Study Progress

New Website - Prime 357

Steve — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 02:36:07 -0500

I've not been blogging much lately and for the last two weeks it's just been a weekly wrap-up. Most of my time has been spent 1. actually running and 2. designing my new website.

My new website (http://prime357.org) went live on Wednesday 2 April 2008. Prime357 caters for technical computer stuff, stuff that was creeping into this blog.

Since the go-live date I've been fiddling with all sorts of settings in order to re-direct all hits pertaining to Drupal and C++ to Prime357, and it works (the re-direct).

In time I'll remove the menu buttons above pertaining to Drupal & C++. That's not an overly urgent job, click on them and a re-direction occurs to Prime357 anyway.

I'll keep this blog purely for my running and other personal stuff but not geekie stuff.

Week 18

Steve — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 19:03:30 -0500

C++ Study w/e 23 Mar 2008
Week #:	18
Week Hours:	8.2
Total Hours:	197.6

Completed Chapter 13 from the book, C++ Primer Plus Fifth Edition, by Stephen Prata. Studying this chapter highlighted an obscure compiler/linker error which most likely only occurs when progressively compiling. By that I mean, write some code, compile and check, write some code compile and check and so on. It was not pointed out by the text of the chapter. It caused me some grief, required some extra research but finally nutted it out. As a result I wrote an article/paper relating to this feature which I'll publish when my new site is up and running.

Commenced Chapter 14 which spouts on about Multiple Inheritance. Why on earth the developers thought there was a need for multiple inheritance is beyond me (at this time). It makes things unnecessarily complex. I'm sure where code has been written using Multiple Inheritance that it could be efficiently re-written using Single Inheritance and thus easier to comprehend.

Only 8 hours of study. Other time was devoted to developing my other site which will be more suited to this type of stuff.

Week 17 - plugging away

Steve — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 19:27:10 -0500

C++ Study w/e 16 Mar 2008
Week #:	17
Week Hours:	6.6
Total Hours:	189.4

A little more study time than the previous week, the six hours evenly spread over four days. Continued with Chapter 13, Class Inheritance - Review Questions and Programming Exercises. One programming exercise remaining.

That's it.

Week 16 and ... (wait for it)

Steve — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 18:10:31 -0500

C++ Study w/e 8 Mar 2008
Week #:	16
Week Hours:	3.8
Total Hours:	182.8

Not that many hours for the week just gone, only 3.8, way down on my previous two weeks.

I started the week with a cold and flu and couldn't be bothered thinking so on that day I just messed around improving a previous program, remove vowels, which I'd written and posted. I changed things around, utilising strings rather than character arrays and accounted for both upper and lower case. I didn't include this time in my study hours, probably should, as it could be considered review hours. I uploaded the program and can be found here. You'll note that the code I post now is syntax highlighted. That's created by a little module I added which I got from here.

On Tuesday and Wednesday I continued with Chapter 13 relating to Class Inheritance - Abstract Base Classes and Dynamic Memory Allocation.

From Thursday, for the rest of the week, my time was devoted to creating another website. My next site will be IT only, so that means for starters it'll cover my C++ and Drupal stuff. This stuff really needs to be separated from my running and training.

I've purchased a few domain names which I won't reveal just yet until I've sorted out a few issues here and there. Some of the issues are:

transfer of existing data - (do I bother)
redirecting hits (if data transferred)
finalise purpose of site (have clear goal)

Well that was my week.

Week 15 - More on Classes

Steve — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 07:15:10 -0600

C++ Study w/e 2 Mar 2008
Week #:	15
Week Hours:	21.4
Total Hours:	179.0

Week # 15 done and dusted and what a whopping week it was. 21 hours all up, evenly spread over 5 days, actually 6 days but the sixth day (Saturday) was only 30 mins worth.

As I'm writing this late Sunday night my primary reference book (C++ Primer Plus, Fifth Edition) is sitting open next to me, bookmark in place, at page 668. What's bugging me is that I'm only a tad past the half-way mark. The remaining pages looks ever so thick and I'm hoping it's not going to take another 15 weeks to complete. I don't think so but at the same time I'm not going to get ahead of myself at the expense not really understanding the goods.

For this week I completed Chapter 12 which dealt with Classes and Dynamic Memory Allocation. General topics including implicit & explicit member functions - and, can that be confusing. Default constructors, copy constructors (shallow/deep copying), overloaded assignment operator - similar issues as per copy constructor along with checking for self-assignment. Matching of new with delete and to further complicate things the use of placement new which impacts upon destructors.

