This coming Fall term I will be teaching two courses at the Concordia University School of Extended Learning or as I like to call it “the department formerly known as Continuing Education”. They are Java Programming Fundamentals on Tuesdays and Web Services and XML Processing on Mondays. The times for both classes are from 6 PM till 10 PM.

Java Programming Fundamentals (CEJV419/A1 from 2009-09-15 till 2009-11-17)

The objective of this course is to introduce object oriented programming using the Java language to students who have already been exposed to and used another programming language. What this means is that the course does not spend much time on how to write a loop or a selection statement. Rather, the way that Java implements these and other common language constructs will be reviewed.

The primary focus of this course is how to use Java to write truly object oriented programs. The concepts of developing classes that cooperate and work with other classes and implementing them as objects will be covered. The libraries unique to Java such as Swing and JDBC will be explored but creating classes to solve problems will be paramount to the course.

Web Services and XML Processing (CEJV659/A1 from 2009-09-14 till 2009-11-23)

As the name implies there are two major topics in this course. The first is creating, writing, and reading files in the XML format. XML is the standard by which designers and programmers communicate information between processes on single computers and networks of computers. XML is a meta‑language or language for creating languages that provides a framework for developing specific formats of communication. Java has a very sophisticated family of libraries for XML and the course will examine them and see how they are used.

We typically write software that at some level contains methods or functions that we call upon to perform some work on our behalf. These are typically contained within the executable code of our programs. A Web Service turns this arrangement sideways by placing the methods on other computers somewhere on a network or the Internet itself. By using protocols that work within the protocols associated with Web Servers (hence the name Web Service) programs can be written without regard to the physical location of the code. Java provides the necessary framework and code to make using these services as easy as calling a local function. The format of the information that flows between an application on one computer and the web service it is consuming on another computer is a langauge created using XML.

For more information on these courses and other great courses at the Concordia University School of Extended Learning visit their web site at http://sarno.concordia.ca/conted/.