Re: The Measure of a Man - Design and Architecture Discussion Boards

[Message Deleted]

The Grand Negus wrote:
But does anyone really need to talk to someone on the other side of the earth?

Yes. I phone to California from time to time. I used to phone to Denver quite a bit. When I've visited North America I've phoned home, or to a friend on a few streets away.

The Grand Negus wrote:
I know I'd be happier having this conversation with a real flesh-and-blood neighbor, face-to-face, than on this remote and unresponsive forum.

Well, sometimes that just isn't possible. No matter how loud I yell, no one in California is going to here me.

The Grand Negus wrote:
When I was young I attended a church with almost 1000 members. At least one out of ten was musically inclined, but only two or three were allowed to share their songs each week; and because of the politics of large groups, most never got to share at all. I came to the conclusion that smaller, more intimate, local groups would serve the individuals in those groups better, and started a home church.

In the context of units of measurement this story makes no sense. In the context of giving everyone a better chance at having an opportunity to share their songs it makes a lot of sense. So, I don't really see what this anecdote is adding to the argument. It sounds like a Grandpa Simpson story to me.

The Grand Negus wrote:
I think I'd like a world where each community had it's own phone system, designed by the local genius and maintained by the local handymen. Such a system could be used by the locals to talk to other locals - primarily to plan face-to-face meetings! And other communities could do the same, giving their local genius the opportunity to flex his mental muscles, and their local handymen the chance to be useful to their neighbors.

Thank goodness I don't live in that world. My relatives are spread out across the world. I'd never hear from them for years at a time in your scenario.

The Grand Negus wrote:
I really don't see how more than this improves the quality of life for anyone. And by quality I mean the opportunity to be both creative and useful. The whole argument hangs on those two words.

There are plenty opportunities for people to be creative and useful in this world. There are no shortage of people starting their own little businesses to serve the local community.

But, I fail to see what this has to do with units of measurement.

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Never write for other people. Write for yourself, because you have a passion for it. -- Marc Clifton

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[Message Deleted]

The Grand Negus wrote:
But should they be?

Why not?! Who are you to pass judgement on the freedoms of my family?

The Grand Negus wrote:
Why not have a small, local company make bottles just for our little community? Just the way we like them? Wouldn't that be better?

Not really. We live in the "global village". The bottle of Irn Bru (a local drink) is the same size as a bottle of Coca Cola. When I want to put it in the drink holder in my fridge it doesn't matter which I buy, it will still fit.

Last time I was in the States I went to buy new shoes. Because of the many different standards across the world in shoes sizes it took a while to figure out what size I needed. I am a European 45. I no longer care what that is in any other locale. I can go into a shoe shop in the UK and say I want a size 45 and they'll get me the right shoes (even although that obviously isn't a UK size) because the European system is slowly replacing our system. I can go anywhere in Europe and know that if I buy a size 45 they will fit. But outsize that zone I have to be remeasured. What a waste of time for the assistant in the shop who could have used the time to sell someone else a pair of shoes.

Because of different standards I can't use my electrical equipment outside the UK unless I spend money on an adapter. Wouldn't it be better if I didn't need to do that? What a waste of money that is, especially as I keep losing the adapters in hotels.

It would not benefit most people if the standards were local. We live in an age where we need global standards to allow things to interoperate more easily.

Some technologies can get around this to some extent. My DVD player can play audio and video CDs also. The standard for the way the data is stored on the disc is different in each case. In a few years it will be able to do DVD-HD and Blu-Ray also.

Upcoming events:
* Glasgow: Introduction to AJAX (2nd May), SQL Server 2005 - XML and XML Query Plans, Mock Objects, SQL Server Reporting Services...

Never write for other people. Write for yourself, because you have a passion for it. -- Marc Clifton

My website

The Grand Negus wrote:
But people also have responsibilities to their immediate and extended families; their communities; etc. M

Are you defining what these standards are? Isn't that up to the family in question? I bet that Colin's family is just fine with it.

The Grand Negus wrote:
If, and only if, you believe that global interoperability is more important than close family and community relationships.

These don't need to be orthogonal to one another. We can have both.

The Grand Negus wrote:
The other has his own little woodshop where he makes chairs of his own design for local sale; and when he goes to the local restaurant, he ends up sitting on a chair that he designed and built. Which of these men, do you think, will be happier?

