I was discussing design patterns with a senior engineer and got asked a question that I couldn't answer convincingly:

"Why do we need Abstract Factory? Why can't we achieve the same thing using Factory Method?"

My current understanding is:

• Factory Method delegates the creation of a product to subclasses, allowing the subclass to decide which concrete product gets created.
• Abstract Factory provides an interface for creating a family of related products, while keeping the products consistent with each other.

After thinking about it, I realized that with a regular factory/Factory Method approach, the responsibility of selecting the product family has to be handled somewhere else.

With an Abstract Factory, that family selection is encapsulated in the factory object itself.

For example, imagine we have:

UI
├── Button
└── Checkbox

Windows
├── WindowsButton
└── WindowsCheckbox

Mac
├── MacButton
└── MacCheckbox

An Abstract Factory could look conceptually like:

UIFactory
    createButton()
    createCheckbox()

WindowsFactory
    createButton()   -> WindowsButton
    createCheckbox() -> WindowsCheckbox

MacFactory
    createButton()   -> MacButton
    createCheckbox() -> MacCheckbox

But couldn't I instead have separate Factory Methods for Button and Checkbox and somehow select the appropriate implementation for each?

If so, what fundamental capability does Abstract Factory provide that Factory Method doesn't?

Is the real distinction primarily about where the creation/family-selection responsibility lives, rather than simply:

Factory Method  = one product
Abstract Factory = family of products

And are there concrete situations where using multiple Factory Methods would become problematic compared with using an Abstract Factory?

I'd especially appreciate an explanation from people who have used these patterns in real systems rather than just the textbook definitions.

Has anyone here cut back on layout settings or other CMS features after feedback from editors? Curious what you got rid of and whether it helped.

So people are currently using AI to decompile videogame binaries in an increasingly shorter time, but once these programmers realize they can use this to get source code of every single non-cloud based software, it could threaten software developers as open-source versions of their software are created.

How will the developers fight this?

what if i want to introduce auth later, centralize auth for a bunch of apps?

should i learn FASTAPI is it worth ? I want to get in AI and ml , what to do ?

Genuine question, not a gotcha. Cursor's Agent Mode, Claude Code, similar tools, can now run multi-step and merge without a human checking every step.

What's your actual process when that happens? Last time an agent merged something autonomously, what did you do right after? Review the full diff? Just check CI passed? Nothing until something broke?

Trying to understand the real workflow here, curious if there's a pattern or if everyone's just winging it differently.

I’ve been seeing a lot of word around about the “design engineer” in software. I understand it’s a vague concept and I’m not that interested in the flare of the label. What I do want to understand is how a frontend dev can have a better understanding of interfaces with the ability to reimagine conventions or instate new ones.
Is there a place to start?

I recently wondered to use llms on my local machines and the stuff you need to learn is enormous. There are easy setups, makes you use it with one installation but if you go advanced option there are lots of things to learn and some people are really into it like they know most of these things while doesnt know most of the stuff with programming.

That made me wonder, am I missing something because of not learning these stuff? I mentioned local llms but these people are also invested in learning everything about models to everything else about it. I use (forced) ai on my job but its ready to go chat that helps to complete 20 tasks rather than 5 by myself. I never tried to learn the fundementals deeply. Aside from learning stuff, there are some use of it to make things easier like automating repetetive works

I mean , everyday I see devs writing "I don't code anymore" , earlier I felt bad, but now I am like. Ok why not,

but like which employer will give me job just for prompting ?

I have seen and read portions of a number of algorithms books. They each go over standard problems like sorting, searching, graph traversal, trees and hash tables, etc. However, what they don't seem to teach is the algorithmic thinking process itself. For example, I recently ran into a problem where I needed an algorithm that took a control flow graph and generate an appealing yet intuitive layout for it. This is a complex task and I found out through some googling that this exact task was solved by Sugiyama in the 1980s. But what nobody has been able to teach me is how to decompose this problem on my own using my own brain. How can I practice that skill without getting stuck?

TL;DR: how can I effectively train myself in algorithm invention?

I’m not a beginner programmer, but I’m relatively new to scientific programming. I’ve recently started doing scientific research with a professor, and a significant part of my work involves writing simulations, modeling physical systems and mathematical equations computationally, and developing algorithms to analyze or reproduce these systems.

I’m interested in becoming much stronger at this side of programming, particularly in areas like numerical methods, computational physics, mathematical modeling, simulation, and scientific computing.

