Category Archives: Programming

Best WAMP for Web Development (2013 Edition)

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Lex

I just wanted to put out there one guy’s opinion on the best WAMP package in 2013. I’ve had the chance to use all of the following, and here’s my rating from best (1) to worst (5). I should say first thought … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming, Tools, Web Development | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Convert String to Qt Keycode in C++

Posted on December 25, 2012 by Lex

I came across the need to convert a string representing a key on the keyboard to a keycode enum like Qt::Key (or anything else). Example conversions would be: As you see the above includes not just alpha-numeric keys but modifiers and … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

When an Integer and a Floating Point Number Meet in C++

Posted on December 1, 2012 by Lex

First, if you don’t know what a floating point number is, or don’t know that it can be a minefield for programmers that work with numbers, please read What Every Computer Scientist Should Know About Floating-Point Arithmetic. In C++, there are … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Include Full BibTeX Entry Inside Text

Posted on January 28, 2012 by Lex

This isn’t rocket science, but you can insert BibTeX entries as you go, instead of (dumping all the references at the end in a “References” section. It’s useful when writing many chaotic pages of notes as you crawl through dozens … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Backward Compatibility in C++ Libraries

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Lex

Backward compatibility is an important design goal of a software system that says that a new version of the software should play nice with the old version. As an example, Microsoft Windows has done a remarkably good job (in my opinion) … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Sorting a Sorted List in C++

Posted on July 4, 2011 by Lex

It came to my attention that I didn’t know how well STL sorting algorithms performed on a vector of values that are already sorted. One would hope it would be close to $latex O(n)$. This page does a comparison of … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Open Source Software Engineering is Not Communism

Posted on May 20, 2011 by Lex

I’ve worked on a number of software engineering projects over the years that involve a group of 3-5 developers. I’ve also contributed to large open source projects of 20+ developers. The figure to the left is taken from a post … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Commas in a PHP For Loop

Posted on April 24, 2011 by Lex

When generating a string that lists items (e.g. for a MySQL query) with a for-loop in PHP, you often need to add commas after every element except the last one. It may be trivial advice, but instead of having an … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming, Web Development | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Bash Script to Determine Terrorist Threat Level

Posted on March 16, 2011 by Lex

I’ve really been immersing myself into the world of Bash scripting lately. There is an incredible amount of productivity-increasing scripts available online, and I have already written several of my own that make my programming life just a little easier. That … Continue reading →

Posted in Linux, Programming | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

PHP IDE: Avoiding Emacs

Posted on March 9, 2011 by Lex

I love Emacs. I consider this a problem, because while it’s an exceptionally powerful and productive environment for a programmer, I feel like it’s a tool that has a good chance of being left in the dust of quickly developing … Continue reading →

Posted in Programming, Web Development | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments