• Multiverse : Software Transactional Memory for Java – Multiverse is a Software Transansactional Memory implementation and meant as an alternative to traditional lock based concurrency
• John Nack on Adobe : Adobe demos Flash-to-HTML5 conversion tool – Adobe lives or dies by its ability to help customers solve real problems. That means putting pragmatism ahead of ideology
• Sencha – Sencha Animator – Create CSS3 Animations with Ease – Introducing Sencha Animator, a powerful desktop application to create awesome CSS3 animations for WebKit browsers and touchscreen mobile devices.
• 15 Killer Google Chrome Features You Might Not Know About – Chrome has a lot of obscure features which could immensely enhance one’s browsing productivity if he were to know about them. This post intends to do reveal exactly those features.
• InfoQ: Functional Design Patterns – Aino Vonge Corry reviews a number of well known design patterns showing that their implementation is simpler in functional languages because such languages have pattern-based constructs.
• Hadoop + HBase + Cygwin + Windows 7 x64 « alan said – In this post I will describe how to get a Hadoop environment with HBase running in Cygwin on Windows 7 x64. Having spent the better part of a week reading through blog posts and documentation, I found that none of them covered the process in full detail, at least not for the software versions I intended to use.
• Tutorial: Creating a Stock Watcher with GWT Designer (UPDATED) « Giant Flying Saucer – Obviously with a powerful tool like the GWT Designer I cannot show off all the bells and whistles in one tutorial but hopefully this grabs your attention enough to see what is possible and to experiment further.
• Babylon 5 & the Great War of Java – Stephen Colebourne’s Weblog – We all have to look to ourselves – developers, community members, vendors, Oracle – and decide "Who we Are" and "What we Want". And then find a way to bring all the different answers to those questions together for a common purpose.
• Jetty Continuations: Push Your Java Server Beyond Its Scalability Limits — Developer.com – Jetty Continuations suspend an HTTP request and releases the thread to the thread pool. When an event or timeout occurs, it resumes the suspended request. This approach avoids the thread-per-connection limitation of Web servers, allowing the server to scale for heavy loads
• Apple joins Google in counterattack against Paul Allen lawsuit – Computerworld – Apple last week joined forces with Google, Facebook, Yahoo and others in an effort to dismiss patent infringement charges brought by billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen

Daily del.icio.us for October 25th through October 29th

• Play framework ? Home – Finally a Java framework made by Web developers. Discover a clean alternative to bloated enterprise Java stacks. Play focuses on developer productivity and targets RESTful architectures
• SimpleJPA – Java Persistence API for Amazon SimpleDB – SimpleJPA is a Java Persistence API (JPA) implementation for Amazon's SimpleDB. In other words, an object-relational mapping (ORM) framework for Amazon's database in the cloud
• redis – A persistent key-value database with built-in net interface written in ANSI-C for Posix systems – Redis is an advanced key-value store. It is similar to memcached but the dataset is not volatile, and values can be strings, exactly like in memcached, but also lists, sets, and ordered sets
• VMware: The Console: VMware hires key developer for Redis – As VMware continues its investments in the context of cloud computing, technologies such as Redis become key for future cloud based apps, whether private or public cloud, and the cloud infrastructure itself.
• NPR Creating New App and Web Site for Apple iPad | Peter Kafka | MediaMemo | AllThingsD – the standoff between Apple (AAPL) and Adobe has prompted NPR to take on another engineering project at the same time: It is building a version of its Web site designed specifically for the iPad.
• Op-Ed Columnist – Taking On China and Its Currency – NYTimes.com – It’s time for America to confront China about the undervaluation of its currency, which is adding to the world’s economic problems at a time when those problems are already severe.
• Developing Android Applications with Java – O’Reilly Media – Learn to build mobile applications for the exciting new Android platform. In this dynamic, online workshop, you'll get up to speed on the basics of Android development, including the Android SDK and the Eclipse IDE
• Winstone: The Smaller, Faster, Lighter Servlet Container | CapTech Ventures Blogs – The Winstone project was born out of a desire for a servlet container without all of the bloat of a typical Java EE container. Weighing in at a paltry 167 KB for the "lite" version and 320 KB for the "full featured" version, it is one of the lightest weight servlet containers out there.  
• Unixmen – Digg says yes to NoSQL, bye to MySQL | Unixmen – After twitter, now is Digg who decided to replace MySQL and most of their infrastructure components and move away from LAMP to another architecture called NoSQL that is based in Casandra, an opensource project that develops a highly scalable second-generation distributed database
• Leo Laporte crowd surfing while live streaming @ Diggnation on Vimeo – Leo Laporte crowd surfing while live streaming on the Internet at Diggnation Live case. As seen at SXSW 2010 at Stubbs BBQ in Austin, TX!