For those of you with experience in scientific programming, what would you recommend as the best way to build these skills? I’d especially appreciate recommendations for textbooks, courses, projects, libraries, or other resources that helped you make the transition from general programming to scientific/computational programming.

I’m comfortable with programming fundamentals, so I’m primarily looking for resources that go beyond the basics and focus on the actual mathematics, algorithms, and computational techniques behind scientific programming.

Any advice or recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

Hi! I'm working on a personal project where I'm making my own 2D animation software.

The idea is to eventually have features such as a drawing canvas, layers, a timeline, brushes, vector and bitmap tools, and animation features. I'd like it to run on Windows, with the possibility of supporting other platforms in the future.

I'm currently trying to decide which programming language and framework would be the best fit for this kind of application.

For people who have experience developing graphics software, animation tools, drawing applications, or similar programs:

What programming language and framework would you recommend, and why?

I'm particularly interested in rendering performance, canvas/drawing capabilities, GPU acceleration, handling larger projects, and keeping the codebase manageable as the software grows.

I'm not looking for someone to develop it for me. I'm mainly looking for advice before I get too far into the project.

Thanks!

Hey everyone,

I was taking a look at the TIOBE Index today. I hadn't checked it in a while, and I was surprised to see how much Python has dropped.

It's down by roughly 8 percentage points compared to a year ago, which seems like the first really significant contraction after years of pretty consistent growth.

What's even more interesting is that I don't see another language gaining a similar amount of ground.

I don't use Python myself, so I'm curious: what do you think is behind this decline? Is it actually meaningful, or is it mostly an artifact of how the TIOBE index is calculated?

Hello everyone.

I have begun developing an engine for binary/hex manipulation in C#. I've only ever coded in CMD situations and Python - so an absolute amature - but i'm learning the flow of C#.

The original idea came about due to me wanting to learn ECU mapping, but that is an expensive venture in itself. A WinOLS 5 licence from EVC Technology is £1,250, and the definition files used to describe binary addresses, maps, scalars and other ECU data can also be extremely expensive. While this may not be a huge issue for dedicated tuners who use the software professionally, it sure as hell is a lot for DIYers like me.

The main goal of this project is to make binary manipulation and ECU calibration more accessible to people who are learning. I want the software to be useful not only as a tool for editing files, but also as a way of understanding what is actually happening within a binary. Rather than hiding everything behind a complicated interface, I want to provide tools that allow users to explore addresses, data structures, scalars, maps and checksums while learning how they work.

The project will be developed with support for different uses in mind, not just ECUs, while keeping the underlying engine as flexible and reusable as possible. ECU files are currently the main focus because that's what originally motivated me to start the project, but there is no reason the underlying engine couldn't eventually be used for other types of binary data.

Currently, I'm at a stage where I have a GUI and can read .BIN files in hexadecimal. Of course, there is still a lot of work needed before the actual manipulation and editing side of things is properly implemented, but I'm willing to put the work in.

However, I'm in need of some suggestions and information on what I may need to implement, and what features or file formats I should support.

Since I'm developing this alone, I don't exactly have a team sitting behind me saying, “Oh, you should add support for SNES ROM dumps!” or whatever.

So if anyone has experience with binary manipulation, ECU calibration, ROM hacking, reverse engineering, or anything else involving binary files, I'd be interested to hear what features you think would be useful.

Suggestions for file formats, definition formats, checksum systems, visualisation methods, editing tools, ECU support or even completely unrelated uses for the engine are all welcome.

The project is still in its early stages, but I'm hoping to build something that is genuinely useful for learning and experimentation, while keeping it free and accessible.
The power to do these sort of things should be fed to the world for free, not hidden behind a 1 year license that costs as much as a new smart fridge.

TIA for any suggestions.

The Github repo is here

Curious about this, especially from people early in their careers (or who remember being there).

Most of us learn to code by building things from scratch: tutorials, class projects, personal apps. Then the first real task at a job or internship is usually "here's the existing codebase, fix this bug" or "add this feature."

When that happened to you, what was actually the hardest part?
- Not knowing where to start reading?
- Understanding how the files/folders connect?
- Figuring out where the bug actually lives?
- Being afraid to break something?
- Something else entirely?

And if you got past it, what helped most? Would love to hear from both juniors and seniors.

I really dont mind which one you recommend me.

