Hello everyone and welcome back to another week of my blog. This week I will be talking about UML diagrams. UML stands for Unified Modeling Language and it is used to model business, application structures, programming languages, analysis, design, and implementation of software-based systems. In other words, it is a way to visually represent the design and implementation of complex software. There can be many lines of codes in your software and it can be difficult to keep track of all the class relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can make it easier for developers to see the relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can work for many different programming languages. It is a standardized modeling language that any language can incorporate into the language of their choosing.

There are two different types of UML diagrams. The two different types are structural and behavioral. Structural UML diagrams show how a system is structured. They show how classes and object components work together and show the relationships between those components. Behavioral UML diagrams on the other hand, show how a system would behave from the objects interacting with each other in it. In this class I am currently taking at Worcester State University, we look at the design and structure of programs through structural UML diagrams. We went through different versions of a “DuckSimulator” and its UML diagrams to see how the program can be improved. When given a difficult concept to add to the DuckSimulator, we were able to come up with a solution through the UML diagram because we could visually see how adding interface classes would affect the DuckSimulator.

The DuckSimulator structural UML diagram we used was a class diagram intended to be written in Java. UML diagrams are very commonly used to represent software that is based on object orientated programming because they can easily show the different classes with their attributes and behaviors as well as the relationships between each class. Class diagrams are split into three vertical sections. The section at the top is the name of the class, the section in the middle are the attributes, and the section at the bottom are the methods. Types of variables and return types of methods are indicated after the name and a colon (id : int). Typically the attributes in the middle section of each class are private variables indicated by a minus sign (-) before the name. Classes can be linked together with many different arrows to show relationships between them. UML diagrams are very powerful at representing a program written with a object orientated language.

https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/uml-diagram-types-examples/
 

From the blog Comfy Blog by Angus Cheng and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello everyone and welcome back to another week of my blog. This week I will be talking about UML diagrams. UML stands for Unified Modeling Language and it is used to model business, application structures, programming languages, analysis, design, and implementation of software-based systems. In other words, it is a way to visually represent the design and implementation of complex software. There can be many lines of codes in your software and it can be difficult to keep track of all the class relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can make it easier for developers to see the relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can work for many different programming languages. It is a standardized modeling language that any language can incorporate into the language of their choosing.

There are two different types of UML diagrams. The two different types are structural and behavioral. Structural UML diagrams show how a system is structured. They show how classes and object components work together and show the relationships between those components. Behavioral UML diagrams on the other hand, show how a system would behave from the objects interacting with each other in it. In this class I am currently taking at Worcester State University, we look at the design and structure of programs through structural UML diagrams. We went through different versions of a “DuckSimulator” and its UML diagrams to see how the program can be improved. When given a difficult concept to add to the DuckSimulator, we were able to come up with a solution through the UML diagram because we could visually see how adding interface classes would affect the DuckSimulator.

The DuckSimulator structural UML diagram we used was a class diagram intended to be written in Java. UML diagrams are very commonly used to represent software that is based on object orientated programming because they can easily show the different classes with their attributes and behaviors as well as the relationships between each class. Class diagrams are split into three vertical sections. The section at the top is the name of the class, the section in the middle are the attributes, and the section at the bottom are the methods. Types of variables and return types of methods are indicated after the name and a colon (id : int). Typically the attributes in the middle section of each class are private variables indicated by a minus sign (-) before the name. Classes can be linked together with many different arrows to show relationships between them. UML diagrams are very powerful at representing a program written with a object orientated language.

https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/uml-diagram-types-examples/
 

From the blog Comfy Blog by Angus Cheng and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello everyone and welcome back to another week of my blog. This week I will be talking about UML diagrams. UML stands for Unified Modeling Language and it is used to model business, application structures, programming languages, analysis, design, and implementation of software-based systems. In other words, it is a way to visually represent the design and implementation of complex software. There can be many lines of codes in your software and it can be difficult to keep track of all the class relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can make it easier for developers to see the relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can work for many different programming languages. It is a standardized modeling language that any language can incorporate into the language of their choosing.

There are two different types of UML diagrams. The two different types are structural and behavioral. Structural UML diagrams show how a system is structured. They show how classes and object components work together and show the relationships between those components. Behavioral UML diagrams on the other hand, show how a system would behave from the objects interacting with each other in it. In this class I am currently taking at Worcester State University, we look at the design and structure of programs through structural UML diagrams. We went through different versions of a “DuckSimulator” and its UML diagrams to see how the program can be improved. When given a difficult concept to add to the DuckSimulator, we were able to come up with a solution through the UML diagram because we could visually see how adding interface classes would affect the DuckSimulator.

