Jul 31

Will Microsoft’s ObjectSpaces support help JDO?

Tech No Comments »

Microsoft showed off their Developer Tools Roadmap 2003-2005. There are lots of things to look through, but I find it interesting that ObjectSpaces has now been choosen for addition (ADO.NET). If you go to the ObjectSpaces home page you will see that this isn’t brand new technology, so what made them decide to add it now?

Also, since this tech is basically transparent persistence, will this push JDO in the Java world? I hope so.

Jul 30

TMC Petstore Case Study Reloaded

Tech 1 Comment »

TMC has released their “retrial” of the Petstore “case study”. I know from experience that this one was handled entirely differently, and I think the results show this. Although some people will jump through the whitepaper, looking for a statement like “X beats Y”, they shouldn’t be looking for that kind of statement in this paper. In my opinion, the value of this paper is in showing exactly what was done, giving us valuable information on tuning this particular application. You can’t jump to too many conclusions. For example, the CMP version of the PetStore (mPetstore) actually out performed JPetstore, which didn’t use CMP. Does this now mean that CMP is suddenly fantastic and that we should all use it? no. The paper explains some theories on why this result was seen.

Basically it is due to the nature of the benchmark where hitting the app very hard gives the method dispatch mechanism a chance to show a lot of the performance. JPetstore used a fair amount of Reflection, compared to next to none for the CMP side…. so this made the difference. Does this mean that reflection is evil? NO. Most of the time the performance hit doesn’t matter to use at all (especially compared to the productivity we are getting), but in certain cases, yes, you want to bypass this. Reflection is getting better and better, but even in JDK 1.4.2 (which was used in the case study) it reminds us that there IS a penalty.

If you are a J2EE (or even a .NET) architect, I would take a look through this paper, as it takes the time to detail what was done, and what came out of the experiment.

Web Services was shown to be lagging behind J2EE (even though the other tests: web app and 24hr reliability were shown to be fairly even). I would love to know if a tool like The Mind Electic’s GLUE would have made up the difference (or gone even better).

I also hope we get more feedback on other things that TMC could do with this case study. I hope we continue to get the opportunity to do more case studies like this, trying to get more experiences that can help developers in the future. If you have any questions/concerns please post on TSS, and/or email [email protected].

Go to the TSS thread on the case study

Also visit the Case Study Home page

I look forward to reading what other bloggers/folks think/feel about these results

Jul 29

Big Pancakes w/ Applesauce

Personal 83 Comments »

A family tradition is to have big pancakes (or as most of the world knows them… crepes). I think I have had the pleasure of having a dose once at each occasion at the in-laws (yeah, I actually have cool in laws).

People always forget the recipe…. so here it is:

4 eggs
1 cup milk
1.5 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup applesauce
2-3 tbsp margarine

Mmmmm…

Jul 28

Java.net vs. SF.net

Tech 3 Comments »

Lofi has a post on JavaLobby saying “Java.net underestimates SF.net”. He may have some valid points (SF.net is not just CVS). So my questions are:

a) Why are some projects moving to java.net? (e.g. OpenSymphony code)
b) Why would you choose java.net vs. sf.net?

Are people moving to java.net as sf.net is too bloated? They want their Java projects on a Java site? They think that it will get more exposure there? Or maybe due to boredom, they just feel like moving it somewhere else.

java.net may not be perfect, but it is a start, and it will be interesting to see where Sun goes with the entire endeavour.

Jul 28

Moving East…

Personal No Comments »

So, my nomadic summer is coming to an end. I now move east to Cambridge, Mass. I think it is going to be exciting living around Boston, and there are lots of geeks there (*cough* Cameron *cough*).

If there are any java bloggers in Boston give me a shout, and let me know if there are any cool Cambridge/Boston JUGs that are worth checking out.

Jul 27

OpenSymphony Revamp: new site, new code

Tech, UI / UX No Comments »

Mike has revamped the OpenSymphony website this weekend. Not only that, but a lot of new code is coming out of OS these days. OSCache 2.0, OSWorkFlow 2.5, and the rest of the gang are all coming with new releases. It is great to see these guys pushing on with quality components. I am always impressed with what they offer, and how othogonal the pieces are. Compare WebWork + Sitemesh to Struts + Tiles. Which one of those sets locks you in more? Keep up the great work.

Jul 26

New Blog

Personal 38 Comments »

I decided to setup my own blog on almaer.com. Partly, to have more control, and to just have an easier interface to work with. My RSS feed at O’Reilly is always weird (it sucks in any content that I create… not just my blog) so this should be a little better. I also wouldn’t feel comfortable blogging about personal stuff through O’Reilly.

Jul 26

I got to interview Gregor Kiczales, father of AOP, on AOP: past, present, and future

AOP, Tech No Comments »

I had a great time interviewing Gregor Kiczales, the guy who founded AOP/AspectJ at Xerox PARC. It must be such an interesting time for him, to see AOP growing more and more, seeing other frameworks out there (and probably seeing some of them making mistakes his work has already gone through!).

Check out the interview and comment on what you thought of his comments!

Jul 21

Voodoopad-daddy – Wiki Everywhere

Tech No Comments »

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