Published inCodeX·Aug 14Member-onlyTests are not documentationWhen learning test-driven development (TDD), even from the less dogmatic teachers, you might hear the erroneous dogma that tests are documentation. Any Java project, except maybe Hello World, should have tests. And any Java project, except maybe those meant only for in-house use, should have documentation. If it’s not already…Java5 min readJava5 min read
Jul 31What Groovy auto-importsI had heard of the Spock testing framework before, I knew IntelliJ IDEA (even the Community Edition) has Spock. Or, more precisely, IntelliJ can have Maven download it and add it to the XML file with the dependencies. So I decided to give Spock a try. I made a Hello…Groovy3 min readGroovy3 min read
Jul 17Java trick question: string theoryThere’s yet another silly trick question about Java making the rounds on the Internet. Before you answer it, keep in mind that sometimes the shtick of a trick question is getting you to assume something that is not actually stated in the question. Can a Java class extend String? The…Java2 min readJava2 min read
Published inDev Genius·Jul 7Member-onlyAlgorithms practice: The binary strings problemHere’s a classic problem in the study of algorithms: Given a length n, list all the “binary strings” of length n can be made such that none contains two or more consecutive 1s? For example, given length n = 4, the possibilities are “0000,” “0001,” “0010,” “0100,” “0101,” “1000,” “1001”…Algorithms10 min readAlgorithms10 min read
Jul 3Java lives as long as people write articles saying it’s deadJava is dead. Article after article tells us that Java is dying. Java is too verbose, too archaic, it’s not evolving fast enough, it’s a terrible first programming language for a student, etc. There are plenty of valid criticisms of Java, as experts like Martin Odersky can tell you. And…Java4 min readJava4 min read
Jul 1Member-onlyKnow how the Java annotations you use work. Part III: Lombok annotations for getters and settersAnnotations in Java can feel like magic, and if we don’t make an effort to understand what they do, we’re little better than cargo cult programmers. In both Part I and Part II of this series, I’ve hinted that I’m going to write an article about Spring’s @Autowired annotation. …Java5 min readJava5 min read
Published inDev Genius·Jun 20Member-only5 silly Java trick questions, with answersTo demonstrate your Java programming acumen, you could create a Java program that does something that’s really useful to you and other people. Or you could answer a bunch of silly trick questions with little relevance to real world projects. This article’s about the latter. Here are five silly Java…Java8 min readJava8 min read
Jun 10Quick tip: Random alphanumerics in ScalaOnce in a while in my Java projects, I need a function that gives a pseudorandom String of alphanumeric gibberish. For example, “UvYB8qDS2nhn9wu”. So I wrote a Java function for that: public static String alphanumeric(int length) { // TODO…Java2 min readJava2 min read
Published inDev Genius·Jun 7Member-onlyRerouting the Java system’s default output streamFile this one under “Not sure when I would ever need to do this, but now I know how to do it.” You can reroute the output of java.lang.System.out to a String, and you can do this a few different ways. Using ByteArrayOutputStream from the java.io package might be the…Java4 min readJava4 min read
May 19Member-onlyData structures exercise: Sorted lists in Java with TDDMany years ago, Richard Hendricks made the big mistake of writing a brute force search for a sorted list. We all make silly mistakes, I’ve made a few just writing this article. I’d consider myself fortunate to have a past silly mistake of mine brought up in a staff meeting…Data Structures14 min readData Structures14 min read
