EuroPython 2008 - Day 1

It's the end of first day of EuroPython 2008, a good time to overlook what I've seen.





Right after the keynote, which was short and uplifting, I've headed to the first session - Dynamic Compilation in Python and Jython by Tobias Ivarsson and Jim Baker. It was long and boring, but still inspiring. They looked into things like bytecode versus AST manipulation, introduced nice tools like pyassem. It's nice to see that Java and JVM is a hot topic in smart programmer communities. I consider Python community as one of the smartest people in software development.



Then I went to listen to my native speaker Ignas Mikalajūnas from Programmers of Vilnius. He told Why he Wants Us to Use Eggs. I would disagree with saying "Eggs are to Pythons as Jars are to Java...". It's more like "Eggs may some day be to Pythons as Maven is for Java". For now Eggs look scary and unstable especially with things like Known Good Set (compare it to Maven Repository). Though I would definitely want to use it for Python projects. Better than nothing.





Then I made a mistake by visiting John Pinner's "Python at Home" talk. He was going to tell how he automated his boiler at home with use of Python. I expected a lot from that, instead I've seen some photos of a boiler wired to a motherboard and some source code like "boiler.ignition(On)" and "boiler.ignition(Off)". I would recommend John (and all the other speakers) not to dig deep into source code but concentrate on big picture instead.



I didn't want to go to vendor pitch sessions or things that does not sound interesting (Advanced Searching for Plone and stuff), so my choice was the Barcamp / Open Space, where Tommi Virtanen was giving a talk on Twisted. If you want messaging in Python, do it in Twisted. The guy gave a great quote of Torvalds Linus, which sounded something like "If you have to use debugging - you already have problems. Take a step back and review what could be wrong". It definitely was a great session.



I was going to visit "Discouraging the Use of Python" next, but I was tired and didn't want to be discouraged, so I've headed home to write all this down.

Most of attendees I've spoken to admit that last year's EuroPython was way better than this. But well, two more days to go.

Now for some fun moments:
Canonical was hiring Django developers and senior engineers.



Until the epic failure of their campaign:



All pythonistas got a copy of NetBeans 6.1 and Open Solaris (go Sun! :)) along with geeky looking Bazaar T-Shirt.



And of course, loads of free coffee, snacks and socializing!






See You there at Day 2!

Update

Yesterday I forgot to mention that Guido Van Rossum did not participate in the conference like the last year. I did not participate in his video keynote either...

CMS battle: Drupal vs Joomla vs Custom Programming

In modern Content Management System (CMS) world there are two major figures - Joomla (descendant of Mambo CMS ) and Drupal. They both are open source and have large comunities with enormous amounts of extensions and themes. It's hard to choose which one to use without trying them out. As usually, there are more options - home grown custom programming or even building your own CMS (which I was once stupid enough to do). Programming from scratch is always fun and beneficial for your skills, however, if you need things up and running in no time or you don't do (or don't want to do) any programming, using a CMS is the way to go.

If you are digging for CMS comparisons and trying to decide which one is best for you, here is a quick and dirty answer - go for Drupal, you won't regret it.

Why?

After test-driving them both I've came to these conclusions:

• Joomla is bloated, Drupal is minimal
• Drupal is easy to use and intuitive, Joomla is confusing

That was more than enough for a minimalist like me.

Here are some statistics from CMS Matrix for a more detailed comparison. It shows that Drupal is extremely modular and Joomla has a heavy core, thus a terrible architecture. That means Joomla is hard to extend and messy under the hood. Drupal, on the other hand, looks beautiful.

