Software Engineering

Protecting medical implants from attack

2011-06-14T08:08:00.000-07:00

Fukushima radioactive fallout nears Chernobyl levels - health - 24 March 2011 - New Scientist

2011-04-12T08:24:00.000-07:00

Fukushima radioactive fallout nears Chernobyl levels - health - 24 March 2011 - New Scientist

Austrian researchers have used a worldwide network of radiation detectors – designed to spot clandestine nuclear bomb tests – to show that iodine-131 is being released at daily levels 73 per cent of those seen after the 1986 disaster. The daily amount of caesium-137 released from Fukushima Daiichi is around 60 per cent of the amount released from Chernobyl.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20285-fukushima-radioactive-fallout-nears-chernobyl-levels.html

Ian Anderson + Cady Coleman flute duet in space

2011-04-10T08:42:00.000-07:00

Jeez I am so glad I lived to see this. Anderson is one of my heroes, I saw him live in Germany decades ago. The quality of the audio and video is excellent. And Coleman is an excellent performer ... Anderson is too but that is a given :-)

Jeez I am so glad I lived to see this. Anderson is one of my heroes, I saw him live in Germany decades ago. The quality of the audio and video is excellent. And Coleman is an excellent performer ... Anderson is too but that is a given :-)

Sedona of Belly Dance Soulfire performs with Fan Veils

2011-04-09T08:30:00.000-07:00

ABACUS walk thru A

2010-11-27T14:30:00.000-08:00

Microsoft SharePoint Server 2007(MOSS) and Related Technolgies

2009-08-24T11:58:00.001-07:00

As we are working on Moss-2007, Weh have done some research and found the following resources useful

1.0 Andrew Connell Blog
http://www.andrewconnell.com/blog/
2.0 Moss Webcast
https://msevents.microsoft.com/cui/SearchDisplay.aspx?culture=en-US#cult...
3.0 WCM Books
http://www.amazon.com/Professional-SharePoint-Content-Management-Develop

Vint Cerf- Must See

2009-05-03T11:59:00.001-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTfFB7L85Hc

Branding and Usability

2009-04-14T13:24:00.001-07:00

I am going over some of the videos of branding and usability.

I recommend going over them as a companion to Web 2.0 Application.

1.0

Microsoft Architecture Guide Book

2009-03-13T00:47:00.001-07:00

The entire book is free and a must read.

http://www.codeplex.com/AppArchGuide/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=20586

WebApplications – part 1 – Framework vs. Environment

2009-03-09T13:29:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

I would like to start some kind of series of articles regarding the Web applications and the ways of designing and developing such.

In this first part I would like to focus on some terminology. I will also try to focus on main differences between standard Framework, that we all I suppose know (at least one – such as Zend Framework, Symfonyor others) and something that I call Environment. So – what are the differences ?

However before I will start comparison some of you might start asking yourself, what solutions I based my thoughts on ?

Well – the framework I know in a best way is Zend Framework – which I believe is one of the best for web application building. Yes, I know there’s been many “fights” in the scope of “which framework is the best ?”. None won, some lost (that were really bad J). But at the end most people, that took part in these discussions agreed – everything depends on the usage. And I agree with that – everything depends on a usage, on an application we have to design and develop. As far as I read – in this “category” there were 2 leaders –Symfony and ZF. Symfony I do no know and did not used – so I will focus on ZF J

Regarding the environment – in this case I must admit I do not know any full-scale environments written entirely in PHP beside of an environment created by my company COBA Solutions – COBAEX. So therefore I will focus on the functionality delivered by this environment – and I hope I will not be crucified, as this might be seen as marketing J

OK – but what is the main difference between Framework and Environment. I suppose we can distinguish at least several of them:

Area of usage

I suppose the most important one.

We can use framework to build almost everything. Of course, as mentioned above, some frameworks are designated for webpages, some for web applications, others are for Web 2.0 sites (community, social etc.). However even if you will take a framework, that is targeted for applications, you will still be able to create a website basing on it – the best example might be ZF. You can easily create a website using it (in fact – there are plenty of websites using this framework), but if you will compare it to other, specifically targeted for websites, you will see that ZF is more complicated and creating a simple website using ZF is quite difficult and time consuming.

In case of an environment the situation is a little bit different. Environment (such as COBAEX) gives you already database schema, UI and many other features and mechanisms designed and developed in scope of application building. Using it to create a website will simply not work. However you can make use of an environment for administration panel for the website – but you will still need to create a full-scale website by your own, or at least use a ready-to-use CMS application that has been created in the environment (an example – COBAEX CMS).

So – summarizing – framework area of usage is much more broad, then in case of an environment, which is targeted for applications itself. So the environment is more specialized then framework – which has both pros and cons mentioned below.

Sourcecodes

Most frameworks are delivered in open source. This means, that every developer that is using a framework is able to change even the standards of the framework according to his needs. At first sight it looks great – “I can do whatever I want”. But on the second thought – think about the support. Which simply does not exist on the professional level for the open source projects. Why ? Because it is impossible to give the support for enormous amounts of variants of the code – modified in an unpredicted way by different developers.

In case of closed source – maintained and supported by team or organization – the full-scope professional support is possible. Mostly because there will be no unpredicted and unknown modifications.

I know – now I can start a real war, where on one side I will have open source evangelizers, and on other – companies. Both sides will for sure have their arguments, which will be for sure true. But this is not my point.

I suppose the key in this area is again the area of usage. Most companies can agree with semi-professional (opensourcers – please do not take it personally J) support in scope of their webpages. But in scope of applications, especially business-critical ones – the full-scale professional support is essential. So in this area – again I suppose the first place is for environments – which has at least parts of the code closed.

Standardization

Here we are facing more the way the frameworks are designed. In most cases I see lack of inter-standardization of frameworks. What I mean is the fact, that most frameworks are indeed standardized in scope of this specific framework. However once we will try to integrate 2 applications created in 2 different frameworks – we are stepping into minefield. Because standards delivered in frameworks has nothing in common with enterprise level standards like SOA etc.

So – again getting back to the area of usage and solutions. Once we have a single webpage – the integration and compatibility with other backend applications is very limited – because there’s no need for anything more. In scope of application the situation is different – application should be integrated with other solutions working in a company in much larger areas.

Regarding the transparency of a code – also the decision should be made basing on the complexity of business processes used in the solution. In case of a webpage – these processes are rather uncomplicated and easy – so the possible areas of bugs are less time-consuming to find. In case of applications, the processes are far more complicated and complex – which means the possible bugs will be much harder to target and remove. And in this case clean, standardized code will be a high advantage and will bring a real value in scope of service actions.

Strict standardization however has 2 sides - a good and a bad one:

- From the good side – the code and solution itself is created in more proper, “clean” way

- From the bad side – standardization is limiting the possibilities

Someone might now say “let’s find a compromise”. But I suppose there can be no compromise for every area of usage. We have to decide, what we want to do – and then decide whether we can agree on a high standardization to deliver a clean, proper and integrated solution, but created according to some rules that has been prepared by the environment manufacturer, or we can agree on a low standardization in the level of interconnection, having more possibilities, but loosing easy integration possibilities and effective support for unclean code.

