January 2008 Entries
I've written about this a few times now (use the search thingy to find where) but I'm still surprised how many people mess up the Singleton pattern. For instance take: if (blogSettingsSingleton == null) { blogSettingsSingleton = new BlogSettings(); } return blogSettingsSingleton; Looks ok, right? But this is a classic poor pattern when dealing with multi-threaded apps. Why? Look at the initial 'if' statement, and think what happens if multiple treads hit this at the same time...one thread...
I was reading a story about a 'playable search engine' called Seeqpod being sued under the DMCA safe harbor. I have to admit that I'd never even heard of Seeqpod before this story but it's well pretty interesting! For a while now I've been embedding Youtube music videos but this is a much more interesting step. The engine doesn't (AFAIK) actually host these music files, it just searches them and provides a streaming service. This is a pretty interesting idea...wonder if it'll survive. Of course I guess these files could be pretty volatile, hmm a cool enhancement would be to...
Well, back at work after my trip back to Scotland for Christmas and Hogmanay (New Years Eve as non-scots call it :-)). Great time seeing family again, I hope I never have to spend Christmas away from them. We have a few traditions every year, Christmas eve at my cousin's, Christmas day at my sisters, Boxing Day at my parents then the wait until Hogmanay when we head to yet another cousins. Then it's basically a week of being drunk and eating 'traditional' food (Steak Pie, Boiled Ham and Beef Stew, all with mushy peas). So, great time, amazing to...