platform-agnostic

How do you evaluate a Software Architect?

What characteristics do you find more valuable in a software architect? How to evaluate one? For example: Is in-depth knowledge of a stack more important than a good overall knowledge of different stacks? How important are coding skills in comparison to other skills? How important are documentation skills considering agile methodolo...

CMS which is not a portal system

Hi, this is a repost of a question not correctly answered -- sorry about that. We are looking for a reasonably priced CMS , with source code, in which we can ditch the portal system. There are notorious examples of something similar which are way too expensive: Methode, Broadvision, Microsoft CMS. There are a lot of systems in which th...

What are some GUI clients available for Mercurial?

And where would I find them? I happen to be stuck with Windows at the moment, but to appeal to general interest, other platforms would be good too. ...

What is the biggest drawback of <your favorite database>?

We all have our favourite database. If you look objectively at your chosen database, what drawbacks does it have and what could be improved? The rules: One reply per drawback with; a short description of the limitation, followed by; a more detailed description, an explanation of how it could be done better or an example of another tec...

What's the SQL query to list all rows that have 2 column sub-rows as duplicates?

Ok I have a table that has redundant data and I'm trying to identify all rows that have duplicate sub-rows (for lack of a better word). By sub-rows I mean considering COL1 and COL2 only. So let's say I have something like this: COL1 COL2 COL3 --------------------- aa 111 blah_x aa 111 blah_j aa 112 blah_m...

What is the worst 'gotcha' you've experienced?

I'd like to hear some of the more pernicious 'gotchas' that exist out there. Any language, system, or library is fine. ...

How best to decide on an MVC framework between developers with different backgrounds?

Let's say that Developer Alex has a strong background in Perl and is familiar with the Catalyst framework. Developer Bob, meanwhile, has a strong background in Ruby and is familiar with the Rails framework. Alex and Bob get together on a start-up. Of course, each will have very good arguments for their own specialty. Each will have a go...

Database design for database-agnostic applications

What do I have to consider in database design for a new application which should be able to support the most common relational database systems (SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL ...)? Is it even worth the effort? What are the pitfalls? ...

Working without stored procedures or triggers

We have been working on a complex database and client interface for the last 18 months. We are regularly adding new functionnalities to this application, and it is now used by tens of users on a daily basis in all our offices, including sites and overseas. This is just to tell you it is a REAL application with a REAL database. Until now...

How do I send a patch to another developer and avoid merge conflicts?

How do I get a patch from a commit in order to send it to another developer? And how do I best avoid a merge conflict with this patch when merging our trees at a later date? If you know how please explain how to do this in your VCS of choice such as subversion, git, Mercurial, bzr or etc. ...

URL Design for SSL-Secured SaaS Application

I am developing an application using the ASP.NET MVC platform, which will be exposed as a service over the web (the SaaS model). I am trying to determine the best way to partition the URL namespace for each user account. The application will need to be accessed securely via SSL, so my main concerns have been around coming up with a URL...

Creating dynamic maps on the web

My company uses a sales model of dealers, territory managers and regional managers, each with a different level of area scope (IE manage based on zips codes, states, or regions.) I want to create a slimmed down map that is similar to this US state map that would allow our users to manipulate who manages what. What are some good resourc...

Platform agnostic .NET bitness - from OS or calling application?

I know that platform agnostic .NET applications "float up" to the bitness of the operating system. But what about a .NET assembly that is a library, not an executable, being called from a non-.NET application? We have a .NET DLL that is a CLR extended stored procedure for SQL Server 2005. Currently it is platform agnostic. What happens ...

Encrypted data in URL and salt

When passing symetrically encrypted data in a URL or possibly storing encrypted data in a cookie, is it resonable and/or nessassary and/or possible to also pass the Symetric Encryption IV (Salt) in the same URL? Is the idea of using Salt even valid in a stateless environment such as the web? (I understand how salt works in a database gi...

3D Audio Engine

Despite all the advances in 3D graphic engines, it strikes me as odd that the same level of attention hasn't been given to audio. Modern games do real-time rendering of 3D scenes, yet we still get more-or-less pre-canned audio accompanying those scenes. Imagine - if you will - a 3D engine that models not just the physical appearance of ...

Bluetooth from the Command Line

How do I access files on another device/machine over Bluetooth from the command line? ...

Antialiasing alternatives

I've seen antialiasing on Windows using GDI+, Java and also that provided by Photoshop and Gimp. Are there any other libraries out there which provide antialiasing facility without depending on support from the host OS? ...

Implementing Clone() method in base class

Here's a Clone() implementation for my class: MyClass^ Clone(){ return gcnew MyClass(this->member1, this->member2); } Now I have about 10 classes derived from MyClass. The implementation is the same in each case. Owing to the fact that I need to call gcnew with the actual class name in each case, I am required to creat...

Detecting Overanalysis

How do I know if I am overanalysing? I've been chasing a problem the last 3 days. I've been through many designs and reached a complex solution using about 3 classes. Having discussed with a colleague, I realized that all I need is one method and a struct. How can I avoid being an architecture astronaut? ...

Transaction Processing: When does a rollback occur?

Recently this question was posted about the definition of what a transaction is in a general context. A common answer to this question was that a transaction should be an atomic unit of work My question relates to this atomicity (i think) I often see explicit calls to ROLLBACK in SQL stored procedures. Is it generally a common require...