Boise Code Camp 2008

Saturday, March 8th, 2008
At Boise State University in the
College of Business and Economics

Register today to attend free: www.BoiseCodeCamp.org

This free event for technical professionals is produced by the community, for the community.

Code Camp is bigger than ever this year featuring new and exciting technologies, training on fundamentals, a great party, and more.

• 63 sessions from 45 amazing presenters
• The best training value available anywhere
• Fewer slides, more code and examples
• Familiar names and local real-world coders side by side
• An incredible amount of talent and information
• Free lunch, dinner, swag, and giveaways
• Held during non-work hours (we have jobs too)
• Sessions for non-coders as well
• Amazing after party in the BSU stadium Hall of Fame room

No matter whether you are a seasoned coder, a student, a business analysis in software, a project manager, or a hobbyist technologist, there is something at code camp for you. Invest in yourself and come prepared to learn about these things and more:

• ASP.Net
• Agile / Methodology
• Architecture
• Client Development
• Databases and DB development
• Delphi
• Fundamentals
• Games & Graphics
• Google APIs
• I.T. And Operations
• Languages & Frameworks
• Mobile
• Security
• Web Development
• WCF, WF, WPF
• Virtualization
• XML and the Web
• Java, .Net, SQL, Oracle

Register today at www.BoiseCodeCamp.org.

Google Gears

Did you hear about Google Gears? It lets you use web based applications while you are offline. So you could use Gmail, Google Reader, and Google Apps. BTW, Gears is Open Source.

I noticed support for it in my Google Reader a while ago. I just read a news article about it. Firefox 3 has plans to support this as well. I read about it a while ago. They were waiting for some provider of web based applications to start supporting the idea, which now Google is doing.

The thing is, I don't see Microsoft supporting this kind of innovation since it competes with Office specifically, and Windows in general. That means no IE support for the latest web innovation. But with Microsoft's push for their Live products maybe they will support it. I guess we will see.

I still think we are within 5 years of seeing a very significant shift with Microsoft's position in the industry. The web and the web browser is becoming the platform Microsoft feared it would be. It is competing with the windows and office offering. Now with their move into patent litigation and Paul Graham's observations on their demise, I believe things have been set in motion. John Dvorak said they are going the way of the IBM years ago. He was especially vocal about it during the Lindows AKA Linspire fiasco.

Delphi 2007 and Binary Compatibility

A really cool feature of Delphi 2007 is it is binary compatible with Delphi 2006 (on the Win32 side). What this means is that unlike every previous Delphi and Turbo Pascal release (as far as I know) you can keep all your compiled DCU files. That means you don't have to wait / hope / pray for your 3rd party component provider to release an updated release for Delphi 2007, most of your Delphi 2006 components for Win32 will work just fine.

Typically what makes a DCU stay compatible is if the interface section of the unit remains unchanged. The really cool thing about Delphi 2007 is they added a new property to TForm for support of Vista Aero, but they still remained backwards compatible.

Allen Bauer broke the news about how this was pulled off. Steve Trefethen has some more behind the scenes details. And as usual, Hallvard Vassbotn has a great technical write-up on all the details.

One really cool think, is I think it was Nick Hodges that said they might actually go to a release cycle that only every other release of Delphi was a breaking release. That would certainly be cool, but their component partners might not like that so much.

Technorati Tags: [Programming] [Software] [Delphi] [CodeGear]

Free Turbo Delphi, C++ or C# External link: http://www.turboexplorer.com/

Just in case you some how missed it, you can get a free Turbo product from Borland / CodeGear. You your choice of Delphi for .NET, Delphi for Win32, C# Builder or C++ Builder, but you can only have one installed at a time. They are based on Delphi 2006. The catch for the free version (called Explorer) is you cannot install components, add-ins, etc. and can only have one version installed at a time. You can buy the Pro version for just a little bit more and lift those restrictions.

