Hi Rupert, > > I have a problem, in that I'm currently trying to make a build of this > for an internal client. As I haven't really looked at this code in > great depth I had to take it on faith that it works and will interop > with the Java (note that I'm not blaming you for this, quite the > opposite as you are doing a lot to fix and improve it, I mean that I'm > relying on the code left behind by Steve Shaw being in working order - > with no docs and little tests and with the Java code having evolved > substantially since he stopped working on the .Net this doesn't seem > likely...). No interop tests means that I had to write some on friday > and then find out that it doesn't work. > > An 'experimental patch' at the last moment before putting out a build > seems a bit hairy!
I completely understand your dilemma and were I in your shoes, I'd say the same thing :) We might as well be brutally honest here, and say that the .NET client isn't really in a very good spot right now. It has fallen way behind the development of the corresponding java code and there is a lot unimplemented (or half implemented) in there. In fact, I'll be as bold to say that a lot there doesn't even work even if both ends were the .NET client! It also lacks a lot in unit and integration tests (I once ran the basic tests under coverage to discover just about 10% of the code was getting exercised by the tests... not a good place to be!). It doesn't quite help the fact that there is a lot more people contributing to the Java code than to the .NET code for now... I'm fairly confident in the code I wrote this weekend in the sense that as I said it has fairly good coverage and that once I plugged it into the main code (which took a bit of time because of the naming changes), a lot worked "right away". One of the reasons I said it was experimental is not only that I just wrote the code this weekend, but also the fact that I haven't tested all possible types yet in the message headers. I was kind of planning to do that today. But, I can say for sure that right now at least custom integer headers are going through between the Java and .NET clients which I think it's a lot to say given the state of things. And I might as well add that indeed there is a *lot* more changes needed besides the Buffer stuff. I agree I *should've* caught some of these when I did the base field-table changes patch, and it was pretty unfortunate that I didn't :( Another reason I say it is experimental is that I haven't done yet a few of the "niceties", like getting the monodevelop project files up to date with all the changes. I'm going to create a new JIRA for the patch and link it to the original fieldtable type jira and upload the current patch. At least give it a quick try and let me know what you think. Tomas Restrepo [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.winterdom.com/weblog/
