mybe you agree with me, that it is hard to find reasons to take the step, or any other points of view that can help me in my processing of doing my code more OOPish?Örjan, trying to sleep again, now at 4:24am. ]]> Orjan http://forum.codecall.net/blogs/orjan/183-procedural-programming-vs-object-oriented-programming.html