Product	Drupal 6.2	Joomla! 1.5.3
Last Updated	4/10/2008	5/31/2008
System Requirements	Drupal	Joomla!
Application Server	PHP 4.3.5+	Any that supports PHP (Apache recommended)
Approximate Cost	Free	Free
Database	MySQL, Postgres	MySQL
License	GNU GPL	GNU/GPL v2
Operating System	Any	Any
Programming Language	PHP	PHP
Root Access	No	No
Shell Access	No	No
Web Server	Apache, IIS	Apache
Security	Drupal	Joomla!
Audit Trail	Yes	No
Captcha	Free Add On	Free Add On
Content Approval	Yes	Yes
Email Verification	Yes	Yes
Granular Privileges	Yes	No
Kerberos Authentication	No	No
LDAP Authentication	Free Add On	Yes
Login History	Yes	Yes
NIS Authentication	No	No
NTLM Authentication	Free Add On	No
Pluggable Authentication	Yes	Yes
Problem Notification	No	No
Sandbox	No	No
Session Management	Yes	Yes
SMB Authentication	No	No
SSL Compatible	Yes	Yes
SSL Logins	No	Yes
SSL Pages	No	Yes
Versioning	Yes	No
Support	Drupal	Joomla!
Certification Program	No	No
Code Skeletons	Yes	No
Commercial Manuals	Yes	Yes
Commercial Support	Yes	Yes
Commercial Training	Yes	Yes
Developer Community	Yes	Yes
Online Help	Yes	Yes
Pluggable API	Yes	Yes
Professional Hosting	Yes	Yes
Professional Services	Yes	Yes
Public Forum	Yes	Yes
Public Mailing List	Yes	No
Test Framework	Free Add On	Yes
Third-Party Developers	Yes	Yes
Users Conference	Yes	Yes
Ease of Use	Drupal	Joomla!
Drag-N-Drop Content	Free Add On	No
Email To Discussion	Free Add On	Free Add On
Friendly URLs	Yes	Yes
Image Resizing	Free Add On	Yes
Macro Language	Free Add On	Yes
Mass Upload	Free Add On	No
Prototyping	Limited	Yes
Server Page Language	Yes	Yes
Site Setup Wizard	Limited	No
Spell Checker	Free Add On	No
Style Wizard	Limited	No
Subscriptions	Free Add On	No
Template Language	Limited	Yes
UI Levels	No	Yes
Undo	Limited	No
WYSIWYG Editor	Free Add On	Yes
Zip Archives	No	No
Performance	Drupal	Joomla!
Advanced Caching	Yes	Yes
Database Replication	Limited	No
Load Balancing	Yes	Yes
Page Caching	Yes	Yes
Static Content Export	No	No
Management	Drupal	Joomla!
Advertising Management	Free Add On	Yes
Asset Management	Yes	Yes
Clipboard	No	No
Content Scheduling	Free Add On	Yes
Content Staging	Free Add On	No
Inline Administration	Yes	Yes
Online Administration	Yes	Yes
Package Deployment	No	No
Sub-sites / Roots	Yes	Yes
Themes / Skins	Yes	Yes
Trash	No	Yes
Web Statistics	Yes	Yes
Web-based Style/Template Management	Yes	Yes
Web-based Translation Management	Yes	Free Add On
Workflow Engine	Limited	No
Interoperability	Drupal	Joomla!
Content Syndication (RSS)	Yes	Yes
FTP Support	Limited	Yes
iCal	Free Add On	No
UTF-8 Support	Yes	Yes
WAI Compliant	Limited	No
WebDAV Support	No	No
XHTML Compliant	Yes	No
Flexibility	Drupal	Joomla!
CGI-mode Support	Yes	Yes
Content Reuse	Limited	Yes
Extensible User Profiles	Yes	Yes
Interface Localization	Yes	Yes
Metadata	Yes	Yes
Multi-lingual Content	Yes	Free Add On
Multi-lingual Content Integration	Free Add On	Free Add On
Multi-Site Deployment	Yes	Free Add On
URL Rewriting	Yes	Yes
Built-in Applications	Drupal	Joomla!
Blog	Yes	Yes
Chat	Free Add On	Free Add On
Classifieds	Free Add On	Free Add On
Contact Management	Free Add On	Yes
Data Entry	Free Add On	Free Add On
Database Reports	No	Free Add On
Discussion / Forum	Yes	Free Add On
Document Management	Limited	Free Add On
Events Calendar	Free Add On	Free Add On
Events Management	Free Add On	Free Add On
Expense Reports	No	Free Add On
FAQ Management	Yes	Yes
File Distribution	Free Add On	Free Add On
Graphs and Charts	No	Free Add On
Groupware	Free Add On	Free Add On
Guest Book	Free Add On	Free Add On
Help Desk / Bug Reporting	Free Add On	Free Add On
HTTP Proxy	No	No
In/Out Board	No	No
Job Postings	Free Add On	Free Add On
Link Management	Free Add On	Yes
Mail Form	Free Add On	Yes
Matrix	No	No
My Page / Dashboard	Free Add On	No
Newsletter	Free Add On	Free Add On
Photo Gallery	Free Add On	Free Add On
Polls	Yes	Yes
Product Management	Free Add On	Yes
Project Tracking	Free Add On	Free Add On
Search Engine	Yes	Yes
Site Map	Free Add On	Free Add On
Stock Quotes	Free Add On	No
Surveys	Free Add On	Free Add On
Syndicated Content (RSS)	Yes	Yes
Tests / Quizzes	Free Add On	Free Add On
Time Tracking	Free Add On	No
User Contributions	Yes	Yes
Weather	Free Add On	No
Web Services Front End	Limited	Yes
Wiki	Free Add On	Free Add On
Commerce	Drupal	Joomla!
Affiliate Tracking	Free Add On	Free Add On
Inventory Management	Free Add On	Free Add On
Pluggable Payments	Free Add On	Free Add On
Pluggable Shipping	Free Add On	Free Add On
Pluggable Tax	Free Add On	Free Add On
Point of Sale	No	Free Add On
Shopping Cart	Free Add On	Free Add On
Subscriptions	Free Add On	Free Add On
Wish Lists	Free Add On	Free Add On