[TurboExplorer.com]

Future version will be based on the newer Delphi IDE's. I suspect that after they come out with Delphi Studio 2007 (guessing on the name) with support for .NET, Delphi, C# and C++ then they will have an updated Turbo release. They hinted they may change the restrictions some then too.

Technorati Tags: [Programming] [Software] [Delphi] [Pascal] [CSharp] [Cplusplus] [Free] [Turbo] [CodeGear] [Borland]

8 defensive programming best practices External link: http://www.phpclasses.org/blog/post/65-8-defensive-programming-best-practices-to-prevent-breaking-your-sites.html

This article is written for PHP, but at the high level these 8 practices apply everywhere. Here they are (with comments by me). The original article has more comments and PHP specific resources.

1. Handle unexpected conditions - of course you cannot expect every unexpected condition, but you can write code to handle things when they don't happen as expected. Even if the code just raises an error.
2. Process external systems data properly - Instead of just assuming all input and output is correct, validate it. Be sure you are getting what you are expecting, and that what your program produces is correct. This is especially an issue with SQL and HTML injection!
3. Test your code - Hello McFly, anyone home? You need unit tests, regression tests, UI tests, user tests, etc. Then look at what you are not testing and test that. Especially if you are releasing to the public.
4. Monitor your site errors and act upon them - Whatever kind of development you are doing, you need to log all errors (serious and minor) and if possible centralize them. Then analyze your error logs and do something about it. When you start seeing those exceptions you put in for #1 show up, that means the unexpected happened. Now that you know what it is, you can expect it and act on it.
5. Do not disclose errors to the users -This is huge for websites. I don't know how many times I have been using a website and it breaks and I am presented with a beautiful debug screen with all sorts of juicy details that if I were a hacker I could make use of. This is the worst with ASP/ASP.NET sites. Remove debug messages when you release - same goes for non-web development.
6. Damage control - Make sure your program fails gracefully. Save the users data often.
7. Backup - This is another really obvious one. First of all, use a GOOD source control system so you are backed-up during the development process. Remember to backup your database and other non-source code bits too. Then backup your users data for them. Even if you can't force them to backup their data, at least make it easy.
8. Do what you can as you can never get defensive enough - This is like Lather, Rinse, Repeat. Once you have done all the above, refactor your code, and go through the steps again. Just be aware that things break. This goes back to #6. What can you do to make sure they don't break to bad? That is a good start.

One other point it makes is "If anything can go wrong, it will." I would not say that every worst case scenario will play out. I will however say that the more possibility for malfunction you leave, the greater the chance. Also, the more users you have, and the more time the users spend using your application, the greater the odds of any errors showing up.

What are your defensive programming best practices?

Technorati Tags: [Programming] [Software] [Defensive programming] [PHP] [Best Practices]

Basics of Compiler Design External link: http://www.diku.dk/hjemmesider/ansatte/torbenm/Basics/

Torben Mogensen from DIKU as the University of Copenhagen is offering the text book he has written on Basics of Compiler Design for free use.

I have taught an undergraduate compilers course for over a decade. In the last several years, I have used my own textbook "Basics of Compiler Design". I have now decided to make this available online.

Permission to copy and print for personal use is granted. If you, as a lecturer, want to print the book and sell it to your students, you can do so if you only charge the printing cost.

Technorati Tags: [Programming] [Software] [Development] [Compiler]

Delphi 2007 for Win32 Launch Event

May 11th, 2007 is our Delphi 2007 for Win32 Launch Event. You will want to be present to check out this first look at the first new Delphi release since the CodeGear spin-off and the begin of the Delphi Renaissance. It is a very impressive release! Come hear all the latest Delphi news and get those rumors cleared up.

Also at this meeting we will be showing off and using the new Camtasia to record the presentation. It is our goal to find a way to post this recording for everyone to reference after the meeting.

Then in June we will have a Delphi for PHP Launch Event. I am working on door prizes for both events.

Our usual meeting time is 7 PM at our usual Washington Group International location.