The latest best practices in javascript recommend that object literal notation be used to create a namespace feature of sorts. Object literal notation is ridiculously easy to use and gives a great deal of power to the developer. Here is an example-laden crash course.
Read full entry »As I watch my browser fill with extensions which enhance web pages by adding scripts (Greasemonkey, Platypus, Cocomment, ), I wonder whether some sites may start fighting back. Perhaps Google may detect Platypus removing a text ad, and add a page script to re-insert the ad. Will scripts begin to battle, wage wars of privilege, namespace, obfuscation, and timing? Will the javascript sandbox become a bloody battlefield, littered with object literals, new troops parachuting in via JSON headers and asynchronous XML HTTP requests? Will the DOM tree be hung with broken and battered functions? I envision closures spawning closures, surveiling the digital landscape, emerging from their window.setTimeout bunkers to strike again...
I find the current state of affairs in programming deplorable. As it is, a single tiny system program with an unchecked buffer size can often be exploited by an attacker to execute arbitrary code on the system. (Let that sink in for a second.) Your operating system (whatever it is) is so fragile that a single coding error, a typo, could allow anyone to do anything they wanted to on your machine. That's unacceptable. And all too common.
Read full entry »I'm taking a quick break from studying for my CS 152 final. I'm currently on the Chapter 14 study guide, dealing with OOD. Now, this is something I find completely instinctual. Heck, I nearly reinvented it on my TI-89 graphing calculator, using BASIC. Then someone told me about Java, an OO language, and I just wanted to smack myself.
I've never thought about how a class hierarchy is designed -- when I go to make one, it just falls into order magically. I have gut reaction to improperly designed code. Unfortunately, I have to explain how it works on an exam, and my own description won't cut it. It has to match the book's description, which means I essentially have to memorize a specific description of something I know by heart. Bleagh.
I agree that being forced to think about something you've been doing unconsciously can be a good thing -- I don't dispute that. It teach you things you missed, and expose flaws in your subconscious reasoning. But when I'm forced to regurgitate formulaic descriptions, that's when I object.