Summarizing – key points

To summarize I would like to try to specify some key points, that will help you to choose whether to choose an environment, or a framework for your project.

I suppose the very first, most important question you should have an answer to is “what for I need a framework or an environment ?”.

Once the answer is: “I will be creating a standalone or low-integrated (e.g. only contact forms posted to internal CRM solution) website from the scratch, without using any standard CMS from the market” – choose a framework. It will give you high flexibility, the project will be rather small and on the low complexity.

Once the answer is: “I will be creating a web application, that will automate specific business processes and will be integrated with back-end company applications” – choose the environment. You will achieve a standardized solution with full-scale professional support automating the processes according to industry best practices.

I hope the above article will be useful for you. Please do not hesitiate to place a comments with your thoughts and suggestions. I will really value every (even very critical) thoughts about your attitude to things presented.
Also stay tuned for the next parts of this series – which I plan to be: WebApplications – part 2 – standard, configuration, development…

Great Video Conferencing & Collaboration tool from Acrobat

2009-03-08T17:26:00.001-07:00

I just came across the acrobat collaboration and video conferencing tool. I am sure It will be a great use to software engineers.

There are couple of You Tube videos of the Acrobat Video Conferencing tool. Check them out. This will increase my productivity. I also use logmein sometimes.

Ref:

https://connectnow.acrobat.com

www.logmein.com

Software Retraining During Recession

2009-03-08T16:14:00.001-07:00

I highly recommend training form these outlet. In fact US stimulus package must make these kind of education free for unemployed people.
I am no way connected to these people- however they do the best possible video seminar.

If you need a retraining- get their courses. Ask your senators to make this training free for you
http://www.learnvisualstudio.net
Please post your thoughts.

Architecture and Design of Large Scale CMS

2009-02-03T01:31:00.001-08:00

What is the design and Analysis methodology for large scale content management system that have proven to be repeatable and successful in industrial settings.

Please post your thoughts.

How do you Increase Efficinecy of your Development Team

2009-01-13T11:14:00.001-08:00

I am trying to understand how to increase the efficiency of your development team.?

All forms of Input based on experience will be appreciated.

Leadership in Period of Uncertainty

2009-01-12T14:10:00.001-08:00

The Ram Charan book is must read for anyone-

1.0 Book Web sites

http://www.ram-charan.com/leadership_economic_uncertainty.htm

2.0 Ram Caharan- Video

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=AEL2Kli_vKk

3.0 Business Week Interview

http://feedroom.businessweek.com/?fr_story=287545aba7bdd5b4a0dede36c8b9e62fde672307&rf=sitemap

Great Little Productivity Enhancing Software

2008-12-17T10:25:00.001-08:00

We all have to handle multiple projects for various customers and internal development.

How do you keep track of each one, How do you know what is the status of the last project that you have not touched for 2 weeks.

I always had trouble shuffling projects. I found a very effective tool called to-do list from abstract spoon and it is very effective.

Please evaluate for your self

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/applications/todolist2.aspx

Looking for Jobs in Difficult Times

2008-12-05T00:40:00.001-08:00

It is difficult and painful to look for job in SoftwareEngineering in this time of turmoil. However there are couple of things you can do.

1.0 Join Education Extension Services ( Most Universities have this )to do meta learning- This means you have to find out what is important that you must be willing to learn.

2.0 Learn to discipline yourself- In this economic times measurable , reproducible and desirable skills are necessary.

For instance you need skills at ground level and University will provide knowledge at 50,000 feet level. Learn to differentiate between knowledge and skills. Do put special emphasis on the skills part of it.

3.0 Learn to understand the unstated rule of the game- in most countries people will not hire Govt. sector employees in private sector. In this economy SMB market is poised for rebound faster tahn others and you should be looking for assignment there. This also means the SMB market will be looking for hard skills. If you have worked in soft skills area. this will be definitely difficult. In this economic climate a large number of people will be redundant with soft skills. What is your employment strategy.

4.0 You may have to embrace GTD-getting things done. You may have to network during day and study during night. I recently came across a cultural mind-set in Europe. If you have no jobs for 2 years , your are not employable.

5.0 The criteria for interview in SMB market Place are the following- (a) Smart and Get things Done --- The book.

(b) Humble, Hungry and Smart.

5.0 In SMB market, you have to be aligned with market dynamics. If for any reason you give the impression that you are reluctant to learn- You can not be called for interview.

6.0 For new graduates- The onus on you to educate yourself for the application of your knowledge. The days of training someone for 3 years in the hope that you might produce something is gone. Take a look into dice.com of the reality of the Job market. If the masters program at CS/EE did not prepare you for SystemC/.NET Programming-- too bad. you have to prepare yourself.

7.0 Time for extreme competition is on us and we can embrace it or watch TV and drink beer- the choice is yours.

Ref:

1.0 Smart and Gets things Done ISBN-10: 1590598385

2.0 Execution- ISBN-10: 0609610570

3.0 Humble, Hungry, Smart

These are some of my personal views.

Software Engineering Jobs

2008-10-25T10:43:00.001-07:00

I see many people are putting software jobs in the group discussion. I have created a separate blog for this and you ware most welcome to put the job ads there. Use the Jobs forum

The Url is www.ias-research.com/blog

In another note I need people to contribute to this blog and its maintenance. I need your ideas.

Acceptance of SOA, WCF, WPF in Enterprise Development

2008-10-07T11:11:00.001-07:00

I am working on SOA acceptance with WCF and WPF in Enterprise development.

Please post your thoughts in this subject matter.

Economic Crisis and Software Industry

2008-10-07T00:58:00.001-07:00

The impact of Global Economic Meltdown will have couple of very significant effect on the It and software Industry:

1.0 More Telecommuting and VPN will be embraced.

2.0 Managed Services will be wide spread

3.0 More Software Development will be outsourced.

4.0 More Technical Jobs will move to India/China.

5.0 Web 2.0 will be embraced aggressively

I think the middle management in Post industrial economy will be brutally reduced.

These are my personal opinion.

Open Source .NET Framework Integration in your Development

2008-08-21T17:08:00.001-07:00

How are you using open source .NET Development frameworks in your current and near future projects.

Please post your comments

Reference

CodePlex

Scalability of Web Application

2008-07-27T15:07:00.001-07:00

Scalability for Web applications is crucial and perhaps more important than desktop applications. In desktop applications you have control of the number of users using the application, while in web application the number can jump drastically without any hint. This is however a good thing because we need more traffic . A majority of the developers however do not have formal background in application instrumentation and analysis. Load balancing is another area that needs to be investigated in such areas.

The following Google presentation based on ruby on rails and dtrace explores the idea. I like the web cast and it is simply brilliant.

Google Scalability Video

The two books and conferences that you may find useful are the following:

1.0 Usenix Conference

Usenix Site

2.0 Cal Handserson Book

Cal Handerson Book

3. Theo Book

Theo Book

I would love to hear your reaction to this video. I am personally slightly amused.

