The guys at NetBeans.org have an excellent tutorial on using the new Matisse GUI builder that is included in NetBeans 5.0. The best part of the tutorial is the demos that are included. At the end of each section, there is a small Flash tutorial that shows you exactly what the tutorial is talking about. I always find tutorials easier to follow when I can see video that shows me what is happening and what to expect.
While working on project:Teamdocs, I discovered a new Hibernate feature–”hbm2ddl”:http://www.hibernate.org/hib_docs/v3/reference/en/html/session-configuration.html#configuration-optional. This is a flag that you can put in your hibernate.cfg.xml file. It gets run when Hibernate is first configured. What is does is to, depending on how you set it, either create or update your database schema depending on how you have it set.
For me, the biggest benefit so far is that is allows for very easy testing of mapping files. Currently, I am trying to convert the database persistence layer that I wrote in JDBC over to Hibernate. Using hbm2ddl allows me to create a single JUnit test that gets a SessionFactory. This automatically runs through the mapping files and generates the resulting SQL statements to create the tables.
This solves a huge problem that I was facing: how to create all the tables in Derby. Because it is an embedded database, it works a little differently from a regular database server. I have yet to find a way to start it up and then import an sql file in order to create all the tables (although I am sure that there is a way of doing this). Using hbm2ddl, I don’t have to worry about it because Hibernate will take care of it for me.
For people who want to use Derby for testing, this is also an excellent way of ensuring you start every set of tests with a clean database.
NetBeans 5 RC1 is out along with the first release candidate of the NetBeans Profiler. The only thing I don’t like about this release—not that I have even used it yet—is the new launch icon. It is this ugly orange box. I definitely prefered the earlier silver icon. I have no idea why they switched, I can only guess that someone at NetBeans.org is on drugs or something. How could anyone think that orange looks better then silver?
Other than that, this should be a great release. I hope that it is found to be basically bug free so they can get the final release out as soon as possible. NetBeans 5 should be the first release that can do battle with Eclipse and IDEA head on without people snickering behind its back.
OSx86 Project has put up an very well written and thoughtful article entitled What Today Really Means for Apple… and Everyone Else, in which the author gives his opinion on what yesterdays keynote address really meant.
There are instants in life – never more than a few seconds – that cause me to reflect, “This… this is a moment in which things are changing. This is a landmark event.” Time will prove me wrong or right, but I can’t shake the feeling that Steve Jobs’ keynote at MacWorld 2006 will be one of those moments for the computing industry.
I find myself agreeing with this statement. For the last several days I can’t shake the feeling that in some way, the computer industry is about to change. There have been a lot of people talking about this every since Apple announced they were moving to Intel processors. I truely believe that if Apple plays their cards right, they have a chance of taking the OS market away from Microsoft.
They [Apple] are committed to making computers that are more reliable and more beautiful than most PC makers. Yet the similarity of hardware forces us to ask - what now makes a Mac a Mac? Is the beauty case-deep or does it represent a more holistic philosophy of engineering?
I think this is the biggest question that I have. The new Macs are still priced higher then competing products from Dell or IBM (Lenova), so why should I buy a Mac? Is it just for OS X? I hope not. I hope that over the next few months, the new computer are proven to blow the pants off everything else in their class. And now, for the first time, we can directly compare Apples to Dells to IBMs to Gateways so we will now quantitatively which one is the fastest.
Personally I hope that Apple wakes up and realizes the potential that they now have and releases OS X to the general x86 market. With Microsoft discontinueing support for XP Home at the end of this year and Vista having insane system requirements, how many people do you think will replace Windows with OS X? I know I will. I will be first in line.
It seems that today saw more than the introduction of two new Mac models – we saw the simultaneous creation of new opportunities and new concerns for the company from Cupertino that could. It would be hyperbole to say that today marks the beginning of Apple’s market takeover or a new revolution in the Valley. But it could be that with fresh hopes and fears, we’ve just witnessed the birth of a new Apple.
Apple just announced their new notebook, the MacBook Pro—a dual core intel machine running an ATI X1600 video card with a 15.4 inch screen running at 1440×900. This is one sweet machine.
Here are two intro articles on working with Wicket that I plan on reading through in the very near future. One of my goals for TeamDocs is to rewrite the frontend (the view) using Wicket instead of JSP, so I am hoping that these articles will help.
I am going to be upgrading my site to WordPress 2.0 over the next few days so things may be a little out of whack with the site. I will try and get everything back up and running as quickly as possible.
Update: I have done the upgrade and everything seems to be working well. The new look for the admin part is nice and the whole app seems easier to use. I have tried to test everything, but if anyone finds links, or other things, not working, please let me know via a comment.