Let's add some more detail to this anecdote.

Say the one working in the factory doesn't have the ambition to build his own chairs. Or rather, lets just say that he isn't equipped to do so. Where does he work? Nothing today is stopping the second guy from doing just that. I worked for such a man that in fact made his own furniture and toured around to craft shows to peddle our creations. So, those people do exist. Some people do prefer to automate that, just to work their hours and be done with it. The guy I worked with didn't have that kind of setup. He worked much more than that. Now for his personality it suited him. But I've met others where the factory situation suited them more.

So, your question completely depends on the individual in question. Just too subjective.

This statement was never false.

The Grand Negus wrote:
But should they be?

What does "should" have to do with anything. Its way too abstract and hypothetical.

Should I not be married to a Thai woman then? She's the only one for me.

This statement was never false.

I don't live in the world of should. I live in the real world.

Shoulda woulda coulda doesn't exist. They're hypotheticals. Not valid.

So, a few caveats. We can't have kids. Medical. What we are trying to accomplish is happiness and a life well lived.

But, just to play your should game. Should we be slaves to these notions. Are they greater than us. Meaning, your idea of what kids, grandparents, etc, should those hold more weight than my wife and I being happy together.

We use the telephone to talk to Thailand when we are here, and we use it to talk to the states when we are there. That works. We get to be together, and noone has to do without contact regardless of where we are.

This statement was never false.

Replied too soon.

The Grand Negus wrote:
Why not have a small, local company make bottles just for our little community? Just the way we like them? Wouldn't that be better?

Not necessarily. In your view it would, but not everyone shares that view. I take it you'd like to remake the world in your image.

The Grand Negus wrote:
Not like there use to be. We used to have a different, unique, stand-alone restaurant in every small town in America; now we've got a McDonald's and a Burger King.

While its true that BK and Micky D's can be found everywhere, there are still unique restaurants in every town I've been in.

The bummer with your vision of locals only, is that you end up pigeon holed into that community. I think we grow much more with exposure to other cultures and peoples. Both socially and in business. I think that looking at the world as a single community would have a greater impact.

The Grand Negus wrote:
The owner doesn't get to decide what to buy and how to cook it and how to market it and what the place should look like, etc; the creative aspect of restaurant ownership is gone.

That just isn't true. If the guy decides to buy a franchise then yes. But then, that guy isn't going for creativity. If you want, you can surely start your own restaurant and do all of what you describe.

In fact, there was a show last night on Food Network where they were doing a spotlight on a chef in Portland that does just that. 80% of his ingredients come from local farms, ranges, and markets. Now you are just downright skewing this matter.

The Grand Negus wrote:
And the restaurant franchisee doesn't buy eggs, meat, and vegetables from his neighbors, the local farmers who now cannot survive without becoming chicken factories. The ability to contribute to the local community has been curtailed. These are bad things.

That is only the case with franchises. And some franchises are not constrained by this. In and Out Burger is one that I can think of. They tout fresh locally obtained ingredients.

The Grand Negus wrote:
I'd rather live in a world with a thousand different operating systems - good and bad - than live in this world where everyone has "standardized" on the same few pieces of crap.

You are. Linux is a thousand different operating systems.

I for one, wouldn't want to code for 1000 different systems. And I would love the chance to share my software with other communities.

I am so very glad that the world isn't how you envision it.

The Grand Negus wrote:
To make such a world, we have to begin with local communities that are more-or-less self-sufficient.

The only thing that could bring this about is apocalypse.

This statement was never false.

The Grand Negus wrote:
But does anyone really need to talk to someone on the other side of the earth? I know I'd be happier having this conversation with a real flesh-and-blood neighbor, face-to-face, than on this remote and unresponsive forum.

Are you serious? Do you live in a silo? My wife is from Thailand. I am from US. If she wants to talk to her mother, she needs to talk to someone across the world.

Are you seriously suggesting that my wife does not need to talk to her mother?

Now you are just being rediculous and argumentative and I'd say, downright petty.

This statement was never false.

Not if the one you love is 10,000 miles.

This statement was never false.

My app have a main form (mdi contaier) with a treeview menu. Interacting with the treeview, for example clicking the project node, opens up a new project form (mdi child), clicking the status node opens up a new status form (mdi child), etc. I want to use a MVC pattern for the gui part and have some questions regarding this (first time using MVC).