Flight of the Creative Class

2008-07-20T06:41:00.001-07:00

Flight of the Creative class- dated but still relevant.

Post your comment.

1.0 http://creativeclass.com/

2.0 http://creativeclass.com/richard_florida/video/index.php?video=KUOW_Seattle

SEO Resources and Books

2008-07-18T23:58:00.000-07:00

I found the following book very useful.

Particularly the resources list.

Check the link and digg for the details.
http://buildingfindablewebsites.com/resources.php

Leadership in Software Development- Must See

2008-07-13T16:48:00.000-07:00

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=ypEMdjslEOI

Application Frameworks-

2008-05-26T08:40:00.001-07:00

I am doing research on windows application frameworks.

All pointers will be appreciated.

1.0Theoretical papers

2.0 Tutorials

3.0 Web Videos

4.0 Integration methods

5.0 Testing Methods.

Important Books that Have Changed my Thinking ...

2008-05-18T23:32:00.000-07:00

1.0 Rules for Revolutionaries- GUY Kawasaki
2.0 Principals of Operating Systems- Sacha Krakowiak
3.0 Object Oriented Software Engineering- Ivar Jacobsen
4.0 Extreme Prrogramming Explained- Kent Beck
5.0 Beyond Software Architecture- Luke Hohman
6.0 Object Oriented Software Development- Anton Eliens

Ajax in Action-

2008-05-10T17:18:00.001-07:00

I am reading this book Ajax in Action.

It is good read but I think there are better one for AjaX ISBN-1-932394-61-3

The following Article for Code project is also useful.

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/ajax/IntroAjaxASPNET.aspx

Open Source Diva- Please take a few minutes to Watch this Video

2008-05-04T11:21:00.001-07:00

This is about Sun's Open Source Initiative

http://www.linux.com/feature/132699

http://workatjelly.com/

2008-05-01T07:25:00.001-07:00

Collaboration at New level and this I think is My Pick as a winner.

BTW workatjelly is a collaborative website for working together.

Attaching SQL Database in MDF Format

2008-04-30T07:24:00.001-07:00

Quite Often I have to attach sql server database in mdf format to my development platform . However primary file location can not be recreated due to various reasons.

I am looking for a methods to attach such mdf files to sql server express 2005.

All Pointers will be appreciated.

OASIS Launches New Group to Optimize SOA for Telecommunications

2008-04-28T15:13:00.000-07:00

The OASIS open standards consortium today announced a new initiative aimed at bringing the full advantages of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) to the telecommunications industry. The OASIS Telecommunications Services Member Section (OASIS Telecom) will work to pave the way for a new business model that will make telecommunications services more intelligent, deployable, and easy to consume.

Read More

Not all databases are created equal...

2008-04-23T06:53:00.000-07:00

In today's IT environment, many think of the database as just the persistence layer of objects, or as a commodity. If your database isn't performing well enough, then just throw more hardware at it. While this belief is pervasive, it isn't true.

I recently had one example that shows that each database vendor had a different solution to the same problem.

I have a customer who had overloaded a table's purpose. The table stored different types of comment lines associated to an object. So the layout looked like:
id - the id of the object that it was describing.
type - the type of comment.
sequence - used if there are more than one entry of a given type for this comment
comment_text - the actual text we want to store in the database.

Now the problem arose due to a requirement that we only allow a single entry per id of a comment who has the type = 'c'.
All other types would allow multiple entries.

I looked for a solution in IDS, DB2 and Oracle.

In Oracle, because their indexes allowed nulls, you could create a functional index where the function was inline and returned either the unique id, or null if the id was already in the database.

In IDS, you had two solutions. First was a functional index that you'd either error out if there was an entry of type = 'c' for the given id, or you would return a combination of the id, type, and sequence.
The second solution... use their VII to create an index that mimics Oracle and you can use their solution.

In DB2, you'd have to create a trigger.

While I support all three of the databases at various clients, I have to admit that I loved the simplicity of Oracle's solution.

I also like the fact that IDS's solution as it would also work in Oracle, and that IDS has the ability to extend itself and mimic other features in other databases that are not native to itself.

I was less impressed with the DB2 solution, however I was told that it was extremely efficient.

The point is, while each of the two database vendors (Oracle, and IBM)[IBM owns DB2 and IDS], has the ability to solve the problem, they do so in slightly different methods. Each method has a slightly different cost and will effect performance.

An alternative would have been to separate the table in to multiple tables, the use of an Index had the least amount of development impact.

So the next time you look at choosing a database platform, don't buy in to the idea that they are all the same thing aka a commodity.

E commerce Framework with PHP/ASP.NET

2008-04-14T09:03:00.001-07:00

I am exploring what are availability of Commercial Grade E-commerce Frameworks available. The framworks should integrate with Dreamweaver/ASP.net Development in VS 2005/Vs2008.

I need to explore both PHP based and ASP.NET solutions.

As I explore the situation , I will post the Results

Please post your usability experience, if you have any

Consulting and Delivering Values

2008-04-12T14:51:00.000-07:00

I have found this material to be quite good.
I always watch out for people who can talk and can not deliver. Consultants without implementation experience is useless.

http://www.summitconsulting.com/articles/index.html

Also look into marketing your skills

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=4622195&affil=wftv

Universal Data Models

2008-04-09T21:29:00.001-07:00

I have to design database schema quite a number of time and I simply consider designing from scratch a waste of time.

I have the two particular reference very use ful.

1.o The Database Source book Vol-1- Len Silverston- ISBN 0-471-35348-5

2.0 The Database source Book Vol 2- Len Silverston- ISBN 0-471-38023-7

These books are very good , however each CDROM has asking price of 500 dollars. I do not recommend purchasing the CDROM Auth code.

The material in the Book is very much time saver.

Books That I keep Near my Desk

2008-04-08T21:55:00.001-07:00

There are some books that I keep near My desk while working

1.0 Building Applications and Components with VB.net, Ted Pattison, dr. Joe Hummel-ISBN- 0-201-73495-8

2.0 Windows Forms Programming in VB.net , Chris sells, Justin Gethland- ISBN- 0-321-12519-3

3.0 VB.net and C#.net Cookbooks from Oreily's.

These core set of books are very helpful as I waste a lot of time wandering through MSDN documentation.

I also found that MSDN documentation becomes slightly useful when I have dynamic help turned on in VS 2005 and 2008.

Microsoft Solutions Framework

2008-04-07T22:40:00.001-07:00

I have started my journey involving MSF-3.0 and will post all the discoveries and pitfalls on the way. I will be using Enterprise Architect-7.0 and Vs 2005 for the Journey.

Here is the Url from Microsoft.

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/solutionaccelerators/msf/default.mspx

Transaction Processing - Advanced Topics

2008-04-02T15:55:00.001-07:00

I was doing some research related to transaction processing and came across this book

Database and Transaction Processing- ISBN 0-321-18557-9

and found the material to be better in terms of easy grasp tham Reiters Classic Work on Transaction(Acm biblography).

The idea is how do we introduce concepts of transaction to junior programmers, and this book fits the bill.