Daily del.icio.us for March 14th through March 17th

• Vodori’s Blog » Using TinyMCE with other JavaScript toolkits – TinyMCE is not only the best WYSIWYG editor there is, but also one of the best designed overall frameworks. However, it’s got one terrible flaw — if you try to integrate it with any other JS library you will eventually find yourself drowning in bizarre race conditions as multiple “threads” all compete for the same window.onLoad place
• Apache News Online: 22 February 2009 – Apache POI 3.5 beta 5 now available – The Apache POI team is pleased to announce the availability of Apache POI 3.5
  beta 5, our latest beta including OOXML (Office Open XML) support.
• Configuring Spring Security with Active Directory in 5 easy steps | Eneset Technology – In this article I tried to give as much details as possible about configuring Spring Security with Active Directory. I provided a sample project to be used as a starting point for your own application
• Digital Domain – Everyone Loves Google, Until It’s Too Big – NYTimes.com – Jeff Atwood, a co-founder of Stack Overflow, said: “I have no beef with Google. I like Google. But I’m concerned. If you project this trend forward four years, just follow the graph. A world in which there is no competition strikes me as unhealthy.”
• Ubuntu now has ‘cloud computing inside’ | The Wisdom of Clouds – CNET News – That being said, the Ubuntu crew is in my view the Apple of Linux, and will likely change the game not through the infrastructure itself, but the user experience they introduce to building and managing clouds.
• Flex vs. Silverlight: The Elephant in the Room « The Effect Generator – In contrast, Silverlight has been built from the ground up with more ambitious targets in mind: fully fledged applications.
• Microsoft Visual Studio to boost SharePoint | InfoWorld | News | 2009-02-20 | By Paul Krill – Developers building solutions based on Microsoft#039;s SharePoint collaboration and business process platform will gain expanded support in the planned Visual Studio 2010 development environment, which will feature templates and an extensibility API, a Microsoft official said in a blog on Thursday.
• FRONTLINE: inside the meltdown: watch the full program | PBS – On Thursday, Sept. 18, 2008, the astonished leadership of the U.S. Congress was told in a private session by the chairman of the Federal Reserve that the American economy was in grave danger of a complete meltdown within a matter of days. quot;There was literally a pause in that room where the oxygen left,quot; says Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.)
• Asynchronous processing support in Servlet 3.0 – JavaWorld – Even as a mid-level API ensconced in modern UI component-based Web frameworks and Web services technologies, the incoming Servlet 3.0 specification (JSR 315) will have groundbreaking impact on Java Web application development
• Asynchronous HTTP Comet architectures – JavaWorld – In this article, Gregor Roth takes a wider view of asynchronous HTTP, explaining its role in developing high-performance HTTP proxies and non-blocking HTTP clients, as well as the long-lived HTTP connections associated with Comet.
• The BalusC Code: FileServlet supporting resume and caching – To enable download resumes, the server have to send at least the Accept-Ranges, ETag and Last-Modified response headers to the client along with the file.

Daily del.icio.us for February 19th through February 22nd

• The busy Java developer’s guide to Scala: Scala and servlets – In this article in the The busy Java developer's guide to Scala series, Ted Neward begins a tour of Scala in the real world by examining how Scala can interact with the core Servlet API and perhaps even improve it a little.
• FrontPage – Dropbox Wiki – The Dropbox Wiki is your designated resource for the more advanced features (and creative uses) that Dropbox has to offer. Like all wikis, this will be constantly changing, and we welcome any contributions you make.
• Red Hat 3Q up 20 pct, but revenue below estimate – BusinessWeek – Red Hat Inc. on Monday reported a 20 percent increase in profit for the third quarter as budget-conscious companies opted for the software provider's open-source Linux operating system over more expensive proprietary systems.
• Asia’s wounded giants | Suddenly vulnerable | The Economist – Asia’s two big beasts are shivering. India’s economy is weaker, but China’s leaders have more to fear
• Management guru: Warren Buffett | Warren Buffett | The Economist – Buffett is known as “the Sage of Omaha”, after the town where he was born and where he has spent most of his life, and much is made of his small-town homespun values. He likes to play the ukulele and he plays bridge (with Bill Gates, among others) in his modest home in Omaha
• JavaLobby’s Top 10 Articles of 2008 | Javalobby – As a way of looking back at how the year has been on JavaLobby, we've collected the top 10 most read articles. It paints a clear picture about what is important to you, and gives us some hints as to what we should be covering in 2009
• Dustin’s Software Development Cogitations and Speculations: 2008: Year of the Java Persistence API – It appears that one of the most popular themes in Java development in 2008 has been the Java Persistence API (JPA). I base this statement on the recent announcements that JPA-focused articles appeared in the Top Ten lists of articles for both Oracle Technology Network (OTN) and JavaLobby.
• Data Platform Insider : Ultimate guide for upgrading to SQL Server 2008 – Last week, our SQL Server engineering team in association with Solid Quality Mentors released an unprecedented 490-page free whitepaper called SQL Server 2008 Upgrade Technical Reference Guide that provides in-depth information on how to upgrade to SQL Server 2008
• Scrum in under 10 minutes video | Agile Software Development – Hamid Shojaee from Axosoft published an excellent and funny video on the basics of Scrum. In under 8 minutes of animation Hamid describes most of the basic concepts. I don’t agree with everything (in particular I I would like to see the release burndown chart described), but you can only explain so much in under 10 minutes and every Scrum installation is different anyway. Have a look and enjoy!
• Stax Networks Launches: Google App Engine For Java – Stax is built on top of Amazon EC2 and allows developers to create, text and deploy Java applications without having to build out their own physical infrastructure.
• Database Normalisation :: BlackWasp Software Development – The sixteenth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial discusses the concept of database normalisation. Normalisation is a database design technique that minimises duplication of information, reducing the risk of introducing data errors.
• 10 Steps to Learn a New Coding Language Fast – NETTUTS – Learning a new language can seem like a daunting task. However, as it is with all types of learning, there are certain techniques and practices that will help you learn the language faster and more efficiently. Here are 10 of the best practices that aspiring programmers can use to quickly start programming in a new language
• Kill Your Database – Rather, save your database with Terracotta. Relational database are valuable for many things, but serving as the cost-effective scalability backbone of high-load web applications isn't one of them. Is your database suffering under the weight of your application?
• YouTube – Top Gear Tesla review – Top Gear reviews Tesla, smokes Lotus Elise

