Matt Gutting

Recent Blog Comments By Matt Gutting

• Ask Ben: Removing Duplicate List Items While Maintaining Original List Order

  Posted on Jan 15, 2009 at 10:59 AM

  Very very nice. I was a bit confused though when I read "The list is not composed of unique values in the original order" (emphasis added), and it took me a while to realize that you meant "... now composed ...." I guess I'm not quite awake yet.... read more »

• The Four Agreements By Don Miguel Ruiz (Thanks Jason Kay)

  Posted on Dec 5, 2008 at 12:11 PM

  But how do you know when you are truly doing your best?... read more »

• I Wish: ColdFusion Custom Tag Query Looping

  Posted on Nov 13, 2008 at 1:19 PM

  Okay, that makes sense. And along the same lines, the idea behind a SQL result set is that it's essentially an unordered set - ordering in a SQL statement is only done for convenience in a list. I'll have to think on this a bit.... read more »

• I Wish: ColdFusion Custom Tag Query Looping

  Posted on Nov 13, 2008 at 11:50 AM

  What does that add that you can't get by changing the SQL statement?... read more »

• Ask Ben: What I Look For In A Potential Employee - Passion

  Posted on Oct 2, 2008 at 2:21 PM

  I don't know about getting passionate about MOD. Now CAST() - in SQL - that I can see getting passionate about. Or CASE.... read more »

• Converting A Base64 Value Back Into A String Using ColdFusion

  Posted on Sep 5, 2008 at 3:11 PM

  I've done something similar in a MS SQL Server database - take a text field and output as string: CAST(CAST(textField AS VARBINARY(1000)) AS VARCHAR(1000)) I think that's how it worked. I'm fairly sure most DBMSs have similar functions.... read more »

• OOPhoto - What Is An Idealized Object?

  Posted on Aug 20, 2008 at 2:45 PM

  @Brad, The idea, as I see it, is that an article may not need to "know" how to (for example) validate itself - but it should know that it can be validated. It will then say, "OK, I'll validate myself." From our point of view, perhaps we have some sort of service doing the validation - but from the... read more »

• OOPhoto - If Object.Validate(), Why Not Object.Save()?

  Posted on Aug 18, 2008 at 3:54 PM

  I'm certainly not an expert - but I'd say that an "idealized" object is one that simply does what we need it to do. (which may vary between applications) Which means that, provided we've thought hard enough about what the objects really need to do, we're not "guessing" about what an idealized objec... read more »

• OOPhoto - If Object.Validate(), Why Not Object.Save()?

  Posted on Aug 18, 2008 at 2:41 PM

  Okay, that makes sense, I think. I'm getting the picture of an object kind of floating along, chanting, "I'm chocolate ice cream, I'm chocolate ice cream!" All the while, there's a Service Monster hanging over it, saying "Feed Me!" and waiting for the object to give it chocolate ice cream. :-) Bu... read more »

• OOPhoto - If Object.Validate(), Why Not Object.Save()?

  Posted on Aug 18, 2008 at 1:59 PM

  Ben, As I'm looking at what you're saying, I see your point about Problem.Solve(). But isn't that typically because you *think* about problems? Typically, you have to apply outside information (how to detect relevant information, formulas to use, etc.) for that to happen. In my mind, Object.Save... read more »

• OOPhoto - No More Validation In The Controller

  Posted on Aug 14, 2008 at 3:35 PM

  One drawback I can see to using stored proc validation is that you have to make absolutely sure that you'll be able to port the procs to a new DBMS if that's necessary. It does however give you a great deal of flexibility as far as adding new error types, changing messages, etc. Can you tell I w... read more »

• OOPhoto - No More Validation In The Controller

  Posted on Aug 14, 2008 at 2:09 PM

  Not that I've ever actually done it this way :-) but my ideal approach (if I'm understanding the question correctly) would be to do the validation in the database, using a stored procedure to produce an error code (including a code for 'no error'). That code could be looked up in an 'error_messag... read more »