Internal Refactoring

For my 10-day visit to Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara, Hakone and Chiba (my brother-in-law's wedding), I needed to refactor my internal progamming a bit to avoid OutOfMemoryExceptions.

// This class is package protected to avoid 
// external programs messing up.
class Brain {

public void handleEvent(MeetNewPersonEvent event) {
  ...
  if (getLocation().equals(Locations.JAPAN)) {
    fireEvent(new BowEvent(event));
  }
}

public void handleEvent(BowEvent event) {
    // Avoid infinite loop.  The problem is the 
    // 'esteemed higher' part, the person
    // for whom you're bowing may think the same.
    if (event.isPersonEsteemedHigher() 
        && !event.hasBowedTooMuch()) {
      bow();
    } else {
      nod();
    }
}

protected void bow() {
  lookSincere();
  smile();
  bendForward();
}

I also needed to reprogram the eating subroutines.

public void handleEvent(FeelingHungryEvent event) {
...
  if (getLocation().equals(Locations.JAPAN)) {
     // This was a tricky one to handle, 
     // the implementation is left 
     // as an exercise to the reader.
     uploadChopsticksRoutine();
  }
}

The RunForTrainEvent and especially the WaitForTrainEvent could be canceled out since public transportation is much better than the location I originally wrote it for (Belgium).

public void handleEvent(RunForTrainEvent event) {
  if (getLocation().equals(Locations.JAPAN)) {
     stopRunning();
     relax();
     Thread.sleep(5*Timer.MINUTE);
  }
}

Finally, I needed to handle the RunningNoseEvent (extends HasColdEvent) better.

public void handleEvent(RunningNoseEvent event) {
...
  if (getLocation().equals(Locations.JAPAN)) {
    // Blowing your nose in public is NOT DONE 
    // in Japan.  This is considered 
    // a bit the same as burping.  
    // Public humiliation is your part when
    // this is not checked.
    dipNose();
  } else {
    blowNose();
  }
}

protected Location getLocation() {
  ...
  if (isCurrentLocationUnknown()) {
    if (bodyTallerThanMostOthers() 
            && friendlyPeople() && metroEvery2Minutes()
            && dressCode.equals(Dresscodes.COSTUME)
            && eatingCode.equals(EatingCodes.SHOPSTICKS)) {
       return Locations.JAPAN;
    }
  }
}

} // End class

This is released under an Apache license. Please notify me if these changes are of any use to you.

www.koopjeszoeker.com

After tryouts with script.aculo.us, mootools and DWR, I finally decided to go with Google Web Toolkit (GWT) for the (badly needed) update of my koopjeszoeker website.

GWT allows me to make changes much faster than I could do it with DWR or other frameworks. Writing javascript from Java code seems strange at first, but it's much like writing a Swing application.

On top of that, I get the following benefits:

• I don't need to worry about versioning, GWT uses hashes which create new filenames for every release. So I can cache all files "until the sun explodes".


• GWT compresses and obfuscates the generated javascript


• Internationalisation is fully supported as in Java with properties files


• GWT creates separate files for every browser and language, which means that a Dutch user on Firefox doesn't need to download code that can be used on an English Safari.


• The javascript is compatible on all major browsers

My experiences:

• During development, compile to Firefox for one language instead of to all browsers for all languages. You can do this by adding this to your module xml file:
  

  <extend-property name="locale" values="nl_BE"/>
  <set-property name="user.agent" value="gecko"/>



• Get a faster computer, it really helps. On my Pentium 4 2.8 Ghz, it took 30 seconds to compile. On my brand new Dual Core 2.6Ghz with 2 RAID disks, it takes 5 seconds. Considering the number of times you compile, it really makes it much more fun to develop.


• There is also a "hosted mode" which runs the code as Java, without compiling to javascript. I don't use this anymore because (for my project) it takes longer to start up than simply compiling to javascript and it's more difficult to integrate with a backend.


• I did integration with Spring for the RPC calls by extending RemoteServiceServlet and overriding the method processCall:
  

  
  public String processCall(String payload) throws SerializationException {
          initialize();
          try {
              RPCRequest rpcRequest = RPC.decodeRequest(payload, AjaxService.class);
              return RPC.invokeAndEncodeResponse(this.ajaxService, rpcRequest.getMethod(),
                  rpcRequest.getParameters());
            } catch (IncompatibleRemoteServiceException ex) {
              return RPC.encodeResponseForFailure(null, ex);
            }
      }
  

  
  


• AJAX pages don't work well with Google indexing and Google Adsense. For that reason, I created seperate pages for the search results instead of putting the whole site on one page. I also added noscript tags to the html with a plain html result.