* Is it sound to have one controller for each form, ie maincontroller, projectcontroller, etc?
* As it is now the maincontroller instantiates (opens) the other forms and their controllers and passes along a reference to the mainform (some of the childforms need to update the treeview menu). Is there a better way to do this?

/thanks

I would be very surprised if you could break a project down to a 1-1 mapping between controller and view. This was the type of model that was exposed as Document-View and was widely seen as having problems. It is more likely that your controller will have several views.

Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.

So your saying that I should try keep it down to only one controller? or is there another approach? /thx

No - I'm saying keep it down to 1 controller per model. You can have multiple views per controller/model.

Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.

ok, yes that makes sense Smile | :)

I recently spotted this post, included in the Code Project Insider newsletter:
http://www.codeproject.com/lounge.asp?msg=1992197#xx1992197xx[^]

I got me thinking, we are currently building an app that makes use of tab-like panels, similar to VS2005. Where each panel may deal with completely different aspects. It has a great feel and allows for quite a bit of customization (particularly layout) of the user-interface by the user. But what I hate is that now all your code goes into 1 file/form. (Not even using Regions helps!)

What do you think is the best approach to "compartmentalize" your code in a "per panel" manner as such? I have started using partial classes and this seems to work OK. Any other ideas or am I the only one that hates thousands of lines of code in the same file/form?? D'Oh! | :doh:

Francois

(Sorry if this is in the wrong forum)

Why does all your code go into one form? Surely it should be divided according to purpose. The only code that should go into one form is the code to manage the tabs. Each tab then uses code from a component built for the content of that tab.

Thank you for responding, it is a valid question. Let me clarify.

The form does use classes and other components to do the "work". In make case however you have multiple tab-panels not of the same instance as such each tab-panel has a unique set of controls (buttons, grids, etc). I am refering to the many even handlers for each of these controls; purly UI code. This, at least for me, becomes "too much" code on one form.

Although as I am busy typing this I think think I just figured out what you may be refering to - coding each tab as a component, a custom control as such and then just addint the control to the tab? It makes sense *feeling stupid* - it this what you were saying?

Francois

Yes, that's exactly what I am saying. Don't feel stupid, it's coming to realisations like this in a real world scenario that teach more than just the written word can ever hope to.

Makes perfect sense! Can't believe I didn't think of that. Oh well Smile | :)

Would still be interesting if anyone else has another approach. There is often more ways then one to skin a cat D'Oh! | :doh:

I've been trying to figure out what would generaly be a better course of action regarding Business objects. I have a few options, and i was just wondering what methods other people use, and in what situations.

1) A Data Object with a support object for manipulating data.

2) A Data Object with integrated data manipulation.

3) A Data object with a supporting data manipulation object that can be injected into the Data Object and used to manipulate Data via proxied functions. (A kind of hybrid, almost like injecting a DataAdapter.)

Tris

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Carrier Bags - 21st Century Tumbleweed.

But this isn't always sound advice when someone already has the requirement to build their app to be compatible with both Oracle and MS-SQL.

Rarely do they have the option of changing storage mechanisms. Alot of the times clients already have thousands invested in their database, and just want an app to couple with existing apps and data.

How would you treat a scenario where you had to be able to work with a set of objects that could either be loaded from an Oracle or MS-SQL database, or be loaded from an application server?

You don't have the option of using your page based db either. You can use PE but it has to be able to talk to an app server over tcp/ip, Oracle, and MS-SQL?

I appreciate what you are trying to convey by exposing people to these simpler models, but when someone is asking for advice for a current dilemma, I think it does a disservice to them and doesn't really help.

This statement was never false.

[Message Deleted]

The Grand Negus wrote:

If something is crappy, it should be opposed. Passionately. No man has to work on junk; he chooses to.

I completely agree with you on that.

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Carrier Bags - 21st Century Tumbleweed.

Ahh... but the product is to be available to people independent of their storage choice. Not to force them in any direction. Say a large company like Oh... maybe FedEx, wanted to purchase our product. But they have 100s of thousands invested in their systems. Database and otherwise.

It would be in our best interest to support as many storage mechanisms as possible to ensure sales.

What you are proposing is not very realistic. Expecting customers to invest more money into third party software when they already have software of their own, isn't reasonable. You are asking them to throw away money. I don't know of any company that is willing to do that.

This statement was never false.