Daily del.icio.us for December 17th through December 22nd

• YouTube – Collaborative Spreadsheet Art – people worked together simultaneously on a single Google Docs spreadsheet. Each cell in the 100 row x 186 col spreadsheet was filled using 18 different colors. The entire process was captured in time-lapse.
• Roma Framework: The new way to conceive Web Applications – Roma allows you to develop enterprise level Java applications with low effort following a real Domain Driven Design approach. It's a new way to conceive the application: anything is a POJO, from the GUI forms to the persistent objects.
• SpringSource Acquires G2One Inc. | SpringSource – SpringSource, the company behind Spring, the de facto standard in enterprise Java, today announced the acquisition of G2One Inc., the company behind the popular Groovy and Grails technologies. With the acquisition of G2One, SpringSource will now offer global enterprise support offerings for developers and IT operations that utilize Groovy and Grails applications.
• Roberto Chinnici’s Blog: Ease of development in the Java EE 6 Platform – In Java EE 6, we plan to continue the drive towards a simpler, friendlier platform. This time around, much of the focus is on the web tier, but there are important new features being delivered outside it.
• ‘The White Album’ 40 Years Later : NPR Music – When The White Album was released 40 years ago this month, fans were both baffled and awe struck by its sprawling world of sound. It was released as a double LP (almost unheard of at the time) and featured instant classics like "I Will," "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," and "Blackbird." But The White Album (its real name is simply The Beatles) was also filled with songs many found hard to digest, like the eight-minute, experimental sound collage "Revolution 9" or the inexplicably surreal "Honey Pie." On this edition of All Songs Considered host Bob Boilen talks with Bruce Spizer, author of The Beatles On Apple Records, about the groundbreaking White Album and how it came to be.
• ExtPlayer – An MP3 Player developed with Adobe AIR and Ext JS – In partnership with Adobe, Ext is releasing several new enhancements to the Ext.air package today. These include improvements to existing classes responsible for Sounds, Windowing and Database as well as new classes responsible for Notification, Clipboard and File System Interaction.
• The End of Wall Street’s Boom – National Business News – Portfolio.com – The era that defined Wall Street is finally, officially over. Michael Lewis, who chronicled its excess in Liar’s Poker, returns to his old haunt to figure out what went wrong.
• TwitterFE – Twitter Front End – Twitter Front End is a new look at Twitter.com and the web interface powering the message service's social interactions today. This website was built by Niall Kennedy using web standards best practices and optimized code design. Twitter FE is currently a read-only clone of the Twitter.com website rewritten for external development and rapid iteration.
• Op-Ed Columnist – We Found the W.M.D. – NYTimes.com – If I had my druthers right now we would convene a special session of Congress, amend the Constitution and move up the inauguration from Jan. 20 to Thanksgiving Day. Forget the inaugural balls; we can’t afford them. Forget the grandstands; we don’t need them. Just get me a Supreme Court justice and a Bible, and let’s swear in Barack Obama right now
• Obama Raised Half a Billion Online | 44 | washingtonpost.com – Barack Obama raised half a billion dollars online in his 21-month campaign for the White House, dramatically ushering in a new digital era in presidential fundraising.