Hope this helps to make a choice.

XSL Engine

Amazingly, some bright minds of the company I work at supported the idea to release one of our products as an open source software. It's nice to see a huge "Nothing is Free" business opening up a little. I'm proud to present the release of the XSL Engine:

XSLE at Google Code

XSL Engine is an XSL transformation server and client. It provides united processing of XSL transformations, independent of any programming environment. This can remove load from other applications. It features high throughput, with the possibility to increase the throughput of the XSL transformations by setting up new servers. It operates in an Apache Tomcat Web container. XSL documents are loaded into cache. XSL Includes are supported. PDF can be generated (using XSL-FO). XSL cache can be automatically replicated among remote servers.

Getting Unicode output in Eclipse Console

Tired of seeing garbled Eclipse Console output? Here is a quick and dirty tutorial for getting Unicode output in Eclipse Console.

Fact: You will not get Unicode output in Eclipse Console while using System.out directly in Windows. See Eclipse BUG #13865.

1. add -Dfile.encoding=UTF-8 to your eclipse.ini

2. make sure your Eclipse Console font supports Unicode. You can try it out by typing unicode characters directly to console with keyboard. Console Font is set in Window -> Preferences -> General -> Appearance -> Colors and Fonts -> Debug -> Console Font

3. if you are NOT using Windows, set your system encoding to UTF-8. You should now see Unicode characters in Console after restarting Eclipse.

4. if you are using Windows or do not want to change your OS encoding, you will have to avoid using System.out stream directly. Instead, wrap it up with java.io.PrintStream:
PrintStream sysout = new PrintStream(System.out, true, "UTF-8");
sysout.println("\u2297\u0035\u039e\u322F\u5193");

5. if you are using Log4J with ConsoleAppender, make sure to set the encoding property to UTF-8. Example:
#TRACE appender
log4j.appender.stdout.trace=org.apache.log4j.ConsoleAppender
log4j.appender.stdout.trace.layout=org.apache.log4j.PatternLayout
log4j.appender.stdout.trace.encoding=UTF-8
log4j.appender.stdout.trace.layout.ConversionPattern=%p [%c] - %m%n
log4j.appender.stdout.trace.Threshold=TRACE

Happy development!

Make your Eclipse rock

Eclipse is one of the greatest IDEs available out there. In my opinion it's the best, because in comparison with other choices such as Intellij IDEA, Eclipse is free and open. People say NetBeans are getting good, however I am too skeptic to believe. As it's the matter of preference, I will stick with Eclipse.

Yet, after a fresh and clean install Eclipse (v3.3 as of this moment) is not yet kicking. A few crucial things are missing. I'll give out my recipe to making Eclipse rock. So, let's get on with that:

1. Fresh install from www.eclipse.org. As I'm NOT doing J2EE/Web/XML stuff at home, Eclipse IDE for Java Developers is the best choice for me.
2. Give it more RAM! Default values are pathetic, so you should edit your eclipse.ini to look like this:
   

   -showsplash
   org.eclipse.platform
   --launcher.XXMaxPermSize
   256M
   -vmargs
   -Dosgi.requiredJavaVersion=1.5
   -Xms256m
   -Xmx1024m  
   -XX:PermSize=256m

   Say bye to those possible out of memory and permgen space errors.
   