Commennced Chapter 13 which introduced Class Inheritance. Explored virtual functions, static (early) and dynamic (late) bindings and pointer & reference type compatibility.

Next Week - Week 16

More of the same, hoping for around 20 odd hours.

Week 14 - Getting there

Steve — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 05:12:24 -0600

C++ Study w/e 24 Feb 2008
Week #:	14
Week Hours:	16.2
Total Hours:	157.6

Study wise, a very productive week, 16 hours spread over 5 days. When I say 16 hours I mean 16 hours. I use a stop-watch program to keep track of the hours and religiously stop it when taking breaks. At the end of this process (studying from the book) it'll be interesting, well for me at least, knowing how much time, both in hours and weeks, were spent in order to attain a certain level. This particular figure will be a yardstick for further C++ study (I'm thinking in terms of GUI programming).

Continued with Chapter 11, the programming exercises, completing them and the chapter on Thursday. The programming exercises were relatively straight forward.

Back in week 5 I wrote a program, which was not a part of the book, merely to test my knowledge at that point in time. That program, being a simple single source code file, accepted user input of distance and time (broken down into component time parts), calculated the pace (mins/km) and displayed it.

I revisted that program and completely re-wrote it, this time incorporating Class and Objects and the inclusion of multiple source code files (headers and .cpp's).

Each run (distance & time - duration) is an object of the Class Run
Each object now accounts for a user defined distance units (km or miles)
The class handles all user input, calculations and output
Created a functions.h and functions.cpp file which holds the function necessary to clear the input buffer. This sequence of code used in numerous places throughout the program, therefore an ideal candidate to form a function
Fixed output display whereby previously for seconds, if less than 10 seconds, only one digit was displayed ie 5:2 (5 mins 2 secs) should be 5:02.
Regardless of the user inputted distance units, displayed also is the opposite version, so if kilometres is selected, mins/km is displayed and then mins/mile displayed. This was an afterthought, but it highlighted how easy programming with objects and classes really is. It only took a few addition lines of code to achieve it. I was using what I had already written. At this point the light globe lit up.

The program is nothing earth shattering, it was simply done to cement my learning to date. I believe this is the process where learning actually takes place.

I know in time I'll look back on this code and probably cringe, as I did viewing my program written back in week 5.

Briefly touched on Chapter 12, Classes and Dynamic Memory Allocation, and that's where I'll continue from next week.

Week 13 - More about classes

Steve — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 18:11:31 -0600

C++ Study w/e 17 Feb 2008
Week #:	13
Week Hours:	7.1
Total Hours:	141.4

Another 'plugging away at it' type week. Not that many hours spent studying, only seven hours spread over five days. Nonetheless, I'm still making progress and not getting too far ahead of myself which is quite easy to do when self-studying. I would prefer to put more time in but there are other things to do.

This week (Week # 13) I continued with Chapter 11 from the book, C++ Primer Plus, Fifth Edition, and currently at the programming exercises at the end of the chapter.

In particular this chapter introduced the 'Overloading Operator' either as a class member or friend function. Effectively accounting for situations where 'answer = class + primitive' (member function) which, mathematically, is the same as 'answer = primitive + class' (friend function). Mathematically they are the same but under C++ in order to be in sync with mathematics both versions have to be accounted for ie. coded.

In explanation and clarification of the above, user created vector classes were introduced. These vector classes incorporated both the polar and rectangular co-ordinate system. This aspect alone gave me a heap of ideas on how to eventually write my own running/fitness program which will incorporate GPS mapping.

The chapter finished off with an explanation and examples of 'Automatic Conversion' and 'Type casts for Classes'.

Next week, obviously, I'll continue with the programming exercises, hopefully finish them. A while ago I wrote a simple program which converts distance and time to pace (a runner's utility). This was written (coded) prior to studying classes. I'm thinking of revisting that code, convert to classes and include other little bits I've since learnt.

Anyway, that was the week that was.

Week 12 - Overloading Operators & Friend Functions

Steve — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 17:42:54 -0600

C++ Study w/e 10 Feb 2008
Week #:	12
Week Hours:	2.1
Total Hours:	134.3

Not as productive as the previous week, from a studying perspective, only 2.1 hours spread over three days. I managed to complete chapter 10 in my first session for the week, that accounted for 30 mins on the Tuesday.

