Hibernate 3 has been released. Or at least that is what everyone is saying. However, according to the Hibernate website all that was released was the Release Candidate. Go give it a try, I am going to, but I don’t see how a release candidate qualifies as production ready code. Visist the first link below for a run down on what is new in this release.
Gavin King’s announcement
TheServerSide.com announcement
Javalobby.org announcement
Javalobby.org has an interesting discussion going regarding the Eclipse IDE entitled Is Eclipse the only tool to survive? The most interesting part of any discussion like this is the comments that people leave. So far they are fairly civil as it is far too easy for a thread like this to degenerate into a religous flame war.
I think I am a tool junky and therefore enjoying reading the various arguments that people use to defend their personal choice of software tool. It is kinda like a group of men sitting around discussing whose hammer is superior. Sure there are hammers that are better then others based on design, weight, and other considerations, but in the end, as long as it drives in nails it is doing its job. Although this would mean that I could defend notepad as an IDE on the grounds that it allows me to write code.
So what is your favorite software tool and why?
testdriven.com: Your test-driven development community — I found this website while surfing around JavaRanch.com. It looks like an excellent site for TDD.
NetBeans 4.1 Beta has been released. The big difference between 4.0 and 4.1 is the inclusion of full J2EE tools. Here is a sample from the release notes:
- Create a J2EE application, automatically add EJB modules and Web modules, and deploy the application.
- Create an EJB module and deploy it as a stand-alone module or packaged in a J2EE application.
- Create Session Beans, Entity Beans and Message-Driven Beans.
- Create Entity Beans using an existing database schema.
- Create a Web module, generate calls to EJBs, and deploy the Web module either as a stand-alone Web application or packaged in a J2EE application.
Now I just have to find a small project to do to test drive this new version.
Jason Carreira has posted 15 tips on using Hibernate on his website. If you are a Hibernate user, or, like me are starting to use it, then you should check out this article. Here is a small sampling of what he has on his site:
4. Define the flush strategy early : let Hibernate auto-flush vs. defining your own synchronization points where you flush to the database.
9. Use optimistic concurrency with a version column if possible. Timestamps work too, but not as cleanly. Avoid making Hibernate examine all values to determine if records have changed.
11. Set your IDE up with a reference to the Hibernate source code of the distribution you are using so you can trace into it. Not only will it help you understand what’s causing the behavior you’re seeing, but it will help you understand how Hibernate works.
I once went for an interview where the job description was porting a series of websites created in ColdFusion over to ASP.NET. I asked my interviewer why they were making the switch and their answer showed a complete lack of understanding of what CFMX was and how it worked. They basically said that because ColdFusion added an extra layer of interpretation between the original code and what the use received, they wanted to go with .NET because it was faster. This, on the surface might sound fine based on an understanding of ColdFusion 4.5 or earlier. However, in ColdFusion MX, the original source code is compiled down into java byte code and served up through a J2EE application server. ASP.NET works in exactly the same way. The source code in compiled into byte code and served up through the .net framework and the asp.net server. So the difference would be…?
With all of that said, there are some real differences between ColdFusion MX and ASP.NET and Joe Rinehart has done an excellent job of detailing those differences. He has written an article, CF vs. .NET: Six month comparison, that is based on his experience of using CFMX and asp.net in parallel for the past 6 months.
I am not going to re-iterate the article for you here, so you will have to go and read it yourself, but I will say that I agree with his conclusion—ColdFusion MX wins in the end. I have used both CFMX and a little of ASP.NET and I have to say that CFMX is by far the easier of the two to work with and the faster of the two to develop with. In addition, I have never noticed a speed problem with either ColdFusion 6 or 6.1 (just to debunk the myth listed above).
If you are looking for open source graphics programs to replace the big boys — Macromedia Freehand and Adobe Illustrator — then check out this article at LinuxPlanet called Inkscape: Vector Graphics For Linux - Raster vs. Vector. The tutorial will introduce you to a program called Inkscape, an excellent up-and-coming vector based drawing program.
I have used Inkscape on both Windows and Linux to work with SVG images. Some UML programs only export their images in the svg file format and Inkscape is one of the best programs out there for opening them.
