Kudzu Article Archive

Terms and Conditions

I am not going to make this long and boring, so here is the fine print:

What you can do: Have fun. These articles are here for personal and educational purposes. You can use them to learn from, and feel free to pass them around in unmodified form. You can pass them around your company.

What you cannot do: You cannot plagiarize them. You cannot change my name to yours. You cannot make a presentation with them.

If unsure, or would like to "do what you cannot do", contact me for permission or with questions.

About the Articles

This is a collection of articles that I have written for conferences, user group presentations, magazines, or corporate training. I have written several articles for Visual Basic Online, Delphi Informant, and Delphi Magazine. I also write regularly for SDGN Magazine. 

While some of these articles have been previously published, many of the versions here are the unedited, unabridged versions. Often as part of the publication process, an article is abridged, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. I have chosen to post the article in complete, since room is not an issue. The only drawback, is you lose the benefit of the editing by a professional editor in some cases.

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Feedback

Feedback is always appreciated. Please note that I do not welcome technical support questions - but I do enjoy your feedback.

Articles

I have tried many ways to organize this list. At one point I had short descriptions of each article, however it made the page rather long. Instead I have provided a very brief introduction for each article and listed them in alphabetical order in categories.

Indy

Indy Articles
I have written several articles about Indy. All of these articles are now available at the Indy Portal.

Indy in Depth
Indy in Depth is a an e-book for Indy. Indy in Depth

Techno Reviews

Kudzu's Sony Ericsson P800 Review
I travel a lot, and while I absolutely love my Sony VAIO, many of my travels it is just too much. I needed something that was better for day trips, as well as some of the trips I make where I do not plan to work, but need to keep in touch. I often travel to various parts of Russia, Siberia, and other parts of the world. After researching many options including PDA's + a GPRS phone, I settled on a Sony P800 instead. Full Article

Other Software Development Topics

Advanced Interprocess Communications (IPC)
COM is well suited for many tasks, but what happens when you have many programs that all need to communicate to a single instance of an application simply share data, or all talk to each other at once? Full Article

Box Testing
This article is now available as part of the Bubelen Project.

Database Design for Programmers
Most programmers are not DBA's, but are often thrust into the role of one. This article is a crash course in being and should help you avoid common mistakes. Full Article

Piracy and Unconventional Wisdom
Conventional wisdom, which often equates to the "knee jerk" reaction, is not the proper one. Full Article

Short Circuits or Faulty Circuits?
Short circuiting in software development is a common practice and often propogated and accepted as a good practice because of this. However common practice is not always the best practice.... Full Article

Why Delphi.Net?
With the introduction of .Net many people have been predicting the decline and or death of Delphi as a language. Such predictions have been made many times over the years and Delphi has remained steady and even made several gains. I believe that with the continued growth of .net, Delphi will not only retain its following, but that the use and following of Delphi will increase. This is of course contrary to the beliefs of many people today, so let me explain..... Full Article

Delphi / C++ Builder / Kylix

1998 Borland Conference Report
This is provided for historical purposes. Full Article.

Preventative Programming: Code Smarter, Debug Less
This article covers various techniques for writing Delphi programs that by design catch and highlight their own bugs and other potential problems. It does not focus on code add-ins, or tools, but strategies for effective coding, and early prevention of bugs through coding techniques. Full Article

Taking Action - Using and Writing Actions and Action Lists
This article covers how and why to use Delphi's action lists and also create custom actions. Full Article