I’ve been playing around a bit recently with mono and cocoa#.
There also seems to be an experimental build of Mono-develop.
I begin to think that .net and mono are going to be excellent java competitors. I also think that the idea of supporting platform differences makes more sense than the java swing approach of lowest-common-denominator functionality.
I started off SQLEditor in java swing and then switched to cocoa. I wonder if there will eventually be another rewrite to mono and .net?
SQLEditor Cocoa Beta 6 has been released. Beta 6 offers a number of significant enhancements and improvements, plus several bug fixes.
This new version expires on September 30th 2004.
Why not download it now?
SQLEditorCB6.dmg[355k]
Good progress is being made again on the Cocoa version of SQLEditor. I have recently rewritten the parsing system to use javacc instead of my own home built parser. This allows for better, simpler and more reliable parsing. Writing my own parser was interesting but wasn’t really the best strategy. This new parser should make its way into the java version of SQLEditor eventually.
A key new feature is that the import system can now report parsing errors to the user. Previously the whole thing just kind of gave up without any indication of what went wrong. BAD!
Now you get a nice little window (actually a panel) that appears and gives a list of errors. The current development version always shows this window but I’m still trying to decide if it is better to show it on every import or just when something goes wrong.
The new parser is also much easier to expand to support new features. The old version required a complicated system to add new tokens, the new one has a standard format and requires only a single line.
The new version should also work reliably on Mac OS X 10.2 or Mac OS X 10.3. Which is a change over the previous version that crashed oddly on 10.3.
I’ve decided to release a new version of SQLEditor (Java). The FC1 version is a final candidate version that hopefully incorporates fixes for the bugs that people have reported. There have been problems with users running Mac OS X 10.3 because of crashes in the Java Virtual Machine. These are problems that Apple has to deal with and hopefully any remaining crashes will be fixed in revisions to the Apple JVM.
The Apple – iMac page has a really odd announcement on it (right, middle) stating that stocks of the old iMac have pretty much run out and the whole line will be replaced in September. The message also apologises to customers for not having a replacement ready.
It’s a weird message. The assorted mac sites have jumped on the message and rumors are flying in all directions: processor shortages, new materials, late redesigns or manufacturing disasters have all been suggested.
The real oddity with the whole thing is the fact that there has been no public announcement of the unit. It wasn’t introduced at the WWDC last week. Why not simply announce it and then explain that it won’t be ready until the end of August? Lots of stories about this too, however it does suggest that the Paris Apple Expo is the most likely candidate for the launch. However I make no prediction on this.
The timescale is odd as well. What exactly can be achieved in 2 months? (or actually about a month and a bit. According to manufacturing sources about 3 weeks are needed to actually get the stuff to retailers). Major redesigns are probably out, processor shortages are hardly unexpected given the situation with IBM at their East Fishkill processor plant. (Is it just me or is there something ironic about a processor plant that uses lots of exotic chemicals having the word Fishkill in it’s title?)
Is there some odd technology or design that can’t be announced until September? Who knows?
It’s unfortunate that this happened now. I was very interested in buying a new iMac to run 10.3 on, but now I have to wait until September. Almost two months away. 🙁
This means that the cocoa version of SQLEditor has been delayed again. Sorry to anyone looking forward to this. I may release a technology demo for anyone still running 10.2.8, but 10.3 will have to wait.