Daily del.icio.us for November 23rd through November 24th

• Hueniverse: Beginner’s Guide to OAuth – Part III : Security Architecture – As an authorization delegation protocol, OAuth must be secure and allow the Service Provider to trust the Consumer and validate the credential provided to gain access. To accomplish that, OAuth defines a method for validating the authenticity of HTTP requests.
• Microsoft’s Turner Blocks Google at P&G as Competitors Circle – Bloomberg.com – "To the extent the world moves to Web-based software, that's very hard for Microsoft — it completely unlocks their grip on your desktop,'' said Sarah Friar, a Goldman, Sachs & Co. analyst in San Francisco. "Within Microsoft, people just pooh- pooh that idea. There's a huge complacency within the company.''
• Google Web Toolkit (GWT) & Servlets – Web application tutorial – Computerized World – Google Web Toolkit (GWT) and Java Servlets used in one web application. This tutorial will take you though the steps of developing a simple web application with Google Web Toolkit and J2EE Servlet Technology. The application will have a servlet on server side and one web page.
• At what price will Oracle start sniffing around Red Hat again? | The Open Road – The Business and Politics of Open Source by Matt Asay – CNET News – Yes, I know that Oracle suggests that Unbreakable Linux is changing the world. I'm not buying that, nor are my customers. I've had one enterprise out of 30,000 deployments switch to Oracle's Unbreakable Linux, and that was because it's a hard-core Oracle shop. (Having said that, it's perhaps instructive to note that it hasn't bought Oracle's ECM offering or its Stellent web content management offering, but I digress
• P&G Flirts with Google Apps and Scares the Bejesus Out of Microsoft | Advice and Opinion – Microsoft is now taking the threat from Google quite seriously: In July 2008 COO Kevin Turner was dispatched to consumer-products giant Procter & Gamble to dissuade P&G from moving to Google Apps—and ditching Microsoft
• Greg Luck’s WebLog: Example RESTful Java client for Ehcache – Rick Bryant sent me some sample code he wrote which shows how to use the RESTful Cache Server from Java. Thanks Rick. To use the sample just fire up the cache server: startup.sh and then run the following Java code
• Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Roadster 722 S | Uncrate – Want. With 650 hp and a top speed of 220 mph, the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Roadster 722 S ($TBA; Jan. 2009) may quite possibly be the fastest open-top production car ever built. Powered by a supercharged 5.5 liter V8 engine hand-built in the Mercedes-AMG engine shop in Affalterbach, the 722 S features a carbon fiber body, crystal antimony grey paint finish, and a soft top that can withstand sustained 200 mph+ top speeds
• InfoQ: Extremely Short Iterations as a Catalyst for Effective Prioritization of Work – Mishkin Berteig presents a situation where he proposed to a software development team, which just started to experiment with Scrum, to accept 2-days iterations. The approach was trying to tackle their organizational lack of prioritization resulting in constant crisis. Their decision led to a bigger crisis which exposed the need for task prioritization.
• Data Mining in the Cloud – Brian Knight – Microsoft is offering a new service to allow you to do the same type of data mining in the plugin online. Simply upload your Excel spreadsheet of data and you have all the same functionality online that you did in the plugin.
• Prototype JavaScript framework: Prototype 1.6.0.3: A long-awaited bugfix release – Yesterday we released Prototype 1.6.0.3, the result of some much-needed bug fixes, and a stopgap release on the road to 1.6.1. It’s a backwards-compatible, drop-in replacement recommended for all users of Prototype 1.6. We’ve fixed 30 bugs and made 25 other improvements to our already-rock-solid library.

Daily del.icio.us for October 4th

• Completely Test Your BlackBerry Phone for any Problems with this Secret Shortcut – If you own a BlackBerry mobile phone (or plan to buy one), here’s a very useful shortcut (or can we say Easter Egg) that enables you to perform a complete health checkup of your BlackBerry hardware.
• Using Java Persistence in a J2EE 1.4 Web Application – This document takes you through the basics of how to add Java™ Persistence functionality to a J2EE 1.4 web application. Though the Java Persistence API was introduced as part of the Java EE 5 platform, it is possible to use Java Persistence in a J2EE 1.4 application
• FactCheck.org: FactChecking Debate No. 1 – McCain and Obama contradicted each other repeatedly during their first debate, and each volunteered some factual misstatements as well. Here’s how we sort them out:
• Davenport WebDAV-SMB Gateway – Davenport is a servlet which provides a WebDAV gateway to SMB shared resources. Typical usage would be to provide web-based read and write access to Windows shared drives. WebDAV clients, such as Windows' "Web Folders" can copy files to and from the shares over HTTP. Non-WebDAV-capable web browsers can also access the network, downloading files from shared folders in a seamless fashion.
• Bailout Could Deepen Crisis, CBO Chief Says – washingtonpost.com – The director of the Congressional Budget Office said yesterday that the proposed Wall Street bailout could actually worsen the current financial crisis
• Oracle enters hardware market; Launches storage server to ride shotgun with database | Between the Lines | ZDNet.com – Oracle CEO Larry Ellison on Wednesday unveiled its first ever hardware product–a storage server with embedded software designed to work with the company’s databases and be used in a grid. The Exadata programmable storage server aims to put database intelligence next to each drive. Oracle and HP also launched a “database machine.”
• The Geek Stuff » Turbocharge PuTTY with 12 Powerful Add-Ons – Software for Geeks #3 – PuTTY is hands-down the best, free, and lightweight SSH client for Windows. I have provided list of 12 powerful PuTTY add-ons with screenshots, that will solve few shortcomings of the original PuTTY
• InfoQ: Joshua Bloch: Bumper-Sticker API Design – I distilled the essence of the talk down to a modest collection of pithy maxims, in the spirit of Jon Bentley's classic Bumper-Sticker Computer Science, Item 6 in his excellent book, More Programming Pearls: Confessions of a Coder (Addison-Wesley, 1988).
• Bliki in a Jar 3.0.9 released – Bliki in a Jar is a small Wiki written in Java with focus on supporting the Wikipedia syntax. It is intended to run on an USB stick as a replacement for a paper notebook as a Personal Information Manager
• Ext JS – Improving Application Usability with Ext JS Keyboard Handling – As you can see, adding custom key handling within an Ext JS application is quite easy. For any custom keys, including function keys, alpha keys with or without modifiers (alt/shift/ctrl) there is Ext.KeyMap. For navigation, arrows, paging, home/end there is Ext.KeyNav.
• Hey Rod, You Are Killing Your Company – Weiqi Gao’s Observations – After a new major version of Spring is released, community maintenance updates will be issued for three months to address initial stability issues. Subsequent maintenance releases will be available to SpringSource Enterprise customers. Bug fixes will be folded into the open source development trunk and will be made available in the next major community release of the software.

