Update: Compare alcohol content of your favorite beers

Announcing an update to one of my applications released prior to this blog’s existence. One of my major projects is a Beer database application built on Struts. It started out fairly simply as an application that allows you find out a little bit about a given beer (Alcohol content, calories and carbs, if available). You can select a single beer, a range of beers based on alcohol content, or a random beer.

Now, you can now compare the alcohol content of two beers. I call this “Drunkability!” In short, it allows you to see how many beers it might take to match a six pack of your “usual” beer. It’s just a fun way to use the database.

Technologies used;
Eclipse: IDE
MySQL: Database of beer data
SQL: For persistence (a.k.a. accessing the database)
Struts/JSP/Servlets: Base layer of the whole app
Struts Validator: JavaScript and java validation of the beers selected, to prevent the user from selecting the same beer for the comparison.
XML, JSTL, CSS, HTML: Used throughout

http://rorycullen.com/BeerDatabaseWebStruts

Enjoy, and leave me some feedback if you want.

Xmas Letter Sample now available

Happy New Year!  As promised, I have set up a generic version of my Holiday letter to add to my “public” portfolio.  As mentioned last post, the information entered is first validated via JavaScript utilizing some custom code, and some existing validation code in Struts.  It is then checked to the database before users are allowed access the letter.

Technologies used;
Eclipse: IDE
Apache Tomcat: Host Server
MySQL: Database of “allowed” email addresses
iBATIS/SQL: For persistence (a.k.a. accessing the database)
Struts/JSP/Servlets: Base layer of the whole app
Struts validator: JavaScript validation on both the email addresses and the passwords, prior to accessing the database
XML, JSTL, CSS, HTML: Used throughout

http://rorycullen.com/XmasLetterSample

To login, please use:
Email: sample@sample.com
Password: TestPassword

Note:  Although the version of this project on my development machine utilizes iBATIS, it turns out that my web host does not appear to allow iBATIS.  Hence, all persistence was done using straight Java and SQL.

Rollout: Xmas Letter 2008

Happy holidays!  I have rolled out my latest project, but unfortunately, it is a fairly private affair!  I have set up my Christmas Letter on my website in a secure manner, asking my contacts to enter their email addresses, and a password, prior to accessing the letter.  The information entered is first validated via JavaScript utilizing some custom code, and some existing validation code in Struts.  It is then checked to the database before users are allowed access the letter.

Technologies used;
Eclipse: IDE
MySQL: Database of “allowed” email addresses
iBATIS/SQL: For persistence (a.k.a. accessing the database)
Struts/JSP/Servlets: Base layer of the whole app
Struts validator: JavaScript validation on both the email addresses and the passwords, prior to accessing the database
XML, JSTL, CSS, HTML: Used throughout

http://rorycullen.com/XmasLetter

When I get a chance, I will load up a generic version (without the actual letter) so other people can see how this works.

Note:  Although the version of this project on my development machine utilizes iBATIS, it turns out that my web host does not appear to allow iBATIS.  Hence, all persistence was done using straight Java and SQL.

Welcome

I am a long-time developer who has recently turned my focus toward Java technologies. I became Sun Certified in June 2008 (SCJA).

I’ll be using this blog to talk about some of my coding discoveries along the way, and roll out my new webapps and coding experiments. In the meantime, please check out my projects and résumé on my website. Technologies include J2SE 6, J2EE, Servlets, JSP, Struts, MySQL, XML, iBATIS, JSTL, UML, Swing and more to come!

http://rorycullen.com

Why Kaizen?

Kaizen is the Japanese philosophy of continuous improvement in all aspects of life. In my years of work, I have constantly applied this principle, even before I knew what it was. This summarizes my approach to work, and to life.

Sun Certified Java Associate