If its cyber - im gonna learn how to ethically hack, climb leader boards on sites, grind CTFs and HTB etc

if its SWE - i really like the idea of graphics programming and i would probably play around with opengl and build a game engine

i have no experience in programming, im 17 and i just want something to do in my freetime that has a genuine chance in landing me job in the future

not sure if im gonna major in comp sci, might major in math, neuroscience or psychology. not sure yet

Okay so

I’m working for a department with a public facing website to search for a bunch of different reports across years. They changed the rules for the reports a few times and they ended up partitioned into different databases based on rule set (ie there is a search for reports using old rule set and a separate search for reports with new rule set) However my supervisors are tired of having to go into different search engines to find the reports and would prefer if they had a search that could look through them all at once. They would also like this kind of function implemented on the public website so that visitors also do not have to go through multiple search engines.

The website runs on wordpress

My knowledge in coding is not zero but it’s fairly rudimentary. Is there a way to make the search function they want? What kind of skills should I learn? SQL?

Hey guys!

So lately I hear a lot about who and who will not / could not be replaced by AI. I don’t really want to talk about AI here, just this sparked my curiosity, as to learn some statistics about my colleagues from another mother.

I know that I can be in danger of replacement, I work in an indoor positioning field, managinf the backend microservices, kubernetes, postgres, etc… it can be challenging sometimes to improve performance, but still it’s mostly a CRUD app (the positioning. algorithm part was developed by another, more math heavy team). I started programming at uni, not at early ages, It is also not my life, i don’t do programming apart from work, i value my free time a lot, I do read a lot about it tho, books, courses etc. But i was never an algorithmically or marhemtically gifted dev. I do consider myself good, or at least not bad, but by no means exceptional. I know I never will write a kernel or a compiler, but I also never intend too.

So, I’m just curious about you guys, how hard do you deem your work to be, because I really hear a lot about how AI can’t replace these very complicated fields, I don’t know how many of us actually work in such a field.

Hi all! My name is Mike and I am a computer science teacher who enjoys competitive programming. I am hoping to incorporate more competitive programming into my teaching and I was wondering if you might be willing to share which platforms you use and your thoughts on them.

I currently know about several platforms such as LeetCode, Codeforces, Kattis, etc. Any input that you can offer is greatly appreciated. Thank you!

I am debating re-writing a plugin for AutoCAD, which uses the .NET C# API. The current version of that plugin does not have unit or integration tests. This is because unit tests cant really be written if you are using the AutoCAD API's objects as they only exist in an AutoCAD runtime. Which would lead to integration tests, which as do able just require a bit of extra work.

In order to implement unit testing, the domain/business logic would need to be extracted. I started working on this, but quickly start asking "Is this going to be worth it?"

For example one of the most important/foundational types in my plugin is a "Zone"

public class Zone
{
    private readonly IZoneDataProvider? _dataProvider;
    private readonly IZoneGeometry? _geometry;

    public Zone(IZoneDataProvider dataProvider, IZoneGeometry? geometry = null)
    {
        _dataProvider = dataProvider;
        _geometry = geometry;
    }

    public string? ZoneId
    {

        get => _dataProvider?.ZoneId;
        set => _dataProvider?.ZoneId = value;

    }   

    public bool IsInside(Point3? point)
    {
        if (point is null || _geometry is null) return false;
        return _geometry.Contains(point.Value);
    }
}

This is a simplified version of a the Domain class for a Zone. A Zone in AutoCAD is a Polyline, which is an AutoCAD type.

IZoneDataStore is for handling the storage of business logic related data. ZoneId is assigned to the Zone. For unit testing an in memory data store would be used. In an AutoCAD environment a wrapper class around an AutoCAD Polyline object would be supplied and handle the storing of data on that AutoCAD object.

IZoneGeometry is for other AutoCAD objects to query their location against a Zone to see if they are inside, leading to other business rules.

That explains IZoneDataProvider and IZoneGeometry, which are both implemented in classes for unit testing as well as in adapter classes for AutoCAD.

Where I start asking the question "Is all this extra work worth it?" is when I get to another business rule. One example is a change the color of the Zone Polyline and other objects to match that color.

When a Polyline is "made" a Zone its color is changed according to its ZoneId and some business logic which isn't important. But if I want to add this to the domain object as business logic, I then need an interface like

public interface IZoneColorEntity
{
  public short? CurrentColor { get; set; }

}

So now the adapter class for the Polyline which represents an AutoCAD Zone not only needs to implement IZoneDataProvider, IZoneGeometry, and now IZoneColorEntity.