Want to Increase Productivity 4 Times

2008-03-30T10:17:00.001-07:00

Follow the simple procedures

1.0 Buy GTD:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done

2.0 Life hacker:

http://lifehacker.com/software/geek-to-live/getting-things-done-with-google-notebook-256844.php

3.0 Use Google Notebooks: Create 5 notebooks

4.0 Install Fire Fox Extensions:

http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/

Not Done: back to 1.

How to start a Software Business

2008-03-28T19:12:00.001-07:00

This is an interesting video of how to start a software business.

I will recommend it.

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=2680114700674428424&q=software+engineering&total=1519&start=20&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=5

Here are the PDF slides

http://www.plambeck.org/howtoquit.pdf

Socratic Methods and Competitive Strategy

2008-03-27T08:26:00.001-07:00

I am going thorough Competitive Strategy of Michel Porter and Socratic Methods to Increase Performance i IT and Software Business.

I will appreciate your input and feedback in this

Ref:

1.0 Competitive Strategy- Michel E Porter- ISBN -0-684-84148-7

2.0 http://www.socraticmethod.net/

Starting your Own Software Business

2008-03-26T00:17:00.001-07:00

If you are thinking of starting out your Own Software Business- this is the time.

I recommend the following books:

1.0 Success Thorough Positive Mental Attitude- ISBN- 0-671-74322-8

2.0 The Magic of Thinking Big- David Schwartz-0-671-64678-8

Software Reuse- Architecture, Process and Organization for Business Success

2008-03-23T18:39:00.001-07:00

It is one of the MUST READ Books, if you have any thing to do with software. I recommend it very much. The book is dated, but the contents are very valid

Authors: Ivor Jacobson, Martin Griss, Patrick Johnsson

ISBN- 0-201-92476-5

Also look into- Why software reuse has failed historicaly

http://www.cs.wustl.edu/~schmidt/reuse-lessons.html

ZEND 1.5 PHP Application Frameworks

2008-03-23T18:03:00.001-07:00

I am working on Zend 1.5 PHP application frameworks.

If you are working on any aspect of PHP, it will be worth while to look into ZEND 1.5.

Search Engine Optimization

2008-03-21T10:31:00.001-07:00

I am in the process of writing an article about search engine optimization. Any help from your end will be appreciated.

I have gathered the following References:

1.0 Google Analytics: http://64.233.179.110/analytics/tour/index_en-US.html

2.0 Web Analytics Association

http://www.webanalyticsassociation.org/

3.0 Webtrends Webcast

http://www.webtrends.com/Resources/ExpertWebcasts.aspx

4.0 OnLine Marketing Blog

http://www.toprankblog.com/

Competitive Strategy Linkedin Group

2008-03-20T08:46:00.001-07:00

I am looking for Linkedin Group or website that discusses the following:
1.0 Dynamic Competitive Strategy- Like Wharton/Porter/S Day
2.0 Application areas being Software Engineering
3.0 Web 2.0 in Business
4.0 ERP- Like SAP/Salesforce/CRM
5.0 Information Technology- LAN/WAN/VOIP/Server/VPN/Biztalk

In short, I am looking for Information and ideas to align the following

Strategic Planning

Business Operation

Information Technology Implementation

ERP/CRM Deployment

Integration of Lean Six Sigma

Enabling Technology Like

.Net Development

Web 2.0 based Collaboration

Business Intelligence Integration.

Sales and Marketing Operation

Design Patterns and Component Based Design

2008-03-18T16:03:00.001-07:00

I understand design Patterns, and right now I am reading Ted Faison's book component based design. It is a wonderful book to begin with, since it touches on the UML at the beginning.

I am not clear at this point:

1.0 How component based design is different from design pattern and or application framework. I will post the details.

2.0 Since we can leverage existing third party components ( Read Software Class libraries, frameworks, components) in .NET technology, why I am not familiar with such.

3.0 Class libraries like LEDA, STL and Rougewave, I am aware of, but I do not see any three-tire business building components. I guess I will search www.dundas.com and others for that. May be code projects has some pointers on that.

Ref:

Component Based development with VS C#- Ted Faison- ISBN : 0-7645-4914-6

My Feedback on Qi4j and Edward's Response

2008-03-16T21:28:00.000-07:00

On 13th of March 2008, Thursday, I have attended a presentation on an old-new concept of programming, Composite Oriented Programming, presented by a well-known personality, Rickard Öberg. He is the guy behind XDoclets, WebWork, and Sitevision. He also wrote EJB Engine in JBoss 2.

The presentation was about Composite Oriented Programming for Java with Qi4j, at OUM Angkasaraya, Kuala Lumpur. I got to know this from Malaysian JUG. There were 15-20 folks attending the presentation. It was good, the presentation and question/answer session. Despite, I haven't asked a single question at that time. It was not that I was not having any. Actually, I waited for the other folks and finally I realised that few of my questions are now already got the answer. And the answers for the remaining I derived myself. :)

However, after coming the next day I have sent my feedback to the JUG. And just after few hours I have received the answers of my few worries from Edward Yakop. So, I would like to share those with you guys. Below is the thing.

Me - Too much abstraction

Edward - I'm not sure what this means? I think once u read the DDD book. You might conclude that this is needed.

Me - Big learning curve

Edward - Niclas and I had a chat over breakfast this morning. If we have two fresh programmer, who only knows java. And both of them are given task to create petstore. One use qi4j and the other use spring/jsf/wicket etcs. Who will get it done faster and better (in terms of quality, maintainable etcs).

If the document/tutorials will be as good as spring documents for example. I think we agree, that the qi4j guy will win. But then again, since we're not there in terms of documentation, tutorials, persistence. We better hold back our thoughts until all these are done.

But if we're talking about programmers who already know jpa, some view layer. Yeah, without investing time to learn qi4j. I think the programmer will be frustrated to work in this qi4j manner.

Me - Might be compelling in terms of maintenance

Edward - Sitevision is built on top of this concept. And based from Rickard observation. This should be a big plus in terms of project maintainbility.

One thing that I raised, is the fact that Rickard doesn't show the simple prototype that he did in order to see how module/layers/composite/concerns hang together.

From his blog post. And the screenshot.

If we create a better tooling for this, instead of rdf -> xsl -> html. We would have a powerful tool to figure out how does my application looks like. How does the concerns are stack, and even better, if I call this method, what would be the order of constraint, concern and sideeffects. Would the side effect be asynchronous.

We believe that with this information and tooling (need to be created). This should give a great information for maintainer.

Me - Suits large enterprise applications where maintenance and adding new feature is really cumbersome

Edward - Agree.

Me - Wish it would be a success

Edward - Yeah :) We sure hope so too.

Me - Might look insane before trying it out

Edward - Probably :) But, after working on qi4j during spare time and coding standard java way for commercial project. I personally going insane with the standard way to code :(

Me - Performance would become a primary issue

Edward - Not really. Sitevision is a proof that performance is a non issue. I think with all the experience that Rickard had with sitevision. Qi4j will most probably does not have performance issue in the future.

