Class Viewer, Google searches, and rankings

[JSH]

Maybe more on-topic for Java developers I will again admit that I am
curious about where my open source program Class Viewer for Java
really ranks, where for years now I've puzzled over the #1 position
held on a Google or Yahoo search on "class viewer" without knowing if
it's really significant as hit counts to the page are pathetic, as in,
10 per day, on a good day.

The program itself isn't big or complicated and really just gives you
a GUI for quick reference on Java classes to see all the public
methods, fields and constructors, and it will open a browser to get
javadocs, and can take you to the specific method:

http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/lang/String.html#copyValueOf(char[], int, int)

The program built that URL and opened Firefox for me to it and I just
copied that out to show here.

How good of a feature is that? I know now developers are using IDE's
while when I was professionally programming I used an IDE with C++,
but the Java ones were considered crappy by my fellow developers
(should date when I was developing) so they convinced me to do
everything from the command line. And I hate IntelliSense.

All the javadocs I need are kept up with in an xml file, so once
they're in there, I don't have to look them up again and the program
opens them up in an instant to the method I want, and if there are
changes I just open it with a text editor and make the changes to the
path for the URL.

I've considered letting people do that through the GUI but without
feedback I don't know if it's needed or would be useful.

Oh yeah, as I cover neat features as I need more info, and getting
feedback about users is a waste as I learned earlier, I'll ask about
comparisons, one thing I love is the ability to do a search on every
public method with a certain character string in it. Like I can
search for everything with "ode", in String and get the following
output:

int hashCode()
int codePointAt(int)
int codePointBefore(int)
int codePointCount(int,int)
int offsetByCodePoints(int,int)

So that just pulled everything with "Code", and that's everything in
String. Or you can search on "char" and get every method that has
"char" in it at all, which I think is just neat.

The program itself is just middle-ware I think on Java Reflections
which returns methods with package information which makes that hard
to read so the program strips that off (or tries to strip it off), and
then it just gives you search, and finally you can double-click on a
method and get javadocs opened up for you to that method.

So then, does all of that deserve a #1 ranking in Google for a search
on "Class Viewer"?

Do the IDE's now do all of that for you?

And if it's a decent little program, why do I only get at best 10 hits
per day on the main webpage?


James Harris

 

[Daniele Futtorovic]

blahblahblah

My balls are hairier than yours.

 

[JSH]

My balls are hairier than yours.

Do you have balls? Sorry, I assumed you were female from your name.
My mistake.


___JSH

 

[Daniele Futtorovic]

Do you have balls? Sorry, I assumed you were female from your name.
My mistake.

No biggie.

But do you understand what that statement meant, James? That your "I'm
better than you 'cause I've got a Google rank" attitude is childish and
obnoxious?

It's plain enough by now that you're a narcissistic character. So I'm
afraid pointing out the logical flaws in your argumentation won't reach
you. But don't you realise you're merely talking to your reflection in
the mirror? That your whole attitude revolves around telling yourself
how great you are and getting others to tell it to you? But James,
nobody gives a crap about you and your Google rank.

Can't you realise that? In all earnestness, James, can you even fathom
that what's important to you isn't important to everyone else? Can you
even comprehend that there are people who take neither your nor their
own belly-button for the centre of the world?

Can't you realise that you're annoying the shit out of everyone with
your ClassViewer stuff? That it is utterly pathetic? That if you go on
like this the only person you will have left to talk to and who doesn't
shout back at you will be your reflection in the mirror?

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

Maybe more on-topic for Java developers I will again admit that I am
curious about where my open source program Class Viewer for Java
really ranks, where for years now I've puzzled over the #1 position
held on a Google or Yahoo search on "class viewer" without knowing if
it's really significant as hit counts to the page are pathetic, as in,
10 per day, on a good day.

If I created a tool called "Foobartistic barfoolarum", then I
would probably also get pretty high on Google for that term.

Class viewer is not a term used by Java developers and the type
of software is not used by Java developers.

So the two facts that you are high on Google and low on hits
are not contradictions.

Arne

 

[willo_thewisp]

while when I was professionally programming I used an IDE with C++,

This would be when you were professionally programming at Alltel in
Atlanta, right? Before they fired you for gross incompetence and
almost unfathomable stupidity?

 

[JSH]

No biggie.

But do you understand what that statement meant, James? That your "I'm
better than you 'cause I've got a Google rank" attitude is childish and
obnoxious?

It's plain enough by now that you're a narcissistic character. So I'm
afraid pointing out the logical flaws in your argumentation won't reach
you. But don't you realise you're merely talking to your reflection in
the mirror? That your whole attitude revolves around telling yourself
how great you are and getting others to tell it to you? But James,
nobody gives a crap about you and your Google rank.

Can't you realise that? In all earnestness, James, can you even fathom
that what's important to you isn't important to everyone else? Can you
even comprehend that there are people who take neither your nor their
own belly-button for the centre of the world?

Can't you realise that you're annoying the shit out of everyone with
your ClassViewer stuff? That it is utterly pathetic? That if you go on
like this the only person you will have left to talk to and who doesn't
shout back at you will be your reflection in the mirror?

Yeah sure, but what does that have to do with whether or not you have
balls?

So you're a guy posting as a woman, I get it. No big deal.

That's one of the things about Usenet and the Internet, you can
pretend to be someone else, or someone of a different sex.


___JSH

 

[JSH]

If I created a tool called "Foobartistic barfoolarum", then I
would probably also get pretty high on Google for that term.

