Yakov Fain

Tоday I was participating in a discussion on one Java forum – the question was if Java is an easy or difficult programming language to learn. IMO, Java is not difficult to learn, to teach, and to use. It’s a strongly typed compiled language with tools that help you identify most of the errors before you even run the program. While participating in this discussion I was writing code in a different programming language called JavaScript, which gave me a chance to illustrate a lot of things the Java developer takes for granted, while there are people who work in a more hostile environment called JavaScript. I had a working program, and decided to add a JavaScript handler function to illustrate HTML form submission with jQuery for our upcoming book. I’ve been writing this code in Eclipse-based IDE called Aptana. I’ve added this handler for the submit event to a Donation... (more)

HTML5 or Flex Framework

More than a year passed since Adobe decided to stop supporting Flex framework and gave it away to Apache Foundation. This writeup is based on the conversation I had with my colleague Anatole Tartakovsky in January of 2013. In this conversation I’ve been representing the HTML5 community while Anatole fought for Flex framework. I’m trying to find arguments against using FLex framework even though I believe that it remains the best and the most production way for developing Web applications. I’ll be just playing devil’s advocate here. Anatole also believes that Flex is the best fr... (more)

Secrets Of The Masters: Core Java Job Interview Questions

JDJ's Enterprise Editor, Yakov Fain (pictured) writes: If you are planning to hit the job market,  you may need to refresh some of the Java basic terms and techniques to prepare yourself for a technical interview. Let me offer you some of the core Java questions that you might expect during the interviews.  For  most questions  I’ve provided only  short  answers to encourage further research.  I have included only  questions for mid (*) and senior level (**) Java developers. These sample questions could also become handy for people who need to interview Java developers (see also ... (more)

E-Commerce with Hybris

People are accustomed to buying goods online. If a company sells products to individuals, we call it B2C for Business To Consumers. If a business sells to other businesses – it’s B2B. Having an online store allows to sell around the clock regardless of the consumer’s location (at least within the country) as long as he or she is connected to the Internet. People spend some substantial time online and sellers are trying to reach their clients via all possible channels and devices being that a regular HTML Web page, a social network, a mobile application on any device with embedded... (more)

From Quill Pens to O’Reilly Publishing

 1812 Imagine I wanted to write a book about Web development in the year 1812. Which tools would I need? I’d need an ink, a quill pen, and a stack of paper. To make multiple copies of the book, a publisher would hire a bunch of people who’d use ink, quill pens, and a stack of paper. By the way, this nice image of a quill pen is taken from Wikipedia.  2009 Quill pens are gone. My colleagues and I were writing another book for O’Reilly. The process was not as simple as in 1812: we used MS Word with the publisher’s template. When the draft of a chapter was ready I’d upload it to t... (more)