vsbabu.org

C# day 2

• Can catch multiple named exceptions AND have any uncaught exception caught in a generic exception clause. Good.
• Can call a function with named arguments like func(myname=”Babu”). [Better than Java, as good as Python].
• Through delegates, functions can be passed as parameters to other functions. However, these functions should return void, and can't accept any parameter - like a subroutine.
• Multithreading is pre-emptive.
• Arrays are decent and size can be initialized using a variable size. [As good as Java, but completely smoked by Python's lists (forget slices, reverse indexing etc.)]
• Strings are comparable to Java strings. Can't come anywhere near Python's strings (No easy slices, no reverse indexing, AFAIK multi-line strings are a pain just like C, no triple-quoting or freely using single and double quotes).
• The good old method of using %s %d etc. to format a string is replaced with {0} {1} etc. I can't quite see any benefit. Again, smoked by Python's ludicrously simple mechanism
• Date processing and threading is pretty simple. In these two areas, I think C# surpasses Java and to a certain extent, Python (without mxTools).

According to the instructor, who seems to be a Microsoft expert and a fan (in any case, he has plenty of computing experience from 1978 and genuinely seems to like Microsoft):

• Objects = State, Behaviour, Identity (SBI)
• OOP = Polymorphism, Inheritance, Encapsulation (PIE)
• Rules of OOP are (1)Short and sweet methods, (2)local variables should be initialized as close as possible to the first use, (3) as few data members as needed.

Okay!

Other notable quotes.

• Linux and Open Source is not ready for Enterprise, because those clients need one vendor to be held accountable for support. Can you get any money from Microsoft because your company lost 100 hours due to the recent blaster worms?

• Linux doesn't need as many reboots as Win2k+ because Win32 is a very complex piece of software; complexity affects stability. It may be more complex, but for real life needs, I still have not seen Win32 providing more features than Linux does; other than to sysadmins who can't use a text editor to adjust configuration settings.

• C#'s performance on .Net CLR is much better than comparable Java code on JRE. This, I am not so sure…

In any case, I'm beginning to like C# a little better than Java. One thing C# has going for it is Visual Studio.Net. For desktop application building, I'm not sure any Java tool out there matches it.

Well, if you want to be at your productive best, to make desktop applications, use Python, VIM and PythonCard

Note: These are simply my observations as a poor soul who gets to code in C#, Java and Python in an almost random manner. Net result is that I'm not able to concentrate on any one thing fully; so if you are a Guru in one of these languages and think I'm wrong, please be kind enough to point it out, gently!

1. Yes, that point about MSBlast is absolutely spot on! Our network is still screwed over from the aftermath and it was virtually impossible to do any work last Thursday because of the rampant infections and network traffic.

   I was just glad I wasn't at work on Friday as well. And as for the Microsoft support - we'd all have been better off running Red Hat or some other brand of Linux. I wished I'd had my Knoppix CD with me, really.

   Posted by: Paul Boddie on August 21, 2003 05:27 AM

2. "I wished I'd had my Knoppix CD with me, really." +1; I actually carry one around all the time :-) Just in case...

   Posted by: Babu on August 21, 2003 05:50 AM

3. a.
   > Can call a function with named arguments like func(myname="Babu").

   I googled for an example of this but only came up with hits regarding Attributes.

   b. Is the date statement still valid after Python 2.3's date improvements?
   

   Posted by: DeanG on August 25, 2003 05:12 PM

4. Function with named arguments: the C# docs are silent about this - may be they don't want us to use it? Anyway, this is a question I had and when I tried calling a function with named argument, it worked. I didn't try testing it with changing the order of arguments though. I find it useful to call methods with named arguments - especially if the argument list is more than 5.

   Date statement - for me, I think C#'s builtin Parse() method makes a bit better than Python 2.3's improvements :-)

   Posted by: Babu on August 26, 2003 05:44 AM