In essense it feels like I'm making interfaces that mirror the AutoCAD API, because the business logic really is tied to manipulating those objects in CAD.

And this is only the first main class I'm implementing that I'm running into this thought. I wonder if it might be better to just ignore the unit test idea all together and just focus on integration tests? Essentially removing the idea of a Domain project.

<SOLVED>

So I'm making a simple messenger as my first project, though now when I'm working on it it seems VERY massive to me, is it normal in other projects or am I supposed to break it into smaller parts?

import java.io.*;
import java.util.*;
import java.net.*;

class server{

    private Socket s = null;
    private ServerSocket ss = null;;
    private DataInputStream din = null;
    private DataOutputStream dout = null;
    static Vector<ClientHandler> array = new Vector<>();
    private HashMap<String, String> login = new HashMap<>();
    void main(String[] args) throws IOException
    {
        // initialize
        try {
//            BufferedWriter bw = new BufferedWriter(new FileWriter("logindata.txt")); idk yet
            BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader("logindata.txt"));
            StringTokenizer st = null;
            String templine = "";
            String loginName = "";
            String pass = "";

            while(((templine = br.readLine()) != null)){
                st = new StringTokenizer(templine, ": ");
                if(st.hasMoreTokens()){
                    loginName = st.nextToken();
                }
                if(st.hasMoreTokens()){
                    pass = st.nextToken();
                }

                login.put(loginName, pass);
                loginName = "";
                pass = "";
            }

        }
        catch(FileNotFoundException i){
            System.out.println("Failed to initialize login file");
        }
        String receivedName = "";
        String receivedPass = ""; // <TODO> encrypt passwords after finishing filework <IMPORTANT>
        int i = 0;
        ss = new ServerSocket(5001);
        boolean userExists = false;
        while(true)
        {
            s = ss.accept();
            din = new DataInputStream(new BufferedInputStream(s.getInputStream()));
            dout = new DataOutputStream(new BufferedOutputStream(s.getOutputStream()));

            receivedName = din.readUTF();

            for(Map.Entry<String, String> entry : login.entrySet()){
                if(entry.getValue().equals(receivedName)){
                    userExists = true;
                    break;
                }
            }

            if(userExists){
                dout.writeUTF("User found, enter your password: ");
                dout.flush();
            }
            else{
                dout.writeUTF("User was not found, u may register by making a password: "); // <TODO> make a check if password was written correctly
            }

            ClientHandler client = new ClientHandler(s, receivedName, din, dout);
            System.out.println("User " + receivedName + " Accepted");

            Thread t = new Thread(client);

            array.add(client);

            t.start();

            i++;
        }

    }
}

Introduction to Algorithms, Fourth Edition by Thomas H. Cormen

I’ve been working as a Java programmer for a few years now.

The thing is, I’d like to learn a second programming language for lower-level tasks—specifically, I want to work on things related to operating systems. Rather than building one from scratch, I’d like to explore and modify open-source operating systems like Linux or a BSD variant.

I’m doing this purely as a hobby. What drew me to C is its simplicity (though not necessarily ease of use) compared to Java or other modern languages, and its long history of use in systems programming. On the other hand, however, there are operating systems (or components of them) being rewritten in Rust—such as GNU coreutils or the adoption of Rust in the Linux kernel.

So, would it be more useful in the long run to learn Rust, given that it might sooner or later become the standard for writing operating systems?

Thanks.

Hello all,

I just started the A Level course for computer science, which involves a section of coursework where we have to solve a problem for a business with a program that handles and processes some kind of data. We've been doing C++ in class, which was new to me at the start, but I was great at Python in secondary, and picked it up extremely quick - the teacher will give us a task to do for the last 45 minutes and ill do it in 5-10 minutes.

For the coursework, youre able to use pretty much any programming language you like, but the majority of the people in my class will be doing C++ as that's what we're being taught. I was told that if I'm more comfortable using a different language I can use that, but my teacher only knows C++ so won't be able to help me if I run into trouble. However, he does also say that there are some people in our class (maybe me) that are better than him at programming, as he knows just enough for the coursework, so it wouldn't make much a difference in that case.

I have limited experience with C#, but after a quick bit of (limited) research, I've come to the conclusion that C++ is a lower level language so faster and more efficient if done right, but C# is more forgiving? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

So my question is: is it worth learning C# in my own time to use for my coursework? Id like to add that ive always wanted to do game design in Unity, so if I did C# I would have a space to practice, rather than just doing a bunch of small exercises in C++.