Wow! I can’t believe that I haven’t posted anything in more than two months – where did the time go? It’s not like I don’t have fodder for new posts, the news items are many and varied over the last couple of months and that’s the stuff happening outside my world. I won’t bother even touching any of that though, it’s all been more than adequately covered buy the bloggers you can track over at DelphiFeeds.com
There’s so much on the go, I don’t really know where to begin …
I finally made it over the hump with tiOPF ! Woohoo for me! I’m standing there with this [had to be – at least] 1,000 watt bulb lit up over my head, looking down the slope wondering, “what exactly was the issue, moron?” and I’m coming up with an entire series of articles that just have to be written. They’re coming up … soon as I find the time.
For my birthday I got a copy of Head First Design Patterns by O’Reilly. This is a bit of a “just like me” story … I read the bit in the intro where if you don’t write Java you’re a little on the clueless side and will never really understand this book so maybe you ought to leave it on the shelf for the big boys to buy and I’m ready to heave it in the bin. OK, I’ve taken a bit of license with the actual text. But then … yea, I start thinking maybe writing too much Java made them a little soft in the noodle. Either that -or- Delphi code was a little too complex for them. So anyway, I start reading the book, the first chapter at least, and re-creating the examples in Delphi. Now, if I can do it – they’re way, way off the mark. So the point of this is that I’ve got these articles planned as well – stay tooned. Like I said, I’ve only finished the fist section of it but so far I think it’s a pretty good book. A couple of caveats though;
- the teaching “method” seems pretty good but can be a bit annoying and
- don’t buy a new copy, pick up a used one … they really don’t deserve money from outside the Java community.
Work is extremely busy. This is the second trip in a row where I’ve gone out and never managed to even open the lap-top to work on any of the numerous projects I’ve got on the go. When you consider that when I go out on the ship, I live there 24/7 for 28 days, you’ve got to be pretty tired at the end of a [12 hour] day not to want to fire up Delphi and do a bit of coding.
Finally, a bit of a chuckle, I get home from sea and a late birthday present from the out-laws [my wife's folks] is there waiting … Head First Object-Oriented Analysis and Design … go figure :)
Yea, it’s got the same “if you don’t know Java you’d better put the book back because you’ll never really get it” bit. Never having had much of a head for marketing [far too logically inclined] I just don’t get why you’d shoot yourself in both feet.
A thousand things on the go – all the time, ain’t life grand :)
Thanks for stopping by … hope to get back to regular posts soon
--
Dave
Don't forget Dave,
ReplyDelete"There's none so blind as those who won't see"
Good to read you again.
Derek
Head First Design Patterns was the first book I reviewed for my website. There aren't a lot of Delphi books these days, so you need to make do with what you can. I don't know Java very well at all, but was able to follow along with the examples. I think it is probably worth reading - however I've not been able to apply much of what I read.
ReplyDelete@ Derek - thanks. I think your due an email ... soon.
ReplyDelete@ Alister - nice review. you were much nicer than I think I will be, although it's a topic I'm really interested in. In your review you mentioned "I noticed my self saying “get to the point already!”, but only on occasion." ... I'm in trouble. I was saying that during the first chapter. Thanks for the comment.