A non-coders attempts at writing useful code
Posted in Uncategorized on Jan 28th, 2009
Over my few years writing scripts in Python or Perl , I always told myself that the next time I had to solve a problem I would make my code more object oriented and re-useable. Like an addict trying to break a habit , I always failed miserably. It was just too easy to just [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Jan 7th, 2009
Almost two years ago I first started writing the codeitch weblog about my code ambitions on wordpress ( codeitch.wordpress.com) .This blog was driven by a strong desire to get better at writing code and importantly building solutions that enabled better science. To do that I had decided to pick up python , Java , javascript [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Jan 2nd, 2009
As a crystallographer we routinely travel to the national synchrotron light sources at Chicago , NSLS on Long ISland NY, the BCSB at Lawrence Berkeley etc to collect X-ray diffraction data from our protein crystals at the various beamlines. A beamline is basically a station or a lab room at a synchrotron facility where out of [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Dec 24th, 2008
Everytime I have struggled with syntax in Excel I have always longed to break free from the tyranny of its visual basic syntax. Although very powerful, excels formulae and their complex mix of parenthesis , square brackets , dollar signs and brackets always had me wishing that spreasheets spoke a language with a more readable [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on Dec 22nd, 2008
I have written in the past on my frustrations with the mess that is 32bit browsers and 64 bit plugins. I was desperately trying to get a java web start application to play on my 64bit ubuntu linux box. I of course imagined that upgrading java to java 6 update 11 would be the way to go [...]