The DuckSimulator structural UML diagram we used was a class diagram intended to be written in Java. UML diagrams are very commonly used to represent software that is based on object orientated programming because they can easily show the different classes with their attributes and behaviors as well as the relationships between each class. Class diagrams are split into three vertical sections. The section at the top is the name of the class, the section in the middle are the attributes, and the section at the bottom are the methods. Types of variables and return types of methods are indicated after the name and a colon (id : int). Typically the attributes in the middle section of each class are private variables indicated by a minus sign (-) before the name. Classes can be linked together with many different arrows to show relationships between them. UML diagrams are very powerful at representing a program written with a object orientated language.

https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/uml-diagram-types-examples/
 

From the blog Comfy Blog by Angus Cheng and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello everyone and welcome back to another week of my blog. This week I will be talking about UML diagrams. UML stands for Unified Modeling Language and it is used to model business, application structures, programming languages, analysis, design, and implementation of software-based systems. In other words, it is a way to visually represent the design and implementation of complex software. There can be many lines of codes in your software and it can be difficult to keep track of all the class relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can make it easier for developers to see the relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can work for many different programming languages. It is a standardized modeling language that any language can incorporate into the language of their choosing.

There are two different types of UML diagrams. The two different types are structural and behavioral. Structural UML diagrams show how a system is structured. They show how classes and object components work together and show the relationships between those components. Behavioral UML diagrams on the other hand, show how a system would behave from the objects interacting with each other in it. In this class I am currently taking at Worcester State University, we look at the design and structure of programs through structural UML diagrams. We went through different versions of a “DuckSimulator” and its UML diagrams to see how the program can be improved. When given a difficult concept to add to the DuckSimulator, we were able to come up with a solution through the UML diagram because we could visually see how adding interface classes would affect the DuckSimulator.

The DuckSimulator structural UML diagram we used was a class diagram intended to be written in Java. UML diagrams are very commonly used to represent software that is based on object orientated programming because they can easily show the different classes with their attributes and behaviors as well as the relationships between each class. Class diagrams are split into three vertical sections. The section at the top is the name of the class, the section in the middle are the attributes, and the section at the bottom are the methods. Types of variables and return types of methods are indicated after the name and a colon (id : int). Typically the attributes in the middle section of each class are private variables indicated by a minus sign (-) before the name. Classes can be linked together with many different arrows to show relationships between them. UML diagrams are very powerful at representing a program written with a object orientated language.

https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/uml-diagram-types-examples/
 

From the blog Comfy Blog by and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello everyone and welcome back to another week of my blog. This week I will be talking about UML diagrams. UML stands for Unified Modeling Language and it is used to model business, application structures, programming languages, analysis, design, and implementation of software-based systems. In other words, it is a way to visually represent the design and implementation of complex software. There can be many lines of codes in your software and it can be difficult to keep track of all the class relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can make it easier for developers to see the relationships and hierarchies. UML diagrams can work for many different programming languages. It is a standardized modeling language that any language can incorporate into the language of their choosing.

There are two different types of UML diagrams. The two different types are structural and behavioral. Structural UML diagrams show how a system is structured. They show how classes and object components work together and show the relationships between those components. Behavioral UML diagrams on the other hand, show how a system would behave from the objects interacting with each other in it. In this class I am currently taking at Worcester State University, we look at the design and structure of programs through structural UML diagrams. We went through different versions of a “DuckSimulator” and its UML diagrams to see how the program can be improved. When given a difficult concept to add to the DuckSimulator, we were able to come up with a solution through the UML diagram because we could visually see how adding interface classes would affect the DuckSimulator.

The DuckSimulator structural UML diagram we used was a class diagram intended to be written in Java. UML diagrams are very commonly used to represent software that is based on object orientated programming because they can easily show the different classes with their attributes and behaviors as well as the relationships between each class. Class diagrams are split into three vertical sections. The section at the top is the name of the class, the section in the middle are the attributes, and the section at the bottom are the methods. Types of variables and return types of methods are indicated after the name and a colon (id : int). Typically the attributes in the middle section of each class are private variables indicated by a minus sign (-) before the name. Classes can be linked together with many different arrows to show relationships between them. UML diagrams are very powerful at representing a program written with a object orientated language.

https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/uml-diagram-types-examples/
 

From the blog Comfy Blog by Angus Cheng and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

This week I read a blog post that I thought really related to the class about the history of software development. The blog goes over software development’s history from early computers to development today. The blog starts off with early computers, giving interesting facts like how the first piece of software was made with punch cards, and took 52 minutes to complete calculations. Then, there is a section about personal computers that people have in their homes. The section goes into how programming languages were becoming more well known, and how people started using computers outside of work in the mid-1990s. After, there is a paragraph about mobile computing devices, and how they developed from IBM Simon in 1994, and programmers starting to create phone apps in the 2000s to our smartphones of today. The blog ends with the software development of today. The ending is about how old programming languages are still used, and new languages are being made today. The ending also describes how modern software development is enhancing “dumb” devices by putting chips in them.

