by Jan Blomquist
24. March 2009 10:58
Can you close your eyes and reel off the 12 points to better code. Do you have the Joel's test fresh in mind? The Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code is extremly important for all software developers. In this blog we will cover the three first rules and how we have solved this in Gaiaware.
- Do you use source control?
- Can you make a build in one step?
- Do you make daily builds?
Do you use source control?
We couldn't imagine a life without source control. In fact several studies show that firms without a good source control system cannot survive (ref; http://www.stevemcconnell.com/rd.htm ). For all software development at Gaiaware we are currently using Subversion.
Because we also truly believe in open development of our library we have decided to publish the SVN repositories for public access. That means you can just add Gaia Ajax source directly to your solution (via
externals ) and benefit from the rapid development of Gaia Ajax
Here's the urls for the repositories of Gaia AjaxTagged versions of Gaia Ajax (Released and archived) Note! Use anonymous as username when asked for credentials
Can you make a build in one step?
Yes we can. We've built a customized build system that suits Gaia Ajax just perfectly. It's written in Ruby and uses Rake and COM interop to work with Visual Studio.NET. With Ruby's duck typing it's easy to read project properties, project items and different configuration settings. The build itself is also done with VS.NET using Ruby.
Do you make daily builds?
We've been making daily/nightly builds of Gaia Ajax for quite some time now and now we've finally decided to make them public.
The opening of the source and publishing of nightly builds allow you to post a bug/issue and have it fixed that very same day. Then you will have access to the bits within the next working day (even sooner if required). It should also be easy to pickup new bits that fit the requirements of your development. We will still post release dates for official relases which you can align with your project.
Nightly builds of the commerical package is available for commercialusers. If you have an active subscription just click on the nightlybuilds link to access the nightly builds.
Update 2009-06-29: You can test our nightly build samples here
Summary
Don't cheat when it comes to Joel's 12 steps to better code. Stability and base quality is key. What good does a piece of code do if it simply doesn't work. Source control and automated builds are just some the absolute requirements to achieve higher code quality. The importance of this was also pointed out in this blog post -> (
Principles of UI architecture for libraries )
Enjoy the builds!
by Stian Solberg
8. March 2009 14:00
Our goal with Gaia Ajax is to revolutionize the way you build web applications. To accomplish this goal, Gaia needs to be both simple to use and solve complex demands.
The point: you as a developer is our most important voice to tell us about our missing puzzle part.
Now we are conducting a survey to evaluate your impression and to set the road map for the future for Gaia. This is your chance to tell us what you like/dislike and what's important/unimportant. And not least: what features you would see in upcoming versions.
It takes a few minutes, and all participating will have a chance to win a one year subscription of Gaia Ajax (value: $595).
Click here take our survey
Best regards
The Gaiaware Team
by Jan Blomquist
6. March 2009 14:00
One of the global leaders of statistics and analysis, Synovate, is publishing one of the most popular surveys in Norway. It's called Norsk Monitor (Norwegian Monitor) and will reveal your views on life, social relations and simple societal questions. The results are published every other year. A subset of this larger survey is converted into a 10 questions survey, called MikroMonitor. The chosen technology was Gaia Ajax.
Although the application is fairly simple and the target audience is norwegians, it was written fully server side with the use of C#. No JavaScript was used at all. If you want to see the survey in action, you can either click here or view the YouTube video below
Video
Using Gaia Ajax it was fairly straightforward to add the clickable images and make them highlighted as they are selected.
Code Example
A simple example of the markup looks like this
1: <asp:Repeater ID="repAnswerAlts" runat="server" onitemcommand="itc">
2: <ItemTemplate>
3: <gaia:ImageButton
4: CssClass="smilies"
5: ID="btnAnswer"
6: runat="server"
7: CommandName="AnswerClicked"
8: />
9: </ItemTemplate>
10: </asp:Repeater>
If you want us to publish information about your site or product created with Gaia Ajax, please send us an email and will be delighted to write about it.
by Stian Solberg
4. March 2009 13:53
"Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will."
-George Bernard Shaw
Highlights of Gaia Ajax 3.5
Doubled Speed
Massive performance gains - up to 50% - in Ajax callbacks.
Zero ViewState
We've improved our internal ViewState logic.
For you: even less data sent, even faster applications!
20+ New Features And Enhancements
Built-in Default Skin, Multi File Upload, Better AspectKey, Improved Hybrid Control Collection ++
See list of new features and enhancements
60+ Bug Fixes
Thanks to feedback from our community and customers, over 60 bugs are fixed. Gaia is now even more stable!
Complete change log
Even More Stuff!
Improved Pricing
Take a look at our order page to see the new prices.
Take a quick survey - win a subscription license!
To constantly improve the quality of our deliverance we are conducting a quick survey. It takes two minutes, and all participating will have a chance to win a one year subscription of Gaia Ajax (value: $595)
Take the survey here
Case Study: Logica
Logica is a leading IT and business services company, employing 40,000 people.
Read how they succeeded with Gaia
Yes,one last thing: everyone can download the trial version. Go to http://gaiaware.net/download
As always, we love feedback. Use the comments or our the forum.
Best regards,
The Gaiaware Team.
by Jan Blomquist
4. March 2009 13:03
Full changelog of final release Gaia Ajax 3.5 "Themis"
More...