October 15, 2011

Introduction and policy

This blog will contain little lessons about things that may cause problems in the context of larger code-bases. I will present you coding mistakes, bad practices and a way to implement the same thing in a better way. I will also present you some patterns that are widely promoted, but are often implemented badly by beginners. I will present stuff that is just fine in little home projects or school-work, but in the bigger projects cause a major headache in the future for the maintenance person. 

I am a Java specialist with over 10 years of experience in working with large code-bases. I have started some of those myself from the scratch, some I have just maintained. But in every case there has been so much to learn. 

The best way of learning is by mistake. Most of the stories told here are based on my own mistakes and bad practices. However, our own mistakes and bad habits are often invisible for us, at least for the first 1-2 years after the program has been made. Thus, I would never have learned so much without my dear colleagues. If you know me and see a mistake that was made by you, be proud. You have helped me to learn, and now you are helping others to learn.  

There is a companion code-base for this blog, called beyondhc. All the code snippets and classes presented in this blog can be found there. As most of the large code-bases are commercial, the code is published with Eclipse Public License 1.0 so that you may really use what you find. 

I respect my employer and do not use any project code in this blog. As the stories are based on what I have learned while working, the classes may have some resemblance to existing project code (dead or alive). But I assure that any such resemblance is purely coincidental. Each and every class presented here is written from the scratch - nothing is copied from existing projects.

And one last thing. I am not going to publish regularly, no-no. I'll just publish when I have something new to say. However, once I start a new series, you may expect the next parts to appear maybe once in a week (or two weeks) until the series is finished. 

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