Learn the forEach and injectInto patterns in Eclipse Collections. — To forEach or to injectInto? In Eclipse Collections, forEach and injectInto are both internal iterators that provide the most basic of the iteration patterns. A developer can use both of these patterns to accomplish a large number of iteration tasks. As internal iterators, these methods encapsulate the implementation details of “how to” iterate over the…

Learn how Smalltalk and Java both influenced Eclipse Collections and can help you grow as a developer. Taking a walk with Smalltalk On May 12, 2022, I gave a talk titled “Smalltalk or Java? Why not both!” at the Pittsburgh Java User Group. The meetup was hosted by Sirisha Pratha and Rinat Gatyatullin. The talk…

Discover a better way to count things in Java. Using Map to count the beads on an abacus Here’s a simple problem to solve using a Map. How can we count the number of beads tallied on an abacus by color? First, I will define an enum for Color.

Discover a safer alternative to mapping keys to multiple values in Java. I need a Map with multiple values At some point in your years of coding in Java, you have probably needed a Map<K, Collection<V>>. If you haven’t needed one yet, give it some time… you will. There are more convenient ways to manage the Collection…

Solving a problem with multiple languages and libraries can sometimes bring new insights. Challenge Yourself and Others to Learn I accepted a JLDD (Jet Lag Driven Development) challenge recently to implement a Wordle Checker Kata in Java. My friend José Paumard sent me this challenge and I set out to solve it using my favorite Java…

I love lambdas in Java 8, but method references are elusive and amazing Lambdas are flexible anonymous bits of code We can solve a lot of interesting problems in Java using lambdas. We can use expression lambdas for simple things, and statement lambdas for more complex things. Lambdas can call out to other methods on the current…

Learn how to use Eclipse Collections to solve a Wordle word guessing kata Katas are coding puzzles to keep your skills sharp I love creating and solving code katas. Code Katas are programming puzzles that can help keep your coding skills sharp. I wrote an article titled “Learn to Kata and Kata to Learn” for the “97 Things Every…

Whether life throws you fastballs or curveballs, accept them and swing true. What do you say now, jackass? That’s known as trouble with the curve. -Clint Eastwood as Gus from “Trouble with the Curve” An Extraordinarily Good Man My father-in-law passed away this week. His name was James, but everyone called him Jimmy. I…

Creative writing meets Java Text Blocks and Eclipse Collections My Month of Haiku In September 2021, I took a month off from technical writing in my blog. I experimented with writing haiku for the month. Haiku are a structured form of poetry with a total of seventeen syllables, five in the first line, seven…