Category Archives: Architecture

Encapsulation of asynchronous behaviour in distributed system of scripted autotests

This is an example how to create continuation-like monadic behaviour in C++11 (encapsulate async execution) which is used for specific example: writing asynchronous scripts for system of distributed autotests.

Async scenarions for distributed autotests

I needed to add autotests into continuous integration of client-side multiplatform product. Basic way to build autotesting system is to grab one of well-known frameworks (especially if we are talking about web solutions) and test product locally. Local testing environment simulates clicks buttons inside UI and gets the results right away. This is simple and good way except the case when you have truly cross-platform solution (win, mac, web, iOS, android, etc), custom rich UI framework and you want to perform tests on various kinds of systems at same time.

So I came up with remote distributed scheme for autotests. And inside this post there are some ways to make this scheme shine.

This post contains 3 main points:

  1. what is distributed system of autotests and why the one would need it (advantages / disadvantages)
  2. how to implement asynchronous scenarios of distributed autotests using continuation monadic style in C++11/14 (how to encapsulate asynchronous execution and do this the most compact way)
  3. how to integrate ChaiScript scripting into such system to make it more flexible

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Immutable serialisable data structures in C++11

immutablecppcaption

As C++ is very flexible language there are a lot of ways to construct immutable-like data structures from functional programming style. For example, this nice presentation by Kelvin Henney contains one of the ways. Here I will present my way which is slightly different.

At the same time my approach also solves another problem of serialisation of such immutable structures. I use JSON format at the moment, but the approach is not limited to this format only.

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Templates as first-class citizens in C++11

templates as citizens

C++11 treats functions as first-class citizens and this gives us ability to construct a lot of nice things as design patterns borrowed from functional languages. Meanwhile C++ has very powerful template metaprogramming. This post is aimed to make templated functions closer to first-class citizens, and to construct some simplicity and beauty which you can get from it.

Also here will be implementation for currying of such functions! If you don’t know what currying is – just remember std::bind.

And to make it shine we’ll add piping. (This article will improve some ideas from post about functional piping ). This step is optional and you can replace such piping with commas and function calls.

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C++11 functional decomposition – easy way to do AOP

This post is about making functional decomposition from perspective of Aspect Oriented Programming using C++11. If you are not familiar with ideas of AOP don’t be afraid – it’s rather simple concept, and by the end of this post you will understand the benefits of it.

You also can treat this post just as example how to use high-order functions in C++11.

In short – AOP tries to perform decomposition of every business function into orthogonal parts called aspects such as security, logging, error handling, etc. The separation of crosscutting concerns. It looks like:
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Small presentation of my cross-platform engine for mobile and desktop applications

I made small presentation about my cross-platform engine for mobile and desktop applications. Codename Kobald. Click on image to play it in new window (use arrows and space to move through):

Screenshot 2015-01-21 21.53.14

This is not-so-technical presentation and main info about engine will come later as separate post.

10 ways to not shoot yourself in the foot using C++11

Within C++, there is a much smaller and cleaner language struggling to get out (Stroustrup)

The following text could be modified – current rev.1.0

Very often i hear from java/erlang/etc people that C++ is so bad that it is very unwise to use so-old-school language now, when we have more ‘safe’ higher level languages. Everybody heard about foot-shooting using C++.  What about C++11?

Bjarne said that C++11 feels like whole new language and, at first, i did not take it seriously as modifications looked more as minor additions (especially for boost users). Now i changed my mind – using new features combined together can transform your way of coding into new form. I’m talking not about adding new features to your code, but about changing your coding style.

How not to shoot yourself in the foot? Here is the list of my rules to make the C++ coding life sweet and easy. This is simple convention to follow and can be adopted very fast. Not only it gives more stable implementation but also more clean and understandable design.

This convention is composition of Scott Meyers rules, Functional programming ideas and reducing-complexity ideology by Steve McConnell.

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Writing custom protocol for nanomsg

Custom protocol for nanomsg

Nanomsg is next version of ZeroMQ lib, providing smart cross-platform sockets for implementation of distributed architectures. Here you can find basic examples of included protocols (communication patterns). Lib is simple (written in pure C) and does not have any dependencies like boost. And as this is at least 3rd iteration from same author you can expect some quality/performance here.

This is kind of solution for the hell of writing of your own serious socket server. If you already had such experience you should understand the range of problems which are not so obvious at start. But here we expect to skip all such problems and go straight to processing messages. Lib handles automatic reconnection in case of link disconnects, nonblocking receiving/sending, sockets which can handle large set of clients, etc. All this seems like perfect solution for server-side inner transport of fast distributed architectures.

But i also want to try it outside. The basic communication patterns (PAIR, BUS, REQREP, PUBSUB, PIPELINE, SURVEY) may fit large set of inner server transport schemes, but there are some minor limits in current implementation for client side application. I mean limits of protocols, not the lib itself.

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How to make simple CQRS implementation without Event Sourcing

Here I will try to describe the concept of CQRS without event sourcing based on some other principle instead. The concept to organise your data and messages to create scalable and reliable CQRS/Messaging-based architecture without additional complexity from event store.

CQRS - MVC

At first here is small introduction on what SQRS is. I suppose you are familiar with MVC model and use it on daily basis. And i suppose you understand benefits of separation your code into separate modules.

CQRS – Command-Query Responsibility Segregation. CQRS just separates model into 2 separate parts – READS model and WRITES model. They also can be referenced as Query model and Command model.

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