Me - Not sure how we can bind the object with HTTP request, and how would we use it via JSTL. I hope there would be typical getters/setters behind the scene

Edward - Yeah, this is similar problem that I have atm with qi4j-ibatis entity store. If the project is opensource, I think u could try to convince them to create a pluggable getter/setter resolution. This way, we can hook qi4j way to get and set. Otherwise, there's probably nothing much we can do :(

The current plan is to have qi4j-ibatis, qi4j-neo and qi4j-wicket integration. I'm working on both qi4j-ibatis (in and qi4j-wicket intergation and Rickard and Niclas is working on Entity Session API and core. Once these are done. I will update chronos app.

Me - Not sure how we can integrate with JSF based frameworks i.e. Seam

Edward - You don't. I don't know much about seam. But in order for qi4j to replace seam, we will need to be at least seam feature complete.

Me - Looks we still need to come up with data access layer on our own or through using some other frameworks.

Edward - You don't really need to come up with data access layer at all. You just have to use what we have. if I batis is used, then you would need to create statementid for each composite, association. This way qi4j-ibatis will now which statement to call to delete, update, insert, fetch association.

More to this later, once I complete this.

Me - Time will tell where it is going and how

Edward - Yup

Me - Would love to contribute if I can. I believe we need to go through the DDD book, learn, at least,a basics of Ruby on Rails, and Java Annotations prior to contribute

Edward - Yes, I believe.

Me - We already used to have a cup of coffee or two while programming but now it seems, from the logo, that we should start eating coffee beans too through those chopsticks

Edward - It's closer to Eating steaming HOT rice with chopstick. :)

PHP Development Using Eclipse Europa

2008-03-14T18:37:00.001-07:00

I program quite extensively using PHP for dynamic web sites and e-commerce, commonly known as LAMP architecture. So far I have been using Emacs and Vi and other editors in Unix system.

Recently I downloaded Eclipse for PHP called europa version. I was simply impressed by the eclipse feature. what is more interesting is that I could integrate Apache 2.0 running on Redhat Linux machine's PHP directory directly from the Project File location.

The result is 150% immediate increase in productivity. To make this happen, you have to map the Linux file system using samba.

The Next project is to do the same with Dreamweaver -8.

Using Windows Live Writer

2008-03-14T18:26:00.001-07:00

I have started using windows Live Writer - it is free and seems to be very good.

RPC-Socket-Threads-Signal- Distributed Programming

2008-03-13T08:48:00.000-07:00

You Learn Good Programming Techniques by Working with Linux/SUN

It may sound funny , but I have observed that good programing skills are developed by working with SUN/Solaris/Linux.

Difficult concepts like

1.0 Inter process communication (IPC)
2.0 Multithreading
3.0 Signal Handling for Process
4.0 Garbage Collection /Memory Leakage
5.0 Remote Procedure Calls (RPC)
6.0 Common Object Request Broker Architecture(CORBA, WCF)
7.0 Distributed Programming
8.0 Dynamic Linking
are difficult to master in Windows environment. MSDN has no concept of explaining!!!!!

I have benefited by reading the following materials to really understand how they are implemented and how they work.

1.0 Doglas Comer’s Books- XINU/Networking 2 Volumes
2.0 Richard Stevens Networking
3.0 Sun RPC Tutorials
4.0 Unix Programming

I would suggest any one to look into these before jumping into Windows and .Net.

Jumping Straight into .Net gives you very superficial ideas of these concepts.

VS 2008 and VS 2005 on the Same MAchine

2008-03-11T23:29:00.000-07:00

Visual Studio 2008 and Visual studio 2005 on the same Machines

I just received a Dell Vostro 4000 Quad Core- (2.4GHZ) 4GB Memory with 500GB Sata drive and 19# monitor.

I am not too happy with the machine for the Following reasons:

1.0 It Has 300w of Power supply, which is not adequate
2.0 Speakers are powered from USB Outlet, which is pathetic.
3.0 The Monitor is running ar 1280*1024 in 32 bit mode, The colour and contrast rendering is very poor.
4.0 The Key board rattles
5.0 The mouse buttons rattles and accidentally by slight click turns into web page magnification mode while scrolling.

Any way, I was trying to work with Dreamwever 8 and VS 2008 professional on the same machine.

The machines has XPP with service pack 2 and all the updates.

Now the problem begins:

1.0 C# applications which interfaces with Ado.net and Sql express 2005 is crashing in VS 2008 with no apparent reason. The event log of the machines is Giving run time .NET Version 2 Error. I am yet to decipher this bug with MSDN knowledge base. Many people in code project has had this bug in VS 2008.
2.0 So to get the project Going I installed VS 2005 Prof on the same machine. I started getting, Security violation error- project locations is not safe etc etc.
3.0 Applied all the patches for VS 2005 service pack 1. After this Security violation error went away. However Even in Vs 2005 – Unknown run time error is still there.
4.0 I have a question, Do I have to Uninstall Sql Express 2005 which is part of VS 2008.
5.0 For some reason VS 2005 is unable to access SQL Express 2005 Tables.

Any suggestions will be appreciated.

One suggestions that I have received in CodeProject is to De-CRAPIFY the sytem.
Which involves RE Installing XPP and So on. I am trying to save some time.

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Software Project Failures-What Went Wrong

2008-03-11T10:54:00.000-07:00

We understand more form failure analysis. To this effect it is only natural that we examine failed software projects:

If you would like to share failed projects, please post you thoughts here.

Free IT Information

2008-03-10T20:32:00.000-07:00

We have created a free BB Site for IT Related Infomration. Feel Free to post your questions.
we will try to answer your questions in a short period of time. Also you are welcome to post answers to the questions that other people have.

Cheers

http://www.askushow.ca/

Formal Specification and Research

2008-03-09T16:53:00.001-07:00

Formal Specification has long history in the academic field. It is interesting that large amount is research is done in academics regarding formal specification

UML/SDL are actually implementation of the Formal specification in the Graphical Domain.

If you are interested in the research aspect of the formal specification and systems engineering please follow this link.

Please remember these are research tools at the present moment.
The ideas and projects will give you future directions to come in Software Engineering and Systems Engineering discipline.

Formal Specification can be used for Hardware Design for such language as VHD/Verilog/SystemsC and also in software design such as C++/C#

Formal Specification has not entered the Formal HYPE CYCLE ( still considered sissy-IE. difficult to understand) as they say it in academics.

Related Link:
http://nms.lcs.mit.edu/Larch/

Eclipse Process Framework Project- Bacon

2008-02-28T20:07:00.000-08:00

Eclipse Process framwork Project by Bacon - a Must Read. At least we should look at Bacon's Slides.

More on this later

http://www.eclipse.org/proposals/beacon/

Application Framework in C#

2008-02-24T16:30:00.000-08:00

I was told that I should be looking into Application Framework and C# book such as.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1590592883/ref=reg_hu-wl_item-added

There is no google preview and my local library/bookstore has no copy.

I am yet to acquire this book, however I have planty of GOF Patterns books. and

I have read this one

http://www.amazon.com/Enterprise-Development-Visual-Studio-NET/dp/1590590422/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203899131&sr=8-7
As I get the book and revise the Framework, I will post more details.