Class viewer is not a term used by Java developers and the type
of software is not used by Java developers.

That is useful information if true.

So the two facts that you are high on Google and low on hits
are not contradictions.

Hey, it's a freaking puzzle to me. Some of you seem to think I'm
bragging or something, but I've been puzzling about this for THREE
YEARS.

I finally just decided to talk about it and see if I could get
answers.

So far though, none. Instead I get jealousy. Which I see as idiotic
as I don't know what the rankings mean myself.


James Harris

 

[Andreas Leitgeb]

[about Class viewer]

I had a look at your sourceforge page, and was unclear
about a few things:
- why only "public" members?
(even for the standard class library, protected methods
could be relevant for the user if it's in a class that's
designed for being subclassed)
- It doesn't seem to extract any more information from
the class, than what can be seen in Javadocs in the
first place.

please clarify.

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

Google's main trick is to count the number of links to a page from
other websites. The more, the higher the ranking. Write useful stuff
that other people link to. Google can't see people's bookmarks, but
it can see web copies of them.

My web pages tends to rank highly. I suspect it is because have small
pages that concentrate on one particular thing with some unique
vocabulary, and links to other popular related materials. Another
reason may be that I have fully verified HTML which won't trip up the
spiders.

> Ironically I have not made any special effort to rank highly.

You post links to them intently ...

Arne



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role to fulfill the promise and vision of the United Nations' founders."

--- George Bush
September 11, 1990 televised address to a joint session of Congress

 

[Jean-Baptiste Nizet]

JSH a écrit :

Yeah sure, but what does that have to do with whether or not you have
balls?

So you're a guy posting as a woman, I get it. No big deal.

That's one of the things about Usenet and the Internet, you can
pretend to be someone else, or someone of a different sex.

One of the other good things about Usenet is that anyone, including
people who are not Americans and are not native English speakers, can
post. Daniele is, for example, a usual male Italian first name.

JB.

 

[Roedy Green]

So then, does all of that deserve a #1 ranking in Google for a search
on "Class Viewer"?

Google's main trick is to count the number of links to a page from
other websites. The more, the higher the ranking. Write useful stuff
that other people link to. Google can't see people's bookmarks, but
it can see web copies of them.

Google has patented this obvious ranking technique. It is the main
reason Google is so much better at finding you useful hits near the
top of the list.

My web pages tends to rank highly. I suspect it is because have small
pages that concentrate on one particular thing with some unique
vocabulary, and links to other popular related materials. Another
reason may be that I have fully verified HTML which won't trip up the
spiders. Yet another reason is I update my google sitemap many times
a day. See http://mindprod.com/products1.html#SITEMAP this lowers the
overhead for Google to spider my website, meaning more frequent
updates.

I have google ads too. Google says they give no priority to pages
with ads, but capitalism demands they do so. see
http://mindprod.com/jgloss/google.html#ADSENSE

Ironically I have not made any special effort to rank highly. I
suspect google AI detects attempts to artificially jack up ratings and
penalises such websites, perhaps not right away, but eventually.

 

[JSH]

JSH a écrit :






One of the other good things about Usenet is that anyone, including
people who are not Americans and are not native English speakers, can
post. Daniele is, for example, a usual male Italian first name.

JB.

Oh. Now THAT is very useful information. Thanks!


___JSH

 

[JSH]

 [about Class viewer]

I had a look at your sourceforge page, and was unclear
about a few things:
 - why only "public" members?

     (even for the standard class library, protected methods
      could be relevant for the user if it's in a class that's
      designed for being subclassed)

More of an arbitrary thing where I just went that way. I was taught
use public classes and stay away from protected, if possible.

But if I had a user base that was clamoring for that I'd guess I'd do
it, though individual developers can, of course, simply make the
change in the code themselves.

It is an open source product for developers, so I keep thinking that
people can just make changes to suit their own styles.

 - It doesn't seem to extract any more information from
     the class, than what can be seen in Javadocs in the
     first place.

please clarify.

Yup. It's a quick reference tool. It's not about giving you more info
than you can get from other sources but about presenting basic class
information so that it is easy to look over and getting you javadocs
easily, as in a double-click.

So I can go in, type "String" and look over every public method that
has "char" in it because I'm looking for a method that returns chars,
but am kind of vague on which it is...

char[] toCharArray()

Ok, yeah that's it and that's the ONLY public method that returns
chars in the String class, which I also know from Class Viewer.

But I'm still not sure it's what I want, so I need javadocs, right?

So now I just double-click on that result in the Class Viewer window,
and the program calls Firefox and opens up javadocs, where I have it
going to Sun's site and I have at the top of my screen:

toCharArray

public char[] toCharArray()

Converts this string to a new character array.

Returns:
a newly allocated character array whose length is the length
of this string and whose contents are initialized to contain the
character sequence represented by this string.

The site is

http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/lang/String.html#toCharArray()

built dynamically by the program.

So it's speed and ease, where now I have all the info I need
immediately without looking for javadocs, or wondering if maybe there
is another method that returns chars, and I have that in seconds.


James Harris

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

Google's main trick is to count the number of links to a page from
other websites. The more, the higher the ranking. Write useful stuff
that other people link to. Google can't see people's bookmarks, but
it can see web copies of them.

My web pages tends to rank highly. I suspect it is because have small
pages that concentrate on one particular thing with some unique
vocabulary, and links to