BangBits

While a great fan of type-safety and static checking, I also like a certain amount of leniency from compilers. Sun's Java compiler is a good example of one that goes overboard in some anal, misunderstood attempt at servicing the developer. In the following I will explain why I think so and how to fix it by modifying the publicly available source code for the compiler. Note that although I have done something similar before, I am no compiler expert and never will be. The modifications shown in this post are mere tweaks and I will stay far away from anything below semantic analysis. "Exception is never thrown" Have you ever had a good coding session, with design, implementation and refactoring happening at an immense speed as you try to perfect the internals of a piece of code? All of a sudden you are distracted because a try block no longer contains any methods that declares a checked exception. So now, in order to satisfy the compiler, you'll have to focus on removin...

While it may no longer be so much for reference purposes as in the past, I still really like to have good books at my disposal as a software developer. The DPI of a book still beats that of any screen and I can bring a book to the restroom without raising eyebrows from my girlfriend. In the following I will come with a brief but hopefully useful review of the 3 Android books I have in my library. O'Reilly's Android Application Development The book covers Android 1.1 stuff and is thus already a little dated. The content and organization is a odd and lackluster I find, for instance there's a chapter on signing and publishing your application which comes before chapters on basic views and widgets. It also doesn't come with an ebook/PDF so there's really not a whole lot going for this book, you are probably better of looking elsewhere. Manning's Unlocking Android Also covers 1.1 stuff, but better content and definitely better organized than the O'Reilly book. It...