Jef Cumps

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since Nov 14, 2001
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Recent posts by Jef Cumps

There's a really good preparation book for the Sun SCWCD exam: Head First Servlets, by Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates. Check it out !!
[ January 12, 2005: Message edited by: Jef Cumps ]
19 years ago
maybe try enterprise architect. Not sure it meets all your needs, but I guess it covers the first en second. Don't know about EA and Eclipse.
Hi,

I tried your little prgram, and it works fine with me.. after I changed the hour set in your date member to an hour in the past. Try it first without all setters on your date, just pass the newInstance() to the timer. That will work. Then start experimenting with the setters on your date, watch out for AM and PM mistakes! (check the calendar-API)
19 years ago
A good book for the basics (and as prep for Sun programmer ceritification) is Head First Java from Kathy Sierra and Bert Bates. A more comprehensive, and also very good, book is Thinking in Java from Bruse Eckel. Good luck and hav efun !
19 years ago
I could also use one, jefcumps@hotmail.com please... tnx!
19 years ago
I'll answer your first question: if a checked exception is thrown from a try block you MUST have a catch block for that exception, unless you specify a throws declaration for that exception or a superclass of it in your method signature.

If you throw a checked exception from within a catch block, you need a new try block inside your catch block for that...
[ December 29, 2004: Message edited by: Jef Cumps ]
maybe check out Kathy's new blog for some clues...
[ December 29, 2004: Message edited by: Jef Cumps ]
19 years ago
errata will be published on the O'Reilly website. Also see wickedly smart for more book info and source code.
19 years ago
I recognize the problem about understanding the OO stuff in a course. When I give a 5-day long UML course, I'm supposed to spend 1 day on OO and 4 on UML. What I do with a not-OO-experienced group is one full day OO prinicples and exercices, and then LOTS of OO design and practices in the UML part, maybe even 1/3th of the time. People without OO experience really need al lot of time and exercices to make the 'switch' and start thinkikng in objects, especially when they were programming structurally before...

I never used the CRC cards in a course, but did use them in a project once. I think they can be very valuable in your course! They'll ease the design and splitting up the work. And they stimulate some good OO principles like giving a class the right (and not too much) repsonsability and stimulate refactoring...
19 years ago
Hi,

First of all, putting all your code (java files) in the bin directory of your JDK is NOT a good idea. Create a special directory for your poject somewhere, lets say c:\myproject. Then put all .java files in c:\myproject\src. If you put a Java class in a package (package com.myproject.blabla as first line in your class) then you need to create the package directory structure inside the src-dir. (would be c:\myproject\src\com\myproject\blabla in the given example).

To be able to run javac and java from your project directory, you need to put the bin directory of your JDK in your path. In a prompt you put: set PATH=%PATH%;c:\yourJDKdir\bin

Then you can call javac and java from within your project directory, pointing to the source files in the src dir, en maybe putting the class files in another dir (build) next to the src dir. Use javac -help for the syntaxt for this...

The classpath is where you need to put the things the compiler en jvm need to run. So if things don't work (class not found errors) put your src dir in the classpath.

Let me know if this helps... good luck!
19 years ago
I have some experience in extreme programming Java projects, and 'pair programming' could be a good idea in some cases...

In XP the pair switches the keyboard often (every 20 minutes) so both members stay focused. The one typing concentrates on the code he's writing, the other one helps him with that lines of code, but also thinks about how that little part fits into the whole. The advantage is that you make less errors (even typo's, they're immediately cought by the non-typing pair-member) and that you learn faster. Mostly, one of the two pair-members knows (a little) more about the particular piece the pair is writing, and he explains this to his pair while coding.

I don't know the last advantage will come out in a beginner's Java course, because both pair-members are not familiar with Java, but with a mixed (different levels of experience) group, it's definately a great advantage. A disadvantage in your case could be that 'lazy' students rely on their pair and don't type or think much, and don't learn much in that way. And that's hard to check as a teacher... There will also be a lot of noise in your classrroom, because a pair should constantly be talking to eachother.

Maybe your third option is better for a beginner's course. If you make teams of 3-4 individual programmers, they also need to communicate a lot, but each member gets responsability for his own piece of the app. So every student needs to write the code for his part on his own. This way of working also forces your students to agree on the general design as a team, design common interfaces and they'll encounter some of the problems of working together on a Java project, just as in real life... So maybe option 3 would be better than the second for a beginner's course!

You could also bring the pair programming into option 3, and tell the students that when coding a difficult piece (or something they're totally unfamilir with, they can ask a team member to pair program for a while...

When I teach UML, I make teams of 3-4 students to 'design' some application, they learn a lot from and about working together and it's the closest you'll get to the real life thing IMHO.

Let us know how it goes ! Good luck !

[ December 23, 2004: Message edited by: Jef Cumps ]
[ December 23, 2004: Message edited by: Jef Cumps ]
19 years ago
Those boxes are actually called 'activations', and most UML drawing tools show an activation on an object's lifeline when it receives a message. Seems logical too, as the receiving object gets control (when using synchronous call) and needs to do something. Mostly the activation stops where you draw the return message (a dashed return arrow).
well, Java is the programming language and Websphere is a J2EE application server from IBM, if that's any help...
19 years ago
What is is exactly you want to do?

If you want to call stored procedures from within your Java code, you can do this using JDBC. Use a CallableStatement and parse the ResultSet for the return values from your procedure.

Is this of any help?
can't say anything about jdiscuss, did'n use them. I used the mock tests from ejbcertificate during my prep, and they were surely helpful in my opinion. They are very good in pointing out the parts you need to study again, and the ones you don't.

The mock exam that helped me the best, was the final one from Head First EJB. I did that one the day before the real thing, and it's a really good prep !!

good luck !