November 7, 1998

Even though Java does not have a constant type, you can achieve the same effect by declaring and initializing variables that are static, public, and final. After the variables have been initialized, their value cannot be changed. You can then access the constant value using the name of the variable

Many developers using ODBC, JDBC, OLE DB, and ADO are unaware that there is a standards-compliant solution for expressing dates, times, and timestamps in SQL statements. When writing queries in proprietary SQL, developers find that porting their SQL code to a different platform often produces syntax errors. The Open Group,

“ODBC-compliant database” and “JDBC-compliant database” are nonsequiturs. ODBC and JDBC clients can connect to databases that store behavior in the form of methods, triggers, constraints, and stored procedures. The ODBC and JDBC specifications mandate nothing about database behavior. Likewise, they don’t specify anything about database content, just as the VHS

You can make your Web pages load faster if you reduce the color depth of in-line graphics. This will make your page more useable, impress your audience, and even save space on your server. A GIF file can only have 256 colors max, so most of the time to save

This tip works equally well in both the Windows NT and Windows 95 browsers, and makes managing HTML files a bit easier by adding some file-type specific menu items to the Windows Explorer. In the Explorer, select “View”|”Options…”, then click on the “File Types” tab on the dialog. In the

Namespaces do not incur runtime or memory overhead. The technique used to represent namespaces is called name mangling. This same technique is used to create unique names for overloaded functions with identical names, and for class members. Therefore, you can use namespaces in time-critical applications without hesitation.