 I selected this blog post because software development is my dream job, and I thought it would be interesting to read about the history of it. This blog has a great way of showing how software has progressed over time ,and I think every CS major should read it since we do not want history to repeat itself.

 I think this blog was a great read that I recommend for many reasons. One reason I would recommend this blog is because it is a good history lesson for people that are interested in software development. It is good to learn about the past, so that we could prevent similar mistakes from happening again. Another reason I would recommend this blog is because it has a lot of interesting facts for people interested. One example is when the blogger writes about how the IBM Simon was the first predecessor to smartphones in 1994, and it even had a touchscreen and email! The last reason I would recommend this blog is because it could help having this knowledge in a future job to show how interested you are in software development, and how knowledgeable you are in the area.

This blog taught me about how software development has progressed through time from software that needed an hour to run to our technology of today. The material affected me heavily because it showed me how programming languages from early in its history, like C, are still used today. It makes you really think about how much was overachieved in the beginning, or is being underachieved now. I will use this knowledge to try and further software development in my future.

https://praxent.com/blog/history-of-software-development-innovation

From the blog CS@Worcester – Anesti Blog's by Anesti Lara and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

When designing a frontend (like anything else in software development) it is important to choose your tools wisely. There are many different ways to write a frontend, but Vue.js and React.js are two of the most popular. Both Vue.js and React.js are JavaScript libraries which utilize JavaScript to generate webpages, although Vue.js is much more similar to classical web design.

In “Vue vs React in 2021: Which Framework to Choose and When” by Maja Nowak, Nowak discusses the main differences between the two frameworks. Before Nowak discusses the differences, they discuss the similarities since the two frameworks are similar. Both frameworks are virtual DOMs, which means webpages only update elements which are actually changed. They are also substantial libraries, which optimizes and reduces the amount of code needed to build websites.

Despite these similarities, these two frameworks are different in a multitude of ways. One major way in which they are different is syntax: Vue.js uses HTML whereas React.js is more similar to writing JavaScript code. This makes Vue.js easier to learn for web developers compared to React.js. This also means that Vue.js is weaker since React.js can use JavaScript’s flow control and advanced IDE features to improve design.

Vue.js is a much more lightweight option between the two, which has its advantages and disadvantages. For one, Vue.js being lightweight makes it easier to apply to smaller projects. Nowak notes that although Vue.js is lightweight that does not mean it cannot be used for larger projects. According to “State of Vue.js” the ease of integration is one of the biggest advantages of using Vue.js which is an aspect of being lightweight.

React.js is a much more advanced framework which may not necessarily be needed for every project, but may help significantly for some. React.js was designed by Facebook and is geared towards large-scale projects. Even though React.js is more difficult to learn, there are many more React.js developers compared to Vue.js. One major advantage of React.js is its programming style and patterns. React.js is much more similar to JavaScript which can be useful for developers to design a more complex application.

For me personally, I think I would enjoy React.js more than Vue.js. I have not designed any websites yet and have not gotten used to HTML. I think this would make it easier for me to learn React.js. Although I want to use React.js I will use whatever my employer requires. I don’t plan on doing much frontend work, but I do think it is a good skill to learn.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Ryan Blog by rtrembley and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

https://www.monterail.com/blog/vue-vs-react-2021

Web development has never been my main area of interest. It’s not the environment I’m the most comfortable in, especially when dealing with projects involving many different frameworks and libraries. In order to prepare myself to contribute something useful to the LibreFoodPantry project, I basically picked a framework out of a hat from what I roughly remember in class. As a result, I’m reading up on Vue.js.

Vue (pronounced “view,” which I am still struggling to pronounce correctly when reading) is a frontend framework, meaning it is used as a way to streamline creating the user interface of a website (as opposed to the backend, which refers to work done on the server’s end, or the API layer, which connects the frontend and the backend).

Vue was created by a solo developer named Evan You, and is currently maintained by him and a small team. It allows users to either define the site’s interface in JSX as one would do with React.js or in HTML templates. It is well-documented and considered easy to learn by many developers. It is suitable for small projects, but can also scale to larger ones. It is progressive, meaning that features can be introduced to a project incrementally as they are required.