Daily del.icio.us for September 24th through September 27th

• Pearware Blog : Improving Java web site performance with asset caching – In this post, I’ll be talking about a solution I developed at my day job to improve the performance of our web site by allowing the browser to cache JavaScript, CSS, and image files
• Who Will Tell the People? – New York Times – We need a president who is tough enough to tell the truth to the American people. Any one of the candidates can answer the Red Phone at 3 a.m. in the White House bedroom. I’m voting for the one who can talk straight to the American people on national TV
• The All-White Elephant in the Room – New York Times – Mr. Hagee is not a fringe kook but the pastor of a Texas megachurch. On Feb. 27, he stood with John McCain and endorsed him over the religious conservatives’ favorite, Mike Huckabee, who was then still in the race.
• Headius: The Power of the JVM – The future is definitely looking awesome for dynamic languages on the JVM. And languages like Groovy and JRuby are proving it.
• How Has Functional Programming Influenced Your Coding Style? – Functional programming languages are enjoying a renaissance. Even if not intending to use a functional language for daily work, learning such a language can improve one's programming style
• Sleep deprivation is not a badge of honor – (37signals) – Forgoing sleep is like borrowing from a loan shark. Sure you get that extra hours right now to cover for your overly-optimistic estimation, but at what price? The shark will be back and if you can’t pay, he’ll break your creativity, morale, and good-m
• Java Persistence 2.0 Early Draft Available – Linda DeMichiel’s Blog – We've just released the Early Draft of the Java Persistence 2.0 specification, so I thought it would be a good time to report on some of the work we've been doing in the JSR 317 Expert Group.
• InfoQ: Flex, AIR and AS3 Flex Gain Code Coverage Utilities – Last month Joe Berkovitz announced the initial experimental release of Flexcover, an open-source code coverage tool suite for Flex, AIR and AS3
• For all you know, it’s just another Java library – David Pollak’s Blog – Bottom line… to anyone other than the folks with hands in the code and the folks who have to recruit and manage them, "For all you know, it's just another Java library."
• Common Solutions for T-SQL Problems – Home – Some of the Moderators, Answerers, and MVPs have gotten together to create a new resource to supplement the Forums; it's called SQLExamples. We just started it a few weeks ago so it's still very much in its infancy

