http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer Various items, tidbits, and ramblings related to Delphi Programming. Hosted by Allen Bauer, Embarcadero Chief Scientist. Fri, 14 Oct 2011 17:48:11 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en-US I recently did an email interview with Martin Strohal of the Delphi-Treff Team. I got permission to publish the original English version (Since my German is a little rusty...) Delphi XE2 will be published this year. What are the key features of this new release? (Is this the release named ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2011/10/14/38943 The Windows x64 ABI (Application Binary Interface) presents some new challenges for assembly programming that don’t exist for x86. A couple of the changes that must be taken into account can can be seen as very positive. First of all, there is now one and only one OS specified calling ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2011/10/10/38940 While implementing the x64 built-in assembler for Delphi 64bit, I got to “know” the AMD64/EM64T architecture a lot more. The good thing about the x64 architecture is that it really builds on the existing instruction format and design. However, unlike the move from 16bit to 32bit where most existing instruction ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2011/10/05/38939 So far we’ve had “Testing synchronization primitives” and “Writing a ‘self-monitoring’ thread-pool.” Let’s build on those topics, and discuss what to do with exceptions that occur within a scheduled work item within a thread pool. My view is that exceptions should be caught and held for later inspection, or re-raised ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/04/07/38935 Let’s start thinking about thread pools. How do you manage a general purpose thread pool in the face of no-so-well-written-code? For instance, a task dispatched into the thread pool never returns, effectively locking that thread from ever being recycled. How do you monitor this? How long do you wait before ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/03/26/38934 In this office. I’ve been in the same physical office for nearly 15 years. After years of accumulation, it now looks positively barren. Beginning next Monday, March 29th, 2010, I’ll be in a new building, new location, and new office. The good thing is that the new place is a ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/03/26/38933 I’m going to try a completely different approach to this post. I’ll post a question and simply let the discussion ensue. I would even encourage the discussion to spill over to the public newsgroups/forums. Question for today is: How can you effectively unit-test synchronization primitives for correctness or more ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/03/22/38932 By now you’re all aware that we’re getting ready to move to a new building here in Scotts Valley. This process is giving us a chance to clean out our offices and during all these archeological expeditions, some lost artifacts are being (re)discovered. Note the following: ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/02/23/38931 Is. This? I simply cannot explain this. At. All. This was on a bulletin/white-board in the break area. I’d never noticed it because it was covered with photos from various sign-off (final authorization to release the product) celebrations. Lots of photos of both past and present co-workers, many ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/02/19/38923 It seems that my previous post about FreeAndNil sparked a little controversy. Some of you jumped right on board and flat agreed with my assertion. Others took a very defensive approach. Still others, kept an “arms-length” view. Actually, the whole discussion in the comments was very ... http://blogs.embarcadero.com/abauer/2010/02/16/38916