MSDN Channel 9 Videos

2008-02-16T13:57:00.000-08:00

I have a habit of watching Videos, when I am having a cofee and or taking a break:
Microsft Reasearch and Architectural Videos are worth watching, including Framewoks and stuff

What do you think?

http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/ARCast.TV
http://channel9.msdn.com/

Writing for the Web

2008-02-04T15:26:00.000-08:00

Since a large number of E-commerce and Static website requires good amount of English Composition- The process can be frustrating since the objective of writing has no fixed goal.

Are we writing to create an online marketing campaign? Are we creating a Public Relations material that is supposed to create abuzz like strong German Schnups. Or the public relations will be low key like warm Glue Wine of Scandinavian Christmas.
Or are we just trying to create some stupid Web Pages with zillions of CSS so that we get paid and run!

In more technical sense, Are we substantiating an argument? Using persuasion and compare and contrast to establish a point. Are we just trying to educate some factual information? Who is our target audience? Why such person be interested in our website?
Does the end user needs to be entertained? excited? provoked? educated?

Some how the short answer seems to all the above- and that makes it difficult.

I have found a solution. A new book on web content design seems to be immensely practical and useful. I am reading it , right now-Killer Web Content- Garry McGovern . I highly suggest this book to any one involved in web design and content creation.

Reference:

1.0 http://www.useit.com/
2.0 http://websitetips.com/
3.0 Information Architecture- ISBN 0-596-52734-

Continuous Inspection: Sharing A Practice

2008-01-15T22:57:00.000-08:00

There are several ways to achieve continuous inspection. Some organisations do it by pair reviewing where one person types and the other is considered suggesting code and design improvements. Some teams have another developer review their code before committing it to the VCS repository. Some follow formal peer reviews, in which a developer's peers watch the code and offer better ideas. And may be few more.

In our case we do it using code reviews, which is more like the second form, I have mentioned in the paragraph above. But we do it after committing to VCS. Not a good thing right? I would elaborate it later. The other way we follow is pair programming which is not exactly the form of continuous inspection, but it helps in some way, if not exactly.

Pair Programming
It something annoyed few of our team mates, including me, in the beginning. Nobody was comfortable when someone is watching while the one programs. But after practicing it for a few weeks things changed. One important thing is we must switch in both ways for example, I watch, you code now you watch, I code; and the other is switching the partners so everybody knows everyones weak and strong points and the style of coding. That brings a drastic personal improvement. We found it as an efficient way for some tasks and bad, not really bad but inappropriate, for others. This works best when its about to train a new developer, to implement something complex or not routine and it helps transferring the skills as well. So, now we don't practice this for every other task.

After getting all these benefits, one benefits which it gives you the code quality and most of the time you don't really need to inspect the code exclusively.

Code Reviews
This is the thing, we merely follow for continuous inspection. In our team we found that most of us are very good in coding but not as good in reviewing other developers code. So, what we did was, we generated code review tickets using hook script provided by our project management system. Its your choice how you want to generate it whether you want the tickets to be assigned randomly or in a particular order. Now, on every commit we have a code review ticket assigned to any of the team mate. He/She needs to review it and then close it after making appropriate changes, if required. This way we got a good improvement in the skill of understanding other developers code and the design pattern we should follow for a particular scenario. We improved on software quality, bug reports, code clarity.

Please share your's in comments. Thanks.

Related Links:
Automation for the people: Continuous Inspection
Paul Duvall on continuous inspection with software inspectors
Peer Reviews in Software: A Practical Guide

Hello Everyone

2008-01-14T08:43:00.000-08:00

I would just like to say hello to everyone in the group. This is my first posting on this blog and I look forward to blogging with everyone more. I would just like to share with everyone http://babajob.com/person.htm?user=10001

This is Sean Blagsvedt, a Microsoft alum who left a lucrative job with them to start Babajob and Babalife in Bangalore, the IT Capital of India. I think what he is doing is incredible and I am trying to help spread the word as much as I can because I think that he provides a great example for how empowered we can be if we believe in a cause and have the guts to follow through. Please also see my other blog on Wordpress http://benkross.wordpress.com/. If anyone wants to talk more about this or any other topic, feel free to call me at 212-204-1025 or my cell 914-523-6166. Please reference Blogger so I know where the call is coming from.

Cheers and happy blogging,

Ben Ross
IT Recruiter
Forrest Solutions
212-204-1025
bross@forrestsolutions.com

Jommla, LAMP, Dreamweaver, CSS, PHP and ASP.NET

2008-01-13T14:34:00.000-08:00

Trying to understand where Joomla, LAMP, Dreamweaver, CSS, PHP and Asp.net work together for SMB marketplace. More and more customers are asking for web maintenance/update functionalty; can Macromedia Contribute work with these technologies?

As I discover these answers, I will update the Blog.

Push to Test- Google Tech Talk- Must see

2008-01-06T17:06:00.000-08:00

Please watch this google tech talk-push to test, some thing new- and better
Push to test video
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-4427578441647658650

Micosoft Action Pack

2007-12-17T08:44:00.000-08:00

Just received this querters action pack. It is quite a list of software for SMB markets.
I hope to check this out soon. I think I received about 80 DVD. Enough for holidays.
More on this later

SQL Server 2005 Express for Developers

2007-12-09T19:10:00.000-08:00

I just Received The book-

1.0 Sql Server 2005 Express for Developers- Apress -ISBN-1-590059-720-6
I will comment about the content, However quite a lot of the stuff is still in MSDN and Code Project.

2.0 Also Picked up the Lion's Commentary on Unix- The classic Text- I always wanted to buy this one but was out of print.

And thirdly

1.0 Execution- The Discipline of Getting Things Done- NYT Best Seller-ISBN- 0-609-61057-0
I definitely need this book. To keep me focused on getting some thing done every hour.( This is true)

Enterprise Architecture

2007-12-01T20:35:00.000-08:00

I am just going over the Book
A practical Guide to Enterprise Architecture- ISBN 0-13-141275-2
I am trying out some of the ideas with Ea-7.0 of Sparkworks.
Details on this wll be posted soon.
A side note, some of these books may be avilable in google library, please look into that.

I have the objective to keep this blog FAT-Free. Please let me know if you would like to publish and participate in postings.

Building Large Systems at Google

2007-10-20T03:33:00.000-07:00

This is a must see Web cast- building Large systems at Google.

1.0 Building Large Systems at Google
2.0 Making Great Decisions
3.0 Developing Applications with Ajax( Next Generation Asp.net)

I would like to have your feedbacks on these webcasts.

Google Maps: Is the Earth a Sphere or Ellipsoid?

2007-10-18T10:39:00.000-07:00

Google Maps sees the Earth as a Spheroid, not an Ellipsoid. This came up through a discussion on the PROJ mailing list and I thought it was interesting to point out how Open Source can even handle projected lat/long systems (such as Google Maps) using a very familiar tool called cs2cs.

Christoper Schmidt wrote about it on his blog and also on his blog he points out the EPSG code to use. The magical number for the Google Mercator Projection (of a lat/long grid based on a sphere) is: 900913

Now onto the fun, showing how we can use Open Source to have our data show within a KML project and Google Maps.