3. Fine-tune the Preferences. Go straight to workspace and open Window -> Preferences.
   General:
   Check "Show heap status" - it's nice to see how much heap you've got.
   General -> Appearance:
   Uncheck "Show text on the perspective bar". That gives more space for perspective icons.
   Check "Show traditional style tabs". Performance.
   Uncheck "Enable animations". Performance.
   General -> Editors -> Text Editors:
   Check "Insert spaces for tabs". You may not want that if you're a tab fan.
   Check "Show print margin". 80 is good.
   Check "Show line numbers". Who would not want to see line numbers by default?
   General -> Editors -> Text Editors -> Spelling:
   Uncheck "Enable spell checking". Performance. And hell, that's no Microsoft Word.
   General -> Startup and Shutdown:
   Uncheck "Mylin Tasks UI" from "Plug-ins activated on startup". Unless you REALLY want to use Mylin. I think it sucks and terribly slows Eclipse down.
   General -> Workspace:
   Choose "UTF-8" as your "Text file encoding". Unicode is the way to go.
   Choose "Unix" as your "New text file line delimiter". This is also is the way to go.
   Java -> Code Style -> Formatter:
   Click "Edit..." on Eclipse [built-in] profile. Set new profile name. In "Identation" tab set "Tab policy" to "Spaces only". You may skip this if you're a tab dude.
   Java -> Compiler -> Errors/Warnings:
   You may want to harden your compiler warnings for more beautiful and strict development. I tend to override these:
   In "Code style": "Undocumented empty block" -> "Warning".
   In "Unnecessary code": "Unnecessary 'else' statement" -> "Warning".
   In "Unnecessary code": "Unnecessary cast or 'instanceof' operation" -> "Warning".
   In "Unnecessary code": "Unnecessary declaration of thrown checked exception" -> "Warning".
   Java -> Compiler -> Javadoc:
   Set "Malformed Javadoc comments:" -> "Warning".
   Set "Only consider members as visible as: " -> "Private".
   You want your Javadoc clean, don't you.
   Java -> Editor -> Content Assist -> Advanced:
   In content assist proposal list uncheck entries marked with "(Mylin)" and check the alternatives: "Other Java Proposals", "Template Proposals", "Type Proposals".
   In cycling list check all same entries: "Other Java Proposals", "Template Proposals", "Type Proposals".
   Web and XML -> XML Files -> Source:
   In "Formatting" section check "Indent using spaces" and set Indentation size to "2". Otherwise you will end up with tabs in your XML.
   
4. Subversive - the best Eclipse plug-in for SVN support:
   Help -> Software Updates -> Find and Install. Search for new features to install. Add two New Remote Sites - "Subversive SVN Connectors" with URL: http://www.polarion.org/projects/subversive/download/eclipse/2.0/update-site/ and "Subversive plug-in" with URL: http://download.eclipse.org/technology/subversive/0.7/update-site/
   Check http://www.eclipse.org/subversive/downloads.php for latest URLs.
   Install new components. Skip Mylin integration and sources.
   
5. Maven plug-in. You MUST know what Maven is, otherwise don't do Java. Seriously. You may choose from Tycho and Q: http://maven.apache.org/eclipse-plugin.html
   I was a long-time user of Tycho, however Q looks really promising. I'm trying it right now for the first time. Yeah, definitely, go for Q. Installation is easy, just add New Remote Site:
   Q4E: http://q4e.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/updatesite/
   
6. XML Buddy. Your light weight swiss army knife in Eclipse XML editing. Download plug-in manually from http://xmlbuddy.com and drop it into your Eclipse plugins folder, then restart.
7. JADClipse. Your daily Java decompiler. Best for those times when you need to go under the hood. Make this a habit. You will need JAD in your PATH: http://www.kpdus.com/jad.html
   Then download JADClipse plug-in from http://jadclipse.sourceforge.net/, drop it to Eclipse plugins folder and restart.
   

Enjoy your tools!