Sunday, November 29, 2009

Book - chapter nine available for download

I've put a PDF copy of chapter nine up on www.box.net for download here. Chapter nine is two things - a seminal chapter in terms of the exam content it covers (Parts II and III of the SCEA exam) and also one that Safari Rough Cuts (SRC) keep missing out on in updating it. The version of the book on SRC is a lot older than this version. I'll keep this download link live until SRC is updated with the latest version. Enjoy.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Google Go overview for JEE and .NET architects / developers

A few days ago, Google released a pre-release / early look copy of a new programming language and platform - Google Go - for general consumption and feedback. After working with Go for a couple of days, I took my notes and thoughts on how it compares to the Java (J2EE / JEE) and .NET platforms - specifically as far as enterprise computing goes - and wrote them up into this article. All feedback appreciated.

From the Conclusion: "Go has the potential to completely supplant both C and C++ in the systems programming space and that is clearly it's first goal, but it also has the potential to do much more than that - to reach into the enterprise computing / web+application tier as well. It would be short-sighted in this day and age to design a platform that was restricted to low-level systems programming only, when most companies invest far more time and effort in building applications that are used by consumers to communicate, collaborate, transact ecommerce and more. In this author's opinion, Go has the legs to go further".

Another book update (aka where is it..)

The book is still moving through pre-production at Pearson. I'm sure a good number of you will be wondering what kind of impetus can be administered to push it along and I feel the same way myself!

It looks like the book content got caught up in a major upgrade to Safari Rough Cuts that is just about sorted now. A new version has just published, but I know that it does not have the latest chapter nine content that I wrote last month. Chapter nine is a key chapter in the book, focusing as it does on the JustBuildIt scenario that I outlined at JavaOne 2009 and solves it completely. This chapter maps onto Parts II and III of the exam, where candidates download a business scenario of equal complexity and have to propose and defend a solution to it.

I'm waiting to see when this chapter will show up on Rough Cuts. If it's only a few days away, I'll write another post advising that it's there. But if the delay is going to be as long as the previous delay (essentially four - six weeks to get some content updated), then I'll publish chapter nine as a PDF file on www.box.net, like the other sample chapter and the JavaOne 2008 and 2009 slides. Again, apologies for the delay - I'm pushing as hard as I can.