Before we get started here, let me state that I am using Ruby 1.9.1 (I refuse to look back!), and that I have not tested this solution on Ruby 1.8.6, but it should work there as well, though I may have some 1.9-isms in my code. Should be easy enough to spot.

I am working on writing an application in Ruby that can talk to an Windows application that has an ActiveX COM Automation object exposed. Ruby is basically the wrapper so that I can access the application from the Linux side of the world. So, I am using Ruby’s DRb to bridge those worlds because, after all, I am the Linux Bloke!

Well, as you may have guessed, I ran into problems with this approach. I simply could not call the COM objects from a call initiated with DRb, though I could call them directly just fine. After scratching my head a bit, I figured it out.

The win32ole module that runs on the Windows side of the world in Ruby only …

Having a reverse-proxy web cache as one of the major infrastructure elements brings many benefits for large web applications: it reduces your application servers load, reduces average response times on your site, etc. But there is one problem every developer experiences when works with such a cache – cached content invalidation.

It is a complex problem that usually consists of two smaller ones: individual cache elements invalidation (you need to keep an eye on your data changes and invalidate cached pages when related data changes) and full cache purges (sometimes your site layout or page templates change and you need to purge all the cached pages to make sure users will get new visual elements of layout changes). In this post I’d like to look at a few techniques we use at …

Our Universe is full of ironies. But some ironies are just too hard to take.

As you may have guessed (!!!), I am an avid Linux developer and user. Though once upon a time I did develop under Windows. Yes, believe it. And on one particular case, I got to be on a first-name basis with some of the Microsoft Software Engineers to resolve issues we were having with their OLE crap — what the Holy Gods of Microsoft decided to redub as “Active-X”.

But I digress. For the past 10 years, I have been solid Linux and have defenestrated Windows for the most part. But as you know, you can never really completely eliminate Windows.  Despite your best efforts, it will always be (for now, at least) the 500 pound gorilla in any room you care to be in. The installed software base there is just staggering, and most have no Linux options.

But then that’s why projects like Wine and the many wonderful hypervisors …

Why does this change make me feel better? Because cmake configuration is more user friendly than the old autoconf/automake/libtools horror syntax. Not only that, but there is a GUI!
I am a command line guy, as you probably know, but when the purpose of a GUI is not only to show off but to make …

Back in November 2009 I was working on a project to port Scribd.com code base to Rails 2.2 and noticed that some old plugins we were using in 2.1 were abandoned by their authors. Some of them were just removed from the code base, but one needed a replacement – that was an old plugin called acts_as_readonlyable that helped us to distribute our queries among a cluster of MySQL slaves. There were some alternatives but we didn’t like them for one or another reasons so we’ve decided to go with creating our own ActiveRecord plugin, that would help us scale our databases out. That’s the story behind the first release of DbCharmer.

Today, six months after the first release of …

I recently received a question from Robin Schumacher at Calpont, the makers of the InfiniDB analytics database engine for MySQL: "How would you recommend we try and get bundled in with the various Linux distros?"

Since this question has come up several times before, I thought it might make sense to blog about my take on this.

First of all, please note that there is a difference between "being part of the core distribution" and "being available from a distributor's package repository". The latter one is relatively easy, the former can be hard, as you need to convince the distributor that your application is worth devoting engineering resources to maintain and support your application as part of their product. It's also a space issue – distributions need to make sure that the core packages still fit on the installation …

So far PHProjekt 6 (P6, see http://phprojekt.com) is already enhanced with nice AJAX workflows and snappy user-experience. Nevertheless, we discussed a way to provide synchronous communication and direct information within the application.

Everybody knows GoogleMail with its easy to use frontend. Maybe you use it for your daily work. In GoogleMail, there is no need to refresh the page to receive a new mail, Google informs you automatically whenever a new mail is available. But how is this possible? The answer to this question is really simple: The server triggers a signal informing that a new mail is available. This technology is called Comet and describes a way how the server communicates with the client [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet_(programming) ].

Is there a way to use Comet …

So far PHProjekt 6 (P6, see http://phprojekt.com) is already enhanced with nice AJAX workflows and snappy user-experience. Nevertheless, we discussed a way to provide synchronous communication and direct information within the application.

Everybody knows GoogleMail with its easy to use frontend. Maybe you use it for your daily work. In GoogleMail, there is no need to refresh the page to receive a new mail, Google informs you automatically whenever a new mail is available. But how is this possible? The answer to this question is really simple: The server triggers a signal informing that a new mail is available. This technology is called Comet and describes a way how the server communicates with the client [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet_(programming) ].

Is there a way to use Comet …

CMake is a cross-platform, open-source build system, maintained by Kitware, Inc.

From the CMake.org home page:

CMake is a family of tools designed to build, test and package software. CMake is used to control the software compilation process using simple platform and compiler independent configuration files. CMake generates native makefiles and workspaces that can be used in the compiler environment of your choice.

It has been used for building the MySQL Server on Windows since MySQL 5.0 – the initial CMake build support was added in August 2006.

For …

Shortly after I posted my last summary of MySQL releases, our son Mats was born and I went on a 2.5-week vacation. Our developers did not rest in the meanwhile and I'd like to give you a quick update of what's new since then:

MySQL Connector/Net 6.3.0

• Visual Studio 2010 RC support
• Nested transaction scope support

MySQL Workbench 5.2.16 Beta 6

• Fixed 67 bugs
• Saving your profile/connection passwords in OSX keychain, gnome-keyring or in an encrypted password-vault-file.
• New rapid development features for generating complete SQL …