Daily del.icio.us for May 2nd through May 4th

• SaveTheDevelopers.org :: Making The Web A Better Place – Say no to IE 6! Our current campaign focuses on assisting users in upgrading their Internet Explorer 6 web browser. This campaign will result in former IE 6 users having a more enjoyable experience on the web while (hopefully) creating a less stressful an
• Save the Developers! Stop Using Internet Explorer 6 – There is a scourge on the Web. It is called Internet Explorer 6. Even though IE7 has been around for more than two years, IE6 still represents 31% of all browsers out there (versus only 22 % for IE7 and 36.5 % for Firefox).
• Amazon’s cloud computing service fuels startup’s launch | InfoWorld | News | 2008-03-25 | By Jon Brodkin, Network World – A startup called Elastra is launching Tuesday with software that helps customers build database management systems and other applications that can be deployed on top of Amazon's EC2 cloud computing service.
• Gartner Says Worldwide PC Shipments to Grow 11 Percent in 2008, Market Could Fall Victim to Weaker Global Economy – Worldwide PC shipments are forecast to total 293 million units in 2008, up 10.9 percent from 2007 shipments of 264 million units, according to Gartner, Inc. However, analysts warned that growth could fall into single digits if global economic headwinds st
• Microsoft partners with open source Jaspersoft, Sourcesense | Open Source | ZDNet.com – Microsoft and Jaspersoft are working together to ensure that Jasper’s business intelligence software suite runs well on the latest editions of Windows and SQL Server.
• The ’80s Video That Pops Up, Online and Off – New York Times – For rickrolling, the duck was replaced with the 20-year-old Astley video, and in the last year it has become a hugely successful “meme,” the Internet’s word for an idea repeated across the Web. The video from yougotrickrolled.com has been viewed mor
• Roundtable: The state of open source | InfoWorld | News | March 24, 2008 | By Jason Snyder – Any endeavor rooted in community is bound to spark passionate debate. After all, without contention, how else to determine the best way forward? Since its emergence, open source has embodied this spirit. Part defiant, part self-reliant, and often outspoke
• ETL for Free-Form Data – SQL Server Central – Would you like to learn a handy little process for extracting, transforming and loading data fields from a free-form source like a web page or word processing document into something structured like a staging table?
• Asynchronous HTTP and Comet architectures – Java World – In this article, Gregor Roth takes a wider view of asynchronous HTTP, explaining its role in developing high-performance HTTP proxies and non-blocking HTTP clients, as well as the long-lived HTTP connections associated with Comet.
• Ext.ux.grid.RowActions – RowActions Plugin for Ext 2.x – Beta1 by Saki – RowActions plugin allows you to add icons in a grid that you want to bind actions to: delete row, edit row, whatever. It displays an icon and fires two events: beforeaction (return false to cancel) and action (here you put the action you want to execute)
• Coding Horror: Paul Graham’s Participatory Narcissism – Loved this comment – I hadn't realized how unhappy I was until I watched Office Space and my wife said, "That seems like your job". I soon switched jobs

Daily del.icio.us for March 22nd through March 25th

• BEA JRockit Mission Control – JRockit Mission Control for Eclipse is a set of plug-ins for the Eclipse IDE designed to help develop, profile and diagnose applications running in the BEA JRockit ® JVM.
• GridGain – Open Source Grid Computing For Java – GridGain is focused on doing one thing and doing it better than any other product – providing the best grid computing platform for Java that is fun, simple and productive to use.
• Ajaxian » Mozilla Prism update makes it easy to create wrappers – Create Prism applications directly from Firefox – Refractor creates a Prism web application from within Firefox. Users can manually create web applications using "Tools > Convert Website to Application".
• Open Source and Enterprise Architecture: JVM Performance Tuning – I was able to achieve an over 3x improvement in my EJB 3 application, of which fully 60 to 70% of that was due to using large page memory with a 3.5GB heap
• OAuth — An open protocol to allow secure API authentication in a simple and standard method from desktop and web applications. – An open protocol to allow secure API authentication in a simple and standard method from desktop and web applications.
• Data Portability, Authentication, and Authorization – We will take a detailed look at the right and wrong ways to request user data from social hubs large and small, and outline some action items for developers and business people interested in data portability and interoperability done right.
• The world’s 50 most powerful blogs | Technology | The Observer – Blogging has never been bigger – It can help elect presidents and take down attorney generals while simultaneously celebrating the minutiae of our everyday obsessions
• Simplifying Web Service development with JSR-181 – JSR 181 or Web Services Metadata for the Java Platform is a Java Specification Request that defines an annotated Java format that uses Java Language Metadata (JSR 175) to enable easy definition of Java Web Services in a J2EE container
• InfoQ: Architecture as Language: A story – As you develop the architecture, evolve a language that allows you to describe systems based on this architecture. Based on my experience in a number of real-world projects, this makes the architecture tangible and provides an unambiguous description of t
• Hello, OSGi, Part 1: Bundles for beginners – Java World – The Open Services Gateway Initiative (OSGi), also known as the Dynamic Module System for Java, defines an architecture for modular application development. Similar to the Java Servlet and EJB specifications, the OSGi specification defines two things: a se

