S Fox

yeah i meant all you really need is HashSet and TreeSet, i have never needed to implement the set interface itself to create a custom type of set.

ok you got me, i do that too, but i think its the only time i do it.

take a list and run it thru a for loop, append each item to a set, the set removes all duplicates from the list, that's how you make a set. as was already said, a set is the same idea as a set in mathematics, so there's no need to use an if-statement to prevent duplicates getting added into a set, duplicates are prevented automatically.
list: red, blue, green, green, red ----> set: red, blue, green

i think there is also a convenience method in collections to add everything to a set, or you could do it with a lambda, lots of ways to do it.
hashset is backed by a hashmap, but there's also a treeset, i think the set interface you'd probably never need in your entire life.
hashset and treeset are all i ever needed.

im not too sure how java decides if 2 objects are equal, but you can override their default behavior with your own equality operator as needed.

comparing can be a bit tricky for those new to java, you have to use String::equals() instead of == operator when comparing strings.
the equals() method is basically the same as strcmp in C, and == is probably just comparing the memory address of 2 objects to see if they're the same.
using == on two different string objects will be a result of not equal, even if the text of both objects is identical.

Last year I was reading about the pdp-11, altair, and some others. There is indeed assembler for pdp-11, unix and the C language both came from it. This page has some info on it and a picture of Kernigan and Ritchie programming unix onto a pdp-11 thru a teletype machine:
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/03/a-brief-tour-of-the-pdp-11-the-most-influential-minicomputer-of-all-time/

Bill Gates created a version of basic for the altair computer which was pretty much a clone of the pdp-11's version of basic-plus, selling basic to altair is how he started microsoft. Apple also paid MS to port their basic to the appleII.

What I don't understand though, and what nobody ever writes about, is how C became popular in the early 90s all of a sudden. It seems like C was ignored for 20 years, then became popular overnight. You never programmed the pdp-11 in C? When did you switch to using C and then to java? I lived thru that era and don't even know how it happened.

Paul Clapham wrote:

S Fox wrote:you might think BASIC is for babies, but i've seen very professional apps done in it...

Sure, back in the 80's I wrote all kinds of real apps for business in several varieties of BASIC. It was certainly not a toy language then.

i taught myself basic on the apple2 in the 80s, i was never an expert in it though.

yeah it definitely wasn't a toy language back then, but it was interpreted and ran dog-slow compared to asm, there are some timed comparisons on youtube for apple2 i saw once, clearing/redrawing the screen was very bad.

now you can just compile basic to a binary and easily get all that speed for things you would of had to code in asm, you can do multi threaded apps, and use it with api's, so i guess there's no need to use system specific peeks and pokes anymore either.

in the late 80s to early 90s microsoft created a version of basic which didn't require line numbers, and it came with an ide which ran on dos and allowed you to compile it to a binary too, but i don't know how good it performed compared to interpreted or asm, i tried it out once just for fun, i think it also had a debugger. at the time this came out, C was beginning to become popular so maybe nobody ever really used this version of basic. i never even knew about it til recently.

I found it funny you are frustrated about teaching imaginary ducks to quack. You see, I too am frustrated by programmers. They're always saying hello to the world, when it has no ears, and they're always implementing foo and bar in their programs. Mr. T pities the foo, and why a bar? Just drink at home like a proper alcoholic, it's cheaper. Now they're filling up all the programs with blank lines and duckhelpers, it's madness!

i'm sure they told you the difference between a member variable and local variable, and how scope and scope resolution works, that's really basic stuff.
anything inside braces is in a code block, that doesn't mean everything in a code block is a local variable.

mike was correct, they do have a PlayerSorter class, source is here:
https://github.com/eugenp/tutorials/tree/master/core-java-modules/core-java-lang/src/main/java/com/baeldung/comparable

carey: I actually liked the way that K&R C book was written, and it does have exercises!
"Exercise 1-5. Modify the temperature conversion program to print the table in reverse order, that is, from 300 degrees to 0."

kevin: c, c++, c#, java, and python are all in demand, and once you learn one language you can learn another pretty easy.
most of these languages are based on C, so they're all practically the same thing.
c++ is "c with classes", java is "c++ without pointers/references", python is... ?
anyways, basic isn't in demand at all, but keep using it if you like it.
i was using javaFX for my own personal projects, but nobody uses that at all, even though its the best thing in java.
java has totally abandoned FX and left it to rot i think, because it wasn't as popular as swing.
i switched to mainly using c++ with QT now, its a lot like javaFX, its great.
my opinion is that learning api's is more important and more difficult than learning a language.
instead of learning multiple languages, learning multiple api's for 1 language will allow you to do more things with it.

here's some good books on python and they're all free to read
you can also buy the physical/ebook version of them to support the author
https://inventwithpython.com/

yes its my name, just call me fox or s fox as you like.

i think PlayerSorter is a typo, they said in step2 they'll make a PlayerSorter class, but they actually meant a Player class.

this should help?
https://www.howtogeek.com/789655/how-to-open-powershell-with-admin-privileges-from-cmd/

kevin Abel wrote:Campbell,

Even with BASIC I'd run into tricky logic and coding situations.

Kevin

you might think BASIC is for babies, but i've seen very professional apps done in it, which are compiled and run just as fast as compiled C code, and they also have a GUI as well. you might be surprised what you can do with basic these days.
https://www.freebasic.net/

python has no type safety, and no braces for maintaining the formatting of the code. i converted some python apps into java, and they needed weeks of debugging because it was so hard to see where loops and code blocks begin and end, and then you had to figure out what type a variable is because the author reused variables for dozens of different types. you have to pray for a crash to easily find the bugs, god help you if it compiles and its all wrong. python is crap.

i have a feeling that "new Rope().swing();" would violate some coding best practices / style guide.
it irks me to even look at it.

the articles are great and do seem easier to read than oracles, but you know... they don't really do a good job explaining what spring or spring boot is, or why i would want it. these articles are just a way to draw people in for a sales pitch on spring, but they have failed! i read their explanation "what is spring?" and still have no idea what this spring stuff is, too bad.

i can't understand what that foxpro app is doing, but if you're using windows server apparently you can use either powershell or command prompt commands to see which network users have open files, and you can easily access powershell or cmd thru a java app so that's how i'd do it.

here's a site showing some of the powershell commands
https://activedirectorypro.com/view-open-files-windows-server/