Smalltalk with James Robertson

Earlier this evening, I visited the Mall of America. It's impressively large - the Nickleodeon amusement park is in the middle, surrounded by the stores. I took a photo of that:

Tags: mall of america

Today's Smalltalk 4 You looks at the inspector that's used in the latest versions of ObjectStudio. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, click on the image below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Tags: smalltalk, objectstudio, inspector

Today's Javascript 4 You continues looking at the Directions Service APIs in Google Maps. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. Join the Facebook Group to discuss the tutorials. You can view the archives here.

To watch now, click on the image below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Tags: maps, javascript

Pretty stupid, as it turns out. I have pre-check status through my Platinum status on American Airlines. That means that within the bowels of TSA, I have a known traveler number, which means that I should be able to have pre-check regardless of what airline I travel on. Except....

• American doesn't have access to that number
• TSA says they can't provide it to me
• USAirways can't request it

In fact, USAirways tells me that I need to give them the number, which I can't get access to. If this isn't a modern day example of catch-22 in operation, I don't know what is.

Tags: tsa, rigidity

Today's Smalltalk 4 You looks at finding arbitrary strings in your ObjectStudio code. Turns out that this feature in OS is easier to use than the equivalent one in VisualWorks. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, click on the image below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Tags: smalltalk, objectstudio, search

Welcome to episode 115 of Independent Misinterpretations - a Smalltalk and dynamic language oriented podcast with James Robertson and David Buck.

This week Dave and I talked about two things - encapsulation (and what kinds of things break it), and the "bus count" problem on projects. That latter one relates to the fact that on any long term project, a small number of people tend to accumulate critical knowledge about the project - and if they leave for any reason, things can slide downhill quickly.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed directly or in iTunes with this one.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

If you like the music we use, please visit Josh Woodward's site. We use the song Troublemaker for our intro/outro music. I'm sure he'd appreciate your support!

If you have feedback, send it to jarober@gmail.com - or visit us on Facebook - you can subscribe in iTunes using this iTunes enabled feed.. If you enjoy the podcast, pass the word - we would love to have more people hear about Smalltalk!

Tags: smalltalk, encapsulation

Welcome to episode 115 of Independent Misinterpretations - a Smalltalk and dynamic language oriented podcast with James Robertson and David Buck.

This week Dave and I talked about two things - encapsulation (and what kinds of things break it), and the "bus count" problem on projects. That latter one relates to the fact that on any long term project, a small number of people tend to accumulate critical knowledge about the project - and if they leave for any reason, things can slide downhill quickly.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed directly or in iTunes with this one.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

If you like the music we use, please visit Josh Woodward's site. We use the song Troublemaker for our intro/outro music. I'm sure he'd appreciate your support!

If you have feedback, send it to jarober@gmail.com - or visit us on Facebook - you can subscribe in iTunes using this iTunes enabled feed.. If you enjoy the podcast, pass the word - we would love to have more people hear about Smalltalk!

Tags: smalltalk, encapsulation

Posterous is closing down:

On April 30th, we will turn off posterous.com and our mobile apps in order to focus 100% of our efforts on Twitter. This means that as of April 30, Posterous Spaces will no longer be available either to view or to edit.

Now, they are letting you download your content, but: what do you actually do with it? Having your own server shields you from this. Sure, the hosting company could go bust, but there are other hosting firms, and you can switch your DNS setup fairly easily.

Tags: hosting

Today's Smalltalk 4 You looks at one of the low level API aspects of Smalltalk - #instVarAt: and #instVarAt:put:. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, click on the image below:

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If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Today we'll look at a way you can break encapsulation in Smalltalk - useful for some low level tasks (interfacing with databases, for instance) - but dangerous in general. Still, it's useful to know what you can accomplish, so long as you are also aware of the dangers. Consider this class:

Object subclass: #Person
    classInstanceVariableNames: 'nextId '
    instanceVariableNames: 'id first last '
    classVariableNames: ''
    poolDictionaries: ''

Now consider this code:

person := Person new.
person first: 'James'.
person last: 'Robertson'.


person instVarAt: 1

Execute that, and you should get back the value in 'id' = the first instance variable. Again this is not something you want to make use of on a normal basis. It can be useful when debugging (say you have a class without accessing methods), or when creating accessing frameworks for external data. Similarly:

person instVarAt: 1 put: 0.

Need more help? There's a screencast for other topics like this which you may want to watch. Questions? Try the "Chat with James" Google gadget over in the sidebar.

Tags: smalltalk, va smalltalk, reflection

Today's Javascript 4 You continues looking at the Directions Service. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. Join the Facebook Group to discuss the tutorials. You can view the archives here.

To watch now, click on the image below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Tags: javascript, maps

Today's Smalltalk 4 You looks at some basic Store (version control) usage in ObjectStudio 8. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, click on the image below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

Tags: smalltalk, objectstudio, store