Quoting from Frank's FAQ, he provides an excellent example, we see the following the use of cs2cs:

"cs2cs +proj=latlong +datum=WGS84
+to +proj=merc +a=6378137 +b=6378137 +lat_ts=0.0 +lon_0=0.0
+x_0=0.0 +y_0=0 +k=1.0 +units=m +no_defs"

Notice the sphere is being used? a=b

Because we are dealing with a sphere, the Y values will be greatly different from those on an ellipsoid (30 to 100 metres or more).

Quoting Frank again:

"In this case, and many other cases using spherical projections, the desired approach is to actually treat the lat/long locations on the sphere as if they were on WGS84 without any adjustments when using them for converting to other coordinate systems. The solution is to "trick" PROJ.4 into applying no change to the lat/long values when going to (and through) WGS84. This can be accomplished by asking PROJ to use a null grid shift file for switching from your spherical lat/long coordinates to WGS84.

cs2cs +proj=latlong +datum=WGS84
+to +proj=merc +a=6378137 +b=6378137 +lat_ts=0.0 +lon_0=0.0
+x_0=0.0 +y_0=0 +k=1.0 +units=m +nadgrids=@null +no_defs

Note the strategic addition of +nadgrids=@null to the spherical projection definition"

As you can see the value of Open Source and the mailing list and Open Source software is that people are sharing knowledge - whether it be via blogs, lists, or some other means of communication. There is a community out there that supports each other. These are actual users facing everyday problems and looking for solutions. The answers do exist, just the question has to be asked, and the community comes together to help.

Why not share experiences?

2007-10-18T10:00:00.000-07:00

Hi blog members,
Our count is reached to 31, thats why sharing our day to day experiences in any field of Software Engineering would be very beneficial to all of us and to other blog readers.

I shall soon start writing my experiences over here, hope you too will do the same.

Regards.

Software Metrics: function points and lines of code

2007-10-17T12:33:00.000-07:00

I have read a lot of papers and books that try to relate funtion points and lines of code.
The final step is always a big table with the lines of code for function point in every language.

Then the thesys is that is possible to derive the "effort" in man/month, given the fp count and the derived program dimension.

I think that there is a big mistake. In my experience to deliver 1M of lines of code I have to develop 1.5M of lines, and as my program get older, I still deliver 1M of LOCS, continuing to produce new lines that replace the old one.

A stronger example: as I develop new lines to correct errors, the User Manual (and the user interface) is always the same!

The real effort is related to LoC that I write, that are more then LoC that I deliver.

Agile Testing Video on You Tube

2007-10-12T23:22:00.000-07:00

I think these are interesting videos on agile/model/scrum based testing.
1.0 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3054974855576235846
2.0 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5521890509476590796
3.0 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7230144396191025011&q=scrum&total=936&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

I am working on a larger topic of testing and agile-testing in particular. Any technical contribution and direction will be appreciated.

Open Source Managed Services

2007-10-09T15:06:00.000-07:00

Is there any open source Managed Services Software to maintain software at client computer, or deliver tutorial at customer's site. Any pointers will be appreciated.

I have tried VNC and Tight VNC, they are great but requires firewall changes, anything that will not involve touching fire wall will be great.

Membership to This Blog

2007-10-09T14:11:00.000-07:00

Send me Email if you want to join this Blog. My email is keensoftware@gmail.com.
I would also like your views on management and posting.
I personally would like a balance between academic world and Implementation world.

Linkedin Software Engineering Blog

2007-10-07T01:07:00.000-07:00

What are the most important topics tht we should discuss in Linkedin Software Engineering Topics.
Should we have different format/blogsite for this.
We need to discuss these in details

Agile Developmt- XP and Scrum

2007-05-20T10:00:00.000-07:00

Agile Developmet is the defacto way of developing software for small business in my view. Heavy duty modeling and CMMI compliance is good but may not be practical for small development teams.

There are couple of things to consider if you are working on an agile development, if some of your team are out-sourced to India and Romania. How do you keep the communication open and yet get development done a reasonable pace.
The answer to this is to adopt SCRUM methodology and use a tool such as JIRI and Ontract Software Development tools.

More on this later.

Ecommerce and ASP.NET 2.0

2007-04-15T13:15:00.000-07:00

I just picked up a a couple of books from apress and looking through the MSDN webcasts of the ASP.NET related stuff.

Couple of them that I like are:
http://www.learnvisualstudio.net/Default.aspx

http://www.cristiandarie.ro/

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/beginner/learningpath/

I still have issues related ASP.NET 1.1 and ASP.NET 2.0 working on the same machine. Actually I am looking at some of the solutions in www.codeproject.com

Incidentally summer is here and today it is 19 degree centigrade.

Macromedia Studio 8 Suite of tools

2007-03-16T20:59:00.000-07:00

We just installed amcromedia 8 suite of tools.
and right after that, I upgraded the IE6 to I& and macromedia contribute stopped working.
Luckily , adobe had a work around.

Also I am not too happy to see that Freehand has been droped from MX to version 8.
more on this later.

Design Patterns

2007-03-04T10:04:00.000-08:00

I am please to find that design patterns are geting accepted in the embeded design industry like EDA giant Mentor Graphics. Also I am very please to note that design patterns are part of the original release of the Enterprise Architect of SparxSystems.

However in the .net community Hummel and others are trying to promote this in MSDN architecture webcat. I am not sure about the local .net activity in this area.

Archived Webcast for Visual Studio

2007-02-17T09:54:00.000-08:00

I have always found the materials for Jim Hummel useful when it comes to VS.net programming.
Here is the Link
http://www.microsoft.com/events/series/modernsoftdev.mspx

I will request you to post other sources as well for VS.Net resources.

SDL-92 and UML-2.0 Comparison

2006-04-01T23:03:00.000-08:00

Many of us have worked on SDL-92 in telecommunication industry. Here we want to understand how much UML-2.o has been influenced by SDL-92.
It is fairly complex topic and I hope to do justice on that.

Kerio Mail Server

2006-03-23T15:04:00.000-08:00

We sell and service Kerio Mail Server- www.kerio.com

Please post yout comments and concern here.
I will address issues atleast once a day.

Do not post confidential material here; instead send them as email.

Management Information Systems

2006-03-14T15:51:00.000-08:00

we are searching for Management Information Systems Books Materials. All pointers will be appreciated.

At presnet we have Identified Loudon Loudon- however it is introductory.
here is the book.http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0131538411/sr=8-1/qid=1142380150/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-3495716-6070511?%5Fencoding=UTF8

I am not very Impressed with this book. I would like a better reference.

Sam Gentle's Blog

2006-03-14T15:36:00.000-08:00

I like this Sam Gentle blog for Information that may not be avilable else where.
enjoy.