Thursday and Saturday I commenced chapter 11, Working with Classes, and this progressed the learning to 'overloading operators' and 'friend' functions. Not much time spent on these but they appear to be relatively straight forward.

There are a number of reasons why I couldn't devote more time and one them revolves around computers and operating systems. I'm wanting to be able to develop programs generically or with cross-platform functionality in mind. In this regard, obviously I need to access different systems in order to test snippets of code. For quite a while my system has been a dual-boot system (Windows or Linux) but the problem was that it's either one or the other when working. That's a re-boot and we all know how long that takes. The week gone I installed VMWare on my host system, Vista (a pain in the a.... system), and Ubuntu Linux as a virtual operating system. What this means is that I can switch between either system instantaneously without having to re-boot. This is very handy when writing snippets of code and then wanting to test it the other operating system.

I'm also starting to realize that I need to understand compilers, IDE's and editors more so than I do, especially in relation to multiple source files. Spent a little time checking out help files but that was in a more hap-hazard way, looking for the quick fix.

For this upcoming week I'm hoping it should be full-steam ahead, 10 - 15 hours.

Week 11 - Objects & Classes - Headway made

Steve — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 17:15:09 -0600

C++ Study w/e 3 Feb 2008
Week #:	11
Week Hours:	10.5
Total Hours:	132.2

Continued with Chapter 10 (Classes and Objects) from the book, C++ Primer Plus, Fifth Edition, by Stephen Prata. Another consistent week, ten hours over five days, working on the programming exercises at the end of the chapter.

The exercises were relatively straight forward in the end but some were a bit confusing to start with. Some of the problems could have been written in a clearer style. One particular problem, one of the earlier ones, caught me by surprise, it wouldn't work and yet the logic of my code appeared in tact and valid. It seemed to take me ages to work it out, eventually posting to the C++ forum only to be told I was missing a semi-colon at the end of a class definition; a syntax problem. Hopefully that one shouldn't catch me out again, but I've got a feeling it might.

When I say some of the examples are not that clear it's because I try and apply everyday logic to the exercises. With one of the exercises I was querying with/to myself, "why would one do it this way, that doesn't make sense?" I suppose it's a thought process and in the end it clouded my ability to solve the problem at hand with the information as given. I failed to realize that the purpose of the exercises is purely a learning experience, doesn't necessarily mean that's how things are done in the real world.

In relation to another exercise, I fell victim to the, 'not reading the question properly' syndrome and it wasn't until, again, seeking advice from the online community, that it dawned on me but it was too late, I'd already posted the question.

As an aside I came across a puzzle which involved reading the question and applying a deductive process to answer it. It was so apt, it made me realize to deal with the facts as known, not to make assumptions but to make deductions based on the facts given. I completed it and couldn't resist and therefore made a post of it.

I'm left with one programming exercise which involves, not only objects and classes but also pointers to functions. It's the pointers to functions I'll have to re-read from an earlier chapter, otherwise the exercise appears to be straight forward.

Regardless of the above I'm confident that I'm making headway and it's these little problems, which when investigated, help cement the knowledge gained.

Week 10 - Objects and Classes

Steve — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 20:12:11 -0600

C++ Study w/e 27 Jan 2008
Week #:	10
Week Hours:	10.1
Total Hours:	121.7

Another productive self-study week. Finally started on C++ Classes and Objects, Chapter 10 from the book, C++ Primer Plus, Fitth Edition, by Stephen Prata. Ten hours this week, evenly distributed over the seven days. At this stage, objects and classes appears to be relatively straight forward but the theme of breaking the components into multiple files continues. As a result I'm now using Dev-C++ editor (or IDE) as this handles multiple source file programs easier than my other editors (Programmer's Notepad & Contex).

I mentioned last week that I posted a question over at the Programmer's Notepad forum, querying how to compile multiple source file programs. I also mentioned that no fruitful responses were forthcoming (at that time). Since then a couple of responses have been posted which basically advise how to prepare a makefile, use a makefile etc. To be honest I haven't fiddled with these responses. On first perusal, it all appears to be a little too involved or too much messing around to compile simple three file programs. I will at some point look into it and try the examples cited.

I also checked out another editor or IDE, Codeblocks but unfortunately, it appears straight out of the box it doesn't like Windows Vista. The more I work with Vista the more I want to work less with it. I really should take the plunge, dump Windws altogether and work with Linux.

My ten hours of study doesn't include any of this, 'checking out editors'. It's purely a time of book open to book close, actual study time.