As someone without a lot of intuition around tech stacks, I figured it would be a good idea to find an article that compared Vue to another framework, rather than just reading about it on its own. The article linked above compares it to React, an older and more well established frontend framework created and maintained by Facebook. It is not as thoroughly documented, but has a much larger community of developers. Unlike Vue, you can only use JSX with it. It is also primarily meant for large projects, and developers of smaller projects using React might fight themselves with a lot of unnecessary boilerplate.

Both Vue and React use the concept of a Virtual DOM, meaning that they modify the state of the HTML document but only change it dynamically as is needed, rather than reloading the entire thing. They both have large libraries of components that can be added for additional functionality (Vue’s is smaller but has more officially maintained components). Vue and React also show similar performance.

Vue and react both have pros and cons. My instinct is to avoid boilerplate as much as possible, and I can’t imagine I will be working on lots of very large web apps, so I think I would generally prefer Vue over React, if it was up to me to choose one, especially since you can pick and choose how much of its complexity you want to worry about.

From the blog CS@Worcester – Tom's Blog by Thomas Clifford and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Considering how far along we are now in the semester, I decided to revisit a much earlier topic, design patterns. For this week’s blog post, I am going to look at a post by Ravi Kiran, a research analyst at Edureka. In class, we covered what are design patterns and what are some examples of design patterns and in this blog post, Mr. Kiran starts off the same way by introducing the audience to what are design patterns and why we use them. Then he begins to talk about what are the four categories of design patterns which are creational, structural, behavioral, and JEE (Java EE-based). The blog then proceeds to list examples of design patterns, what categories the design pattern falls under, and explains a little bit about why that design pattern falls under that specific design pattern category. The blog post does not explain all of the examples but instead for the ones that it does explain, it explains it very well in the form of a UML diagram and snippets of Java code. In addition to all of the technical information, this blog post gives us, it also gives real-world examples where that design pattern can be applied.

I chose this topic because when we were learning about this topic in class and when we did a homework assignment, I found the topic to be very interesting. I really wished we had spent more time on this topic in class. It was only after reading this post that I realized in class and on the homework, most of the design patterns that we covered in class fall under the creational or structural categories. After learning about the Singleton pattern in class and working on it on the homework, I think conceptually I understood the topic, but after not working on it for some time and revisiting the topic, I think I understand it better now than I did back then. One of my regrets early on in the semester was not doing the Advanced Assignment working with the Factory design pattern. When I was reading about that design pattern for the assignment, I found it interesting and thought I understood the topic, but I did not do the assignment because I was not sure if I understood the topic well enough to do the assignment. After reading more about the topic and seeing the UML diagram, it validated my thinking about the topic. I am the kind of person who second guesses themselves a lot and after reading this blog post, it makes me want to just go for it the next time I don’t quite understand something or understand it completely. I feel like if I just did the assignment back then I probably could have done it but I second-guessed myself.  

https://www.edureka.co/blog/java-design-patterns/

From the blog CS@Worcester – Just a Guy Passing By by Eric Nguyen and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Hello everyone! Hope everyone is doing great! In This week’s blog post I want to write about the front end and the back end and what are the differences between them. Front end and back end are the two most popular terms used in web development and they are very crucial for web development and are quite different from each other. Web development is the process of building websites and applications, Unlike UI UX Design, web development focuses more on coding and making sure the website functions well. Both the front end and bank end need to communicate with each other for the website to operate effectively and to improve the website’s functionality.

Front-end development is a style of computer programming that focuses on the coding and creation of elements and features of the website. This is the part of the website that the user interacts with and can be also referred to as the ‘client side’ of the application. This means as a front-end developer your job is to code and bring to life the visual elements of the website. It includes everything that users directly experience such as text colors and styles, images, graphs and tables, buttons, colors, navigation menu, animations, and content organization. The languages used in Front end development are HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Responsiveness and performance are two main objectives of the Front end. The developer must make sure the site is responsive.

The back-end is also referred to as the “server-side” of the website and focuses on the side of the website user can’t see. It stores and arranges data, and makes sure everything on the client-side of the website works fine. As an example, let’s say you are using a social media website, you need an accessible place to store all the user’s information, this storage is called database systems such as Oracle, SQL Server, and MySQL, these are not seen by users and done at the back end of the website. Back-end uses languages such as PHP, C++, JAVA, Python, JavaScript, and Node.js.

The difference between the frontend and back end is that they work on different sides of a website which is the client-side and server-side, both have different strengths, both work in different languages. I used this article because it makes the front end and back end very easy to understand and In the future if I work as a web developer it’s very important to know about these concepts.

https://www.kenzie.academy/blog/front-end-vs-back-end-whats-the-difference/

From the blog CS@Worcester – Mausam Mishra's Blog by mousammishra21 and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.