Object Oriented Design

[Frank Hale]

I'm programming a fairly large Java/Swing application which is a front end to a Hypersonic SQL database. At the moment I am coding blindly, meaning that there is really no design I am just working line by line so to speak. I really want to come up with a good design to make programming this project simpler and make it easier to maintain. Can somebody recommend some online resources that can hopefully clue me in on how to come up with a strong object oriented design.
Thanks,
Frank

[Frank Carver]

You really need to start by looking at the idea of "Patterns". The seminal book for this is "Design Patterns" by Gamma et. al. This is a bit academic to start with, especially if you already have some running code which you want to "design" after the fact.
Luckily, help is at hand. The top recommendation is "Refactoring" by Martin Fowler. I also recommend "The Pragmatic Programmer" by Hunt and Thomas for lots of good, solid working practices, and "Extreme Programming Explained" by Beck for an introduction on how to cope with developing software in a world of changing requirements.
If you haven't already done so, check out the books in "the bunkhouse". If you click through from there and buy some books from Amazon, then the Java Ranch gets a small kickback.

[Carl Trusiak]

You could try UML an open source version is available at http://www.ics.uci.edu/pub/arch/uml/

[Frank Hale]

It looks very interesting. Could you tell me a little more about it. Does it generate code for you?
I already pretty much know what I want and have some code written. I just don't have a good solid design down for it. I would like to be able to add features to it later as the requirements change but have the code set up so that it is easier to add new things in. Will the UML program help me come up with a strong design for my applications?
Thanks,
Frank

[Carl Trusiak]

I personnally just got it and am setting it up so, we'll see if it generaes any code or not. While browsing around I ran into a free book in html format Object-Oriented System Development that might help you as well. Any tool to aid in design can only help improve your chances of success with a project so....

[Frank Hale]

Well I just went to download ArgoUML today to try it out, but it doesn't work with JDK 1.3, too bad because it looks like a really good program and there is now way I am downgrading my JDK just to use it. Hopefully the developers are working hard to resolve whatever 1.3 conflicts there are.
Frank

[Carl Trusiak]

Originally posted by Frank Hale:
Well I just went to download ArgoUML today to try it out, but it doesn't work with JDK 1.3, too bad because it looks like a really good program and there is now way I am downgrading my JDK just to use it. Hopefully the developers are working hard to resolve whatever 1.3 conflicts there are.
Frank

I don't think it's the jdk. I know you need to get the specific XML parser in order for it to run, the correct version is Here . In fact when I search the bug database, all the errors that I find associated with jdk 1.3 are fixed in the latest release.

[This message has been edited by Carl Trusiak (edited June 23, 2000).]

[Frank Hale]

Well I went and tried it again reinstalling everything, but it still just locks up on its opening screen. It says its "Making Project Browser" and just sits there forever doing nothing.
Frank

[Frank Hale]

Yes xml4j.jar is in my CLASSPATH. And I downloaded the correct one.
Frank

[Carl Trusiak]

Originally posted by Frank Hale:
Yes xml4j.jar is in my CLASSPATH. And I downloaded the correct one.
Frank

What error messages show up in the dos/term window when you execute this?

[Frank Hale]

No errors show up. When I execute the jar file the splash screen shows and it starts to do stuff and when it says "Making Project Browser" it sits there and doesn't do anything else. If I leave it, it will still be sitting there doing nothing until I kill off the process. It gets stuck at that point everytime I run the program.
Frank