Here is the link
http://samgentile.com/blog/
http://codebetter.com/blogs/sam.gentile/default.aspx

Composite Smart Client Architecture

2005-11-19T13:01:00.000-08:00

We are working with composite smart client application development.
The following blog is a good place to start
http://blogs.msdn.com/dphill/articles/371327.aspx

Agile Modeling and Business Modeling

2005-11-08T23:29:00.000-08:00

I just Picked up the following Books for the Project:
1.0 Agile Modeling - Scott Ambler
2.0 Agile database Tehniques - Scott Ambler.
3.0 Business Modeling with UML- Hans-Errikson et al.

I will discuss at leagth the Merits and summary of Each methods.

Firebird Database

2005-11-06T23:00:00.000-08:00

We are working on a project involving .NET as the front end, vb.net in particular and Firebird as the back end. We will post the progress and the difficulties as we go along.
Any suugestions and alternatives will be hightly appreciated.

At present the Firebird will be running on Redhat 8.0 Linux Server.
The Enterprise Architect with Iconix Model will be the Software Engineering Process for the Project.

UML Framework Repository

2005-10-29T18:41:00.000-07:00

I am looking at ways to make UML-2.0 Based repository to work to be effective in Our work.

I also in the process of gathering success stories of the groups that have used pattern frameworks.

Extreme programmng Explained

2005-09-24T01:20:00.000-07:00

I am just going throug the book Extreme Progrmmaing Explained. Kent Beck Second edition,
I will post the Summary below.

I am also going throught the book called Extreme Programming Iconix Process.

The Iconix Process in my opinion is most prctical and readily appplicable to our Process at Keen Compuyet solutions. The best part is Iconix Process can be readily applied with Inexpensive Enterprise architect Software Development Toolset.

Test Driven Development

2005-09-06T13:41:00.000-07:00

Paul Watson, of CodeProject fame, recently asked:

Part of an agile development* process is the test first[^] mindset: You write code which tests code you have yet to write. The test aims to fail the code and you evolve your code until it passes. Testing is normally done via automated unit tests.

Is anyone here using this methodology? How do you find it to be in practice?

Also do you have any good, practical examples of it? The descriptions are all spiffy and what but useful examples are hard to come by.

Check out the replies here.

My response was as follows:

I've tried, and I have three problems. The first is with the way I think. I do not think in terms of test first. I think in terms of object graphcs, and so that's what I code first. If I try to write tests first, I haven't a clue what the test should be because I haven't designed the object graph yet.

And there's the corallary--I don't design on paper, or UML, or whatever. I design by coding. Now, 20 years ago, sure, I would design on paper first. But not only is my experience vastly greater, the tools are so advanced that design tweaks are quite quick.

And the second corallary is that architectural problems that do surface would not usually surface during design, because either the architecture is simple enough that it 1) doesn't need to be refactored or 2) is easily refactored. The third case, complicated architecture that needs refactoring, doesn't really surface until later in the development cycle. The reality of development is that software is not 100% defined up front.

So, the second problem is, unit tests add a maintenance burden. I personally prefer to add unit testing after I have done the major architectural refactoring, otherwise the unit tests need to be rewritten as well. So I write the unit tests "in the middle" of the software development process, when the architecture is mostly solid but the internal implementation might still be in flux.

The third problem is that for complex software, NUnit doesn't cut it. For example, I just wrote a unit test that validates a complex client-server interaction. While I can unit test the client stuff and unit test the server stuff, I need ALL the pieces working IN SEQUENCE to test the entire workflow. Ironically, having written the unit tests for each of the pieces, it was only when I tested the entire workflow that I discovered I had a nasty interaction between to of the pieces that were supposedly separate. Thus, I use my AUT[^] tool (shameless plug), even though it's missing many of the niceties, like command line execution, that NUnit has. And writing unit tests when the tests depend on large pieces of the architecture to be implemented and working, well, first off, they're not exactly unit tests, more like workflow tests, but they're equally, if not more, important. Many, many times, it's the specific sequence of actions that breaks the software, which individual unit testing can't test for because unit tests simply do not cover 100% of the use cases.

Test Driven Development

2005-09-05T21:37:00.000-07:00

I am reading the IBM Articles that was referred in Marc Clifton's Article in Code Project.

All the Reference for test driven development refers to Java and Elcipse sort of Plaforms. The concept is great and I believe in it. However I would appreciate the same kind of Test driven framework for Visual studio.net.

Can you all suggest some directions and guideline for that.

I will summarize findings. So far I have searched the MSDN archive and reading the articles as they come up.

Tools And Techniques

2005-09-05T08:45:00.000-07:00

Software engineering consists, in part, of tools and techniques.

I've posted a debug trace monitor tool, called Traceract, here:
http://www.codeproject.com/useritems/Traceract.asp

and a discussion of data binding techniques here:
http://www.codeproject.com/useritems/simpledatabinding.asp

Both are also available from my personal website:
http://www.marcclifton.com

Extreme Programming

2005-09-04T13:33:00.000-07:00

I recently Came across extreme Programming Article in www.codeproject.com

In Particular I like Marc Cliftons short Introduction. Please read his article before you venture into other Books and Material. IIn my opinion Marc Captures the essence of Extreme Programming avery nicely.

Interlake Wimax- Project

2005-09-02T08:03:00.000-07:00

Interlake Development Corporation is considering Wimax Project. Please post your thoughts.
Wimax is a technology that provides broadband and land phone and cell phone service using licenced and
unlicenced microwave technology.

for details please lookinto www.wimaxforum.org.

More on this later.

Agile Develpment

2005-08-26T09:17:00.000-07:00

Agile Development based on Extreme Programming has proven its value in industrial situation.

Iam just reading the Kent Back book on Extreme Programming.
Scot Ampler's Blog site an excellent source on this subject.

I will post details as we explore this area.

Your Input is highly aprciated.

Enterprise Architect 5.0 Consulting

2005-08-17T01:19:00.000-07:00

Keen Computer has signed up with Sparxsystes.au as a consultant and reseller for enterprise architect. We welcome all questions and inquaries for full cycle software Development.

TerraETL

2005-08-17T01:16:00.000-07:00

Dean of Terra ETL has Joined Keen computer Solutions. Dean Brings wealth of Knowledge from his GIS and Development Experence. We lookforward to working witth DEAN.

Compiler Run Time Design

2005-07-31T11:39:00.000-07:00

I am looing for for Compiler Run time design of Concurrent Systes. such as VHHDL/Verilog.

Tutorial Classes

2005-05-19T22:35:00.000-07:00

We are staring a tutorial class every Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at 6-8 PM for Developers. We hope to Make books NOtes and Lectures available online in this blog.
This Tutorials are open to any one who are interested in Learning Software Engineering.
Local University/college students are most welcome.

The topics are

1.0 CCNA
2.0 Advance Networking
3.0 Redhat Linux
4.0 UML 2.0 and Busines Modeling
5.0 Visio/Access 2003 and Data Modeling
6.0 VB.net
7.0 Delphi 8.0
8.0 .Net Architecture and Technology.

Agile Modeling

2005-05-19T22:30:00.000-07:00

I have started using the Agile Modeling. The basic idea is simple that the client is kept at the centre of the Development process.

I plan to summarize in this topic how thw agille modeling being used in business softwaee Development. I will also List the Books and Periodicals that are used for the agile modeling.