Daily del.icio.us for March 9th through March 10th

• Roller: free and open source Java blog software – Apache Roller 4.0 has been released and is now available for download. This is a major new Roller release which includes easier blog theme customization, a much more simple installation/upgrade process, infrastructure improvements and other small fixes.
• infinitest – Google Code – Infinitest is a continuous JUnit test runner designed to facilitate Test Driven Development. Infinitest helps you learn TDD by providing feedback as you work, and helps you master TDD by reducing your feedback cycle from minutes to mere seconds
• dev2dev: Using Asynchronous Servlets to Deal with Hung Threads – BEA WebLogic Server 9.2 and later versions expose an Abstract Asynchronous Servlet class, which allows you to decouple receiving a servlet request from sending its response. The class also provides a Future Response Servlet, which lets the server handle s
• Yahoo! Flash(R) Blog » Blog Archive » YUI Got a Little More Flashy Today! – Yahoo! releases version 2.4.0 of the YUI Library and they have been working with the Flash team to help them introduce a new component that leverages the power of Flash Player. The experimental YUI Charts widget brings the Yahoo! Astra Flash Charts
• Yahoo! Developer Network – Flash Developer Center – ASTRA Flash Components – Charts – Charts is a set of visualization components that represent two-dimensional data structures (tables, arrays of values, etc.) in a variety of ways (bars, graphs, pie charts, etc.)
• Yahoo! UI Library: Charts – The YUI Charts Control visualizes tabular data on a web page in several possible formats including vertical columns, horizontal bars, lines, and pies. Features include support for the DataSource Utility, customizable serie, axes, mouse-over datatip
• Ext JS LiveGrid Component – The Ext JS LiveGrid Component is a user extension that’s build upon the wonderful Ext JS Framework. The component allows to read chunks of data from an underlying storage (common use case: a database) without the need of paging. Means: You can virtually d
• Ext JS Blog – » Ext 2.0 Final Released – The Ext team is proud to announce that the official release of Ext v2.0 is available for download. Ext 2.0 is a dramatic step forward from all previous versions of Ext, providing increased performance, ease of configurations, flexibility and UI capabiliti
• Adobe Debuts Flash Media Server 3 – Slashes Price – The Flash Media Interactive Server includes the debut of streaming HD video. FMS3 will offer H.264 video streaming, as well as support for High Efficiency AAC (HE-AAC) audio that can be streamed to Flash player, AIR applications, or Adobe’s Media Player a
• NetBeans Magazine – To coincide with the launch of 6.0, this latest issue of NetBeans Magazine features 62 pages of in-depth articles. NetBeans IDE 6.0 features Ruby/JRuby/Ruby on Rails support, enhancements for improved Swing development, a new Visual Game Designer, updated

Daily del.icio.us for Dec 04, 2007 through Dec 06, 2007

• InfoQ: Setting out for Service Component Architecture – SCA is an enhancement to frameworks that offer programming models for components and connectivity abstractions. Those frameworks may be standard offerings, but may also be proprietary technologies, such Remote Function Calls (RFC), SQL stored proc etc.
• Ignite Realtime: Ignite Realtime Video Podcasts: Actionscript, Javascript, and the Future of Webapps – In this video, Jive Software’s David Smith talks about Actionscript, Javascript, and the future of webapps as they relate to his work on Spark.
• Eric Traut talks (and demos) Windows 7 and MinWin – istartedsomething – Microsoft?s distinguished engineer Eric Traut gave a presentation at the University of Illinois about Microsoft?s virtualization technology and also mentioned Windows 7 – the next version of Windows after Vista
• Cairngorm:Cairngorm2.2.1:Release Notes – Adobe Labs – The Cairngorm Microarchitecture is a lightweight yet prescriptive framework for rich Internet application (RIA) development.
• Alfresco Makes Leading Java Implementation JLAN Shared File Drive Interface Available via GPL – Alfresco JLAN is a unique implementation of an embedded virtual file system that offers the only Java client and server implementation of Microsoft Window?s CIFS protocol, allowing content, and rows in a database to appear as a shared drive.
• 1-800-GOOG-411 – Google’s new 411 service is free, fast and easy to use. Give it a try now and see how simple it is to find and connect with local businesses for fre
• Adopting Struts 2.0 – Java World – Struts 2.0 carries much of the power of its predecessor but is simpler for developers to use. In this article, S. Sangeetha and S. V. Subrahmanya outline the changes in Struts 2.0 and offer migration pointers for developers familiar with Struts
• Improve Your Photos 60 Seconds at a Time – If you are tired of reading long explanations and confused by tricky photo techniques, here you can have it short and sweet. Arranged by topics, each subject takes less than 60 seconds to read.
• InfoQ: IntelliJ IDEA 7.0 Adds Spring/Hibernate Support, Eclipse Interoperability, and Maven Integration – Jetbrains has released IntelliJ IDEA 7.0. This version rounds out support for many popular Java technologies while adding support for languages such as Groovy and Ruby. Among its highlights: Spring and Hibernate Support, Ruby/Rails Support, Groovy/Grails
• IntelliJ IDEA Blog » Blog Archive » IntelliJ IDEA: The Magnificent Seven – JetBrains is proud and happy to tell you that IntelliJ IDEA 7.0 is now available! This release is focused on further upgrading performance, usability, and enhancing the user experience with the efficient support for new features, technologies, and tools.

