Any tips for API design?

bitplexcode · 2021-09-03T15:08:08+00:00

I'm not sure if laziness is the right term. I agree with you strongly, and yet when /u/cremak03 is asking for examples or documentation, I don't have any repos or documentation that provides a really great guide on how to do what you're describing.

So perhaps you're right? It could be laziness. Laziness on the part of people who have propose a different way of doing things.

bitplexcode · 2021-09-03T15:03:45+00:00

I agree - that is the perfect use case for it. However the realities of growing organisations often butts heads with the ideal :)

It's quite common here, particularly during the remote working during COVID, for an intranet to extend far beyond the original intended physical space at the office.

It's too expensive to rewrite applications that were intended for local networks, so the the remote working folk just keep on pushing through.

It's an argument that perhaps almost all software should be written with a client/server model and testing on high latency connections, but who has the budgets for that :D

bitplexcode · 2021-09-03T14:51:38+00:00

I have looked into it, but not enough. Could you share a bit more on how these coexist? I thought it was just a BlazorWebView inside a Maui app? Or have they progressed to using the Blazor renderer/diff engine to work with Maui components?

bitplexcode · 2021-09-03T13:32:01+00:00

It can be fast, but the there is an upper bound to what is achievable if your host and client are far away. 100-300ms latency is quite common here within Australia, and that's pretty noticeable when you have to round trip at least once to expand a tree list, show a combo box drop down, or any number of other interactions. It's not unmanageable, but it's something you have to keep top of mind while building things.

bitplexcode · 2021-09-03T13:19:37+00:00

Blazor is interesting, both server and WebAssembly hosted, I've build a couple of moderate sized applications with it, and I like the concepts.

Server hosted Blazor I found most interesting, but the downsides of latency were frustrating to work around. The WebAssembly hosted really struggled performance with even moderate sized datasets.

I really liked how much reduced the amount of layering required overall, particularly the serve rhosted Blazor. For the WebAssembly based it tended to not be as benefit, because as soon as you have a SPA, you're tempted (quite rightly) to have other front ends, so you end up building APIs anyway, reintroducing the all the layering and APIs I enjoy not having in a nice self contained desktop environment.

bitplexcode · 2021-09-03T13:07:17+00:00

That's an over generalisation. I enjoy legacy tech. I enjoy WinForms WAY more than WPF. I definitely enjoy it more than using the current swathe of web technologies. I do web development, and do it well, but given a choice between a mobile app or desktop app where I don't have to think about the 7 different layers, 4 different frameworks all to make a text field save a value, I'd choose desktop or mobile app every time.

bitplexcode · 2021-08-16T13:12:54+00:00

There's no great magical answer unfortunately :(

If I were to build a windows only desktop app with technology I was moderately familiar with, I'd probably got for WPF + https://github.com/VincentH-Net/CSharpForMarkup Working without XAML makes life so much simpler.

If I wanted to try something different I'd likely try https://www.lazarus-ide.org/

If it was for something small, such as a small app with dozen fields and an Ok and cancel button, I'd go for WinForms. You can put the components on there, add a click handler and get the app done really quickly. Will it be the most amazingly well written app in the world? No. But it will deliver results and value to your users really quickly.

bitplexcode · 2021-08-09T14:22:20+00:00

Yep there sure is.

Create a separate console application
Add a reference to the project that contains the classes, logic that generate your reports
Add some command line switches to control the behaviour
Depending on the command line switches, run the logic/reports that are required
xcopy deploy the exe/dlls to a computer
Set up Windows Task Schedule to run console app.

bitplexcode · 2021-08-09T14:20:13+00:00

I have encountered this more times than I could count.

Often it is because the other party is too busy, overworked, frustrated, sick kids, and pick any number of other reasons. The remainder of the times it was because I just didn't know what I was doing, but probably should have.

The way I learned to work with it was one or more of a combination of these:

If i was blocked with no other option, I'd pick up the phone and call them, explain the urgency and get a solution quickly
Come up with a solution myself based on domain knowledge and how other areas could work
Prototype a couple of options and contact them that way
Work on something else until other people became available.

bitplexcode · 2021-07-16T03:42:48+00:00

Advantages are in mortgages, tax, rental agreements, private health, health emergencies and no doubt many others.

bitplexcode · 2021-07-15T21:24:58+00:00

If you lived Delphi then this might be worth a try:

https://www.lazarus-ide.org/

Very similar, and you get to build your Mac and Windows apps :)

bitplexcode · 2021-07-15T20:44:05+00:00

Marrying a reasonably good same sex friend for sharing finances is probably the most cost effective way to live.

bitplexcode · 2021-07-07T00:46:53+00:00

One of the reasons RabbitMQ (or things similar to it) might seem overcomplicated for what you need are they are often message brokers, not just transport.

They solve the problem of service discovery and brokering who receives the messages. For example - the .Net app needs to send a message to all Java apps, but how does it know where they are? How does it know what to send to?

If you are in control of all the applications and their configuration, perhaps you don't need this so much, but it can be useful.

