In a discussion with a friend I was recently reminded of a fascinating idea from the days of Commodore C64. Unfortunately, googling brought no results, which might be due to the fact that I don't even know what to google for. So, I would like to ask for help here...
In a nutshell, I remember there once was a very simple, almost Assembler-like programming language that was used exclusively for programs that were battling each other in computer memory by overwriting each other. Personally, I played around with it on a C64, but it might have been ported to other systems, as well. It might have been called "program war" or something like that and for a while there were big communities running competitions and championships.
Is anyone old enough to know, what I'm talking about, and could help me with some info? :)
Thanks in advance.
Maybe you are remembering Core War where the assembly language was called Redcode and specifically Core Wars Pro for C64 (see mobygames.com, corewar.co.uk)
Related
I am attempting to determine what can possibly be the causative factor for 20+ second response times from a Rails 3 application located in EC2 using Elasticache. I have reason to believe the problem is in fact cache related, but I have no numbers to prove it. I'd like to get those numbers. For the sake of completeness, we're running the applications atop Ubuntu 12.04 .
Searching Google, I found nothing directly relevant to my situation, and no StackOverflow topics I could find were even remotely relevant to my situation. If anyone can point me to some documentation on the matter, I'd be quite appreciative. Thank you!
I've found the best tool for this to be New Relic.
http://newrelic.com/
I don't work for them and get no benefit from you trying them.
They have a free level that you can start with. If you go up to the non-free version you can literally trace all your requests through different models and into the database telling you how long the app spent in each section. It's a great tool for profiling.
Do you, by any chance have access to standard web logs including URLs and response times?
I faced a similar situation, searched the web, found nothing relevant, and eventually decided to roll my own, which I shared in this SO post:
Profiling a multi-tiered, distributed, web application (server side)
While it is far from perfect and may be too high level for some use-cases, it gave me a pretty quick and broad insight into where the application I was trying to profile is spending most of its time in, and what the slowest parts are. HTH.
The best parts of it are that:
It is 100% platform and programming language independent.
It is a 100% free software solution
I am looking to start developing a relatively simple web application that will pull data from various sources and normalizing it. A user can also enter the data directly into the site. I anticipate hitting scale, if successful. Is it worth putting in the time now to use scalable or distributed technologies or just start with a LAMP stack? Framework or not? Any thoughts, suggestions, or comments would help.
Disregard my vague description of the idea, I'd love to share once I get further along.
Later. I can't remember who said it (might have been SO's Jeff Atwood) but it rings true: your first problem is getting other people to care about your work. Worry about scale when they do.
Definitely go with a well structured framework for your own sanity though. Even if it doesn't end up with thousands of users, you'll want to add features as time goes on. Maintaining an expanding codebase without good structure quickly becomes fairly horrible (been there, done that, lost the client).
btw, if you're tempted to write your own framework, be aware that it is a lot of work. My company has an in-house one we're quite proud of, but it's taken 3-4 years to mature.
Is it worth putting in the time now to use scalable or distributed technologies or just start with a LAMP stack?
A LAMP stack is scalable. Apache provides many, many alternatives.
Framework or not?
Always use the highest-powered framework you can find. Write as little code as possible. Get something in front of people as soon as you can.
Focus on what's important: Get something to work.
If you don't have something that works, scalability doesn't matter, does it?
Then read up on optimization. http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?RulesOfOptimization is very helpful.
Rule 1. Don't.
Rule 2. Don't yet.
Rule 3. Profile before Optimizing.
Until you have a working application, you don't know what -- specific -- thing limits your scalability.
Don't assume. Measure.
That means build something that people actually use. Scale comes later.
Absolutely do it later. Scaling pains is a good problem to have, it means people like your project enough to stress the hardware it's running on.
The last company I worked at started fairly small with PHP and the very very first versions of CakePHP that came out (when it was still in beta). Some of the code was dirty, the admin tool was a mess (code-wise), and sure it could have been done better from the start. But do you know what? They got it out the door before their competitors did, and became extremely successful.