Daily del.icio.us for Oct 16, 2007 through Oct 20, 2007

• Icahn further raises BEA stake to 13.22 percent | News | Mergers/Acquisitions | Reuters – Billionaire investor Carl Icahn further boosted his stake in BEA Systems Inc (BEAS.O: Quote, Profile, Research) to 13.22 percent, according to a regulatory filing.
• If wishes were iPhones, then beggars would call [dive into mark] – Buy it for what it is, or don?t buy it at all. Your choices don?t get any more granular than that. Apple has been unwaveringly clear that the iPhone is theirs.
• Adobe – Developer Center : What’s new in Flex 3 Beta 2 – this article has been updated throughout to reflect Flex 3 Beta 2. However, you can see a summary of interesting changes near the bottom of this article.
• Technology Review: Gibson’s Self-Tuning Guitar – A new line of instruments from Gibson Guitar now promises to banish this scenario to the dark ages with high-tech self-tuning technology built into the company’s flagship electric-guitar models.
• Google Web Toolkit Blog: GWT Application Development for the iPhone – In our not-so-humble opinions, we think that the Google Web Toolkit (GWT) and the Apple iPhone are two very cool technologies. Our approach was to build an application that primarily targets the iPhone and to use that as a test-bed for new ideas.
• IntelliJ IDEA Plugins Contest – IntelliJ IDEA has inspired many Java developers to write plug-ins from J2EE and code editing tools to games. Now it has a robust plugin ecosystem with 413 available plugins and new ones appearing nearly every week
• Redirect after POST filter – RedirectAfterPostFilter lets you easily implement Redirect after POST pattern in your web applications. You can map this filter to your controllers processing POST requests and after the processing filter will redirect the original request to the url
• Caching Solutions in Java – Even though caching improves performance and makes your architecture work, it can, in fact, complicate design and introduce such complexities as concurrent code and cluster-wide synchronization.
• Daemon : Procrun – Daemon – Procrun is a set of libraries and applications for making Java applications to run as Windows services. It can convert any application to run as a service.
• The Connector released for Microsoft Project / JIRA Integration – The Connector allows users of JIRA to use Microsoft Project for doing planning and scheduling and provides an easy way to synchronize the information in Microsoft Project with the issues in JIRA

Daily del.icio.us for Sep 20, 2007 through Oct 05, 2007

• SXC – Simple XML Compiler – SXC (Simple XML Compiler) allows you to created optimized parsers and writers for XML. Through a declarative API you’re able to tell SXC what type of XML to expect and what actions to associate with it.
• On the Stre@m – Flex has become more accessible – The Flex module for Apache and IIS provides web-tier compilation of MXML and ActionScript files on Apache and IIS web servers.
• Assessing the Survivors of the Java IDE Wars – For enterprise development, I’d say IDEA wins out with its rich support for both J2EE and Java EE 5, followed closely by NetBeans (which also does an impressive job here), and last is Eclipse/MyEclipse (mostly due to their current lack of support for Java
• An XQuery Servlet for RESTful Data Services – This paper shows how to use XQuery for data integration, and how to expose an XQuery as a RESTful data service using a Java servlet
• Control.Tabs : Projects : LivePipe – Control.Tabs is a javascript library for creating accessible, flexible & unobtrusive tabbed interfaces in your applications or pages.

Daily del.icio.us for Mar 17, 2007

Earlier in the month, I blogged about Servlet Filters and how I see them as Aspects in the AOP world. Based on the blog entry, I’ve gotten tons of email from people that wanted to know more about Servlet Filters, how to use them and how to use the simple Authentication filter I used as an example. I also got quite a few emails from people that wanted to know what other filters I used and so I am including some resources that I find very helpful along with a few servlet filters that I use every day.

Servlet Filter Tutorials

• The Essentials of Filters
• Learning Servlet Filters
• Writing Servlet 2.3 Filters
• Two Servlet Filters Every Web Application Should Have
• Another Java Servlet Filter Most Web Applications Should Have

Servlet Filter Apps

• Authentication Filter
• Clickstream Filter – Track users and path
• URL Rewrite Filter

If you know of any other Servlet Filters that are useful, drop me an email or send me trackback.

Servlet Filters: Part II

I was just discussing this idea of Servlet Filters with a friend and I was trying to explain to him how Filters work and how they are really aspects in the AOP world. I think filters are really incredibly helpful and yet very few developers know about them and even fewer developers implement them. So my thought was that if we started using buzzwords like AOP around filters, suddenly Filters become sexy and everyone’s jumping over to implement Filters.

The filter API was introduced in the Servlet 2.3 specification and is defined by the Filter, FilterChain, and FilterConfig interfaces in the javax.servlet package. You define a filter by implementing the Filter interface. A filter chain, passed to a filter by the container, provides a mechanism for invoking a series of filters. A filter config contains initialization data. The most important method in the Filter interface is the doFilter() method, which is the heart of the filter. Filters intercept request to your web application based on the url-pattern specified in the web.xml, where the filters are defined.

I have used Filters extensively and have a few Filters ready to go when I am called into debug applications in production that are misbehaving or just broken. One of the filters I use quite often is a simple authentication filter that makes is easy to ensure consumers of the web application is authenticated. Here’s a simple snippet:

Here’s a copy of the original documented Filter java class.

Servlet Filters as poor man’s AOP