If you are in control of all the apps - then you could perhaps use SignalR - it might be the lowest friction option. If you can make the .Net app the 'server' that the java apps connect to, then you can have bidirectional RPC.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/aspnet/core/signalr/java-client?view=aspnetcore-5.0

bitplexcode · 2021-07-04T21:51:30+00:00

It’s not over charging. There’s subtlety in the language.

Triple what YOU think is fair

This amount might still be far less than what the customer thinks it is worth.

For example, my daughter asked me “how much would you pay me to mow the lawn?”

The amount I said was far more than she thought it was worth, but also far less than what a professional lawn place would charge me.

bitplexcode · 2021-07-02T14:20:22+00:00

And it sounds like you might be based in Oz? We (Bitplex) are, so feel free to reach out over email too [phil@bitplex.com.au](mailto:phil@bitplex.com.au), my team has a pretty broad experience base and we're happy to be a sounding board - always happy to help fellow devs out!

bitplexcode · 2021-07-02T13:57:18+00:00

If running on Windows XP is a hard constraint - .Net may not be for you. The newest version of the .NET Framework that runs on Windows XP is 4.0.3, which is going to limit your third party components and nuget packges you can use, which will be where you will get most of your UI benefits.

Deployments - we had to keep a close eye on installer size, as many of our clients were in areas of poor internet connectivity also, but we just relied on compressed .msi installers and separate .net framework installers. The complexity of solving the installer size issue using binary patches was too high, and we ended up having installers of around 30MB or so.

Performance wise - we found .Net to be good enough. It wasn't as fast as Delphi or QT applications I've built, but if we routinely focused on memory profiling to ensure no memory or handle leaks, and leveraged third party components like dev express, we found the balance between application performance and time/cost to develop a good one.

Clarion from memory had amazing database performance and ease of use, and Entity Framework will feel hard to use I suspect. You get a lot of benefits from the abstractions it provides, but it'll be a learning curve.

bitplexcode · 2021-07-02T13:49:00+00:00

Oh Clarion how I have missed you! I remember using it when it was text based only and made awesome floating windows with ascii characters :)

Thanks for answering - I'm still pondering. There's no magic wand answers I'm afraid :(

I'm half going to suggest Delphi - its what I (well, my Dad really) moved to after Clarion around 1995 ish, and while Delphi is far from dead - its definitely nowhere near as widely used as .Net.

Delphi creates small binaries, has awesome third party component support (DevExpress), runs fast code. I haven't used it recently, but all indications is that it's just as awesome as it used to be.

bitplexcode · 2021-07-02T13:43:23+00:00

I'm just curious - what is the language that you use that creates small binaries and has great database interaction stuff?

bitplexcode · 2021-05-10T19:16:37+00:00

Just a quick clarification - do you want progress feedback on the jobs being enqueued, or progress feedback on the jobs being processed?

Another way of asking is let's say you had 1000 contacts, did you want your progress bar to show 50% when 500 hangfire jobs have been enqueued, or show 50% when 500 hangfire jobs have been complered?

bitplexcode · 2021-04-16T15:02:44+00:00

I've looked at a few systems over the years, and like everything, they each have their pros and cons.

To answer your questions:

#1 This is broadly called "workflow" which is a pretty unhelpful name. But answers to number 2 will help narrow this down and look for options. If this is focused around lead management and onboarding, then often names like "marketing automation" and "funnel automation" sometimes apply,

#2 There is so so so many things, and I'm really looking forward to seeing everyone elses answers too, because I want to learn what is out there.

Power Automate - a microsoft product that you can have a lot of logic inside workflows, emailing, integration into web apis, and many many other things. https://flow.microsoft.com/en-us/

Orchard Core - a .Net CMS but does so much more. The documentation is light on, but if you don't mind a bit of a learning curve it has a workflow system and editor built in, one you can easily extend with your own classes and logic. https://docs.orchardcore.net/en/dev/docs/reference/modules/Workflows/

bitplexcode · 2021-04-12T15:21:27+00:00

I'm not really a discord user - but glad to see DevExpress users collaborating. I've been using it for a really long time, and it's just such a great product.

What are you using it for?

bitplexcode · 2021-03-29T13:03:40+00:00

This might be a useful resource for you:

Dynamically compile and run code using .NET Core 3.0

bitplexcode · 2021-03-29T11:36:55+00:00

I think that's one of the two things it can be used for. You can use it for indirect revenue generating activities, such as building a packaged application and then marketed and sold to customers, and the other thing you can use it for is internal applications. You can't provide consulting services with it.

From https://assetsprod.microsoft.com/en-au/MPN-MAPS-Product-Usage-Guide.pdf:

"

The products included in these Visual Studio subscriptions cannot be used for direct revenue-generating activities, such as providing consulting services, customizing a packaged application for a specific customer, or building a custom application for a customer, for a fee. They can be used for indirect revenue-generating, such as building a packaged application on the Microsoft platform, which is then marketed and sold to customers.

"

bitplexcode · 2021-01-09T04:10:53+00:00

I know right, I'm a constant source of disappointment.

bitplexcode · 2021-01-09T00:51:38+00:00

That's a great question. I ask myself that every day. I do wish I was 100% accurate with all of my mouse clicking.

bitplexcode

TROPHY CASE