When I came on board they were starting to hit the limits of their current potential scalability, and that is when they decided to start looking at CDN's, lighttpd caching techniques, and other ways to clean up the code and make things run smoother when under heavy load. I don't work for them anymore but it was a good experience in growing an architecture beyond what it was originally scoped at.
I can tell you right now if they had tried to do the scalability and optimizations before selling content and getting a website live - they would never have grown to the size they are now. The company is www.beatport.com if you're interested in who I'm talking about (To re-iterate, I'm not trying to advertise them as I am no longer affiliated with them, but it stands as a good case study and it's easier for people to understand what I'm talking about when they see their website).
Personally, after working with Ruby and Rails (and understanding the separation!) for a couple of years, and having experience with PHP at Beatport - I can confidently say that I never want to work with PHP code again =p
Funny to ask "scale now or later?" and label it "ruby on rails".
Actually, Ruby on Rails was created by David Heinemeier Hansson, who has a whole chapter in his book labeled "Scale later" :))
http://gettingreal.37signals.com/ch04_Scale_Later.php
I agree with the earlier respondents -- make it useful, make it work and get people motivated to use it first. I also agree that you should pick off-the shelf components (of which there are many) rather than roll your own, as much as possible. At the same time, make sure that you choose components for your infrastructure that you know to be scalable so that you can go there when you need to, without having to re-write major chunks of your application.
As the Product Manager for Berkeley DB, I've seen countess cases of developers who decided "Oh, we'll just write that to a flat file" or "I can write my own simple B-tree function" or "Database XYZ is 'good enough', I don't have to worry about concurrency or scalability until later". The problem with that approach is that a) you're re-inventing the wheel (and forgoing what others have learned the hard way already) and b) you're ignoring the fact that you'll have to deal with scalability at some point and going with a 'good enough' solution.
Good luck in your implementation.
The summer is coming up and I will be having a lot of time on my hands. I thought spending the time collaborating on a project online with several other passionated programmers somewhere in the world would be a great idea. I've never tried online collaboration before although I am used to working in larger teams and using source control, so it would mainly be the lack of direct communication that would be new to me. I would be interested in starting a project with programmers around my own level or (preferably) better and finishing the project over the summer/fall.
One problem, however. Where would I go about finding people for such a project? I'm not interested in joining an on-going project but rather be part of a new one. Certainly there must exist sites online where this is possible? The project properly wouldn't huge in any way. I'm thinking a little cozy project such as a arcade 2d game, a subtitle site, a world cup stats tracker or similiar.
Also, what would be a better approach. Finding the people for the project and then come up with an idea for the project or putting an idea out there and see if anyone was interested?
PS: If anyone on this site find the idea interesting feel free to post here or PM me and we'll have a talk about it.
The Google Summer of Code is really perfect for that (and there usually are very interesting projects to work on):
Google Summer of Code (GSoC) is a
global program that offers student
developers stipends to write code for
various open source software projects.
We have worked with several open
source, free software, and
technology-related groups to identify
and fund several projects over a three
month period. Since its inception in
2005, the program has brought together
over 3,500 students and more than more
than 4,000 mentors & co-mentors from
nearly 100 countries worldwide, all
for the love of code. Through Google
Summer of Code, accepted student
applicants are paired with a mentor or
mentors from the participating
projects, thus gaining exposure to
real-world software development
scenarios and the opportunity for
employment in areas related to their
academic pursuits. In turn, the
participating projects are able to
more easily identify and bring in new
developers. Best of all, more source
code is created and released for the
use and benefit of all.
Go check fast if you can still enroll.
To expand on Symen Timmermans answer, non-profit agencencies traditionally do not have the budget to fund many of their IT needs and would probably really appreciate some volunteer IT assistance. I would think you could easily muster up a summer project by approaching some agencies. Be clear that you are offering your services for free.
Besides gaining some exposure to some real-world problems, this may be an opportunity to network within your area. And it also looks pretty good on a resume.
This, perhaps, will lead you in the direction of a project. From there you could try contacting people you know or perhaps ask around at a local user group to see if anyone is interested in collaborating with you.
The OpenHatch.org website exists to help connect people with tasks that need to be completed on various Open Source projects, and to connect them with mentors in the target languages/technologies.
On the Volunteer Opportunities page, you can search through hundreds of open tickets in over 250 projects. On the People page, you can search for others who are willing to mentor you in the target subject with a search like can_mentor:"Python", or search for others near you, and more. The more people that join on the web site, the more visibility that it gets for more projects and people to come and participate, so why not join in the fun?
Why a programming project?
Your tag 'nonprogramming' sparked some ideas. Why don't you research possibilities in your neighbourhood for things like community projects? There might be plenty of organizations looking for you as a volunteer.
Though those projects might not seem as challenging as an innovative programming project can be, they can be really rewarding, especially if you directly witness the benefit your collective effort provides to others. Also you might learn a new skill, meet interesting people, and learn new things about yourself.
Think about it.
First you'd have to think about what kind of project you wanna do.
Game, etc..
Then I would look for a Forum / Community and start looking there for mini-projects.
I however have no particular site to offer you currently.
Also I believe the communities will depend on the languages etc... you are comfortable programming in.
Cheers,
Build It With Me is a website made for connecting developer and designers with ideas.
To find people to work with you on a new project, you have :
to go where they are
to convince them to work with you
Programming folks can be met directly on IRC. Go to a channel corresponding to the computing language you like, and you'll met great people, knowing your language and wasting their time on IRC. You have then to convince them to stop wasting time saying nothing on IRC and to go with you on a new project.
Summer is already well started, so you should choose a small project that can be useful to anybody. People will work with you if the project you propose them is interesting enough for them. Here is an idea of a useful tool that does not exist yet :
http://ha.ckers.org/blog/20100613/web-server-log-forensics-app-wanted/
You could try going to SourceForge and finding a new project or creating your own. They have a large community there so you shouldn't have any trouble finding people to work with.
I have been working with JavaEE/EJB3 web apps for about half a year now. Until recently, I haven't had to touch a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff, just the meat of the code. I have been wrestling with JNDI problems, and though I've solved a couple of them, I'm pretty much just doing the whole cargo cult copy-paste routine. It would really help me to better understand JNDI; my understanding of it right now can be summarized as "it's that thing these classes sometimes do to find other classes."
My question is, has anyone had success learning JNDI/EJB3/related topics from a book or online content? I've googled for it but the stuff that comes up is old or specific to a certain framework I'm not using. I'm looking for something that's either JBoss-specific or generic enough to be useful anyway.
Just signed up for a trial at fogcreek.com/Fogbugz after reading Joel's latest blog post. I think the features are very nice, but there are simply too many of them, and I'm having a hard time learning the platform.
Is there any online quick start guide or an one hour crash course that I can get started from?
I'm aware of a book called Painless Project Management with FogBugz, but how relevant is it to FogBugz 7.0?
Thank you.
I'd suggest looking in the help of FogBugz itself, specifically FogBugz in two minutes and The basics of bug tracking sections. That would give you a quick grounding.
The second edition of the FogBugz book by Mike Gunderloy was written for 6.0, but the core idea of how you use FogBugz on a team to track bugs and schedules is fundamentally the same, so this book is still quite worthwhile.
Fog Creek also runs webinars which you can sign up for on their site (see the WEBINAR tab).
There's a philosophy behind this program, that "there's nothing that you have to enter". That means you can just jump in and start playing. Part of the necessary learning curve is just getting used to the interface. Once you're past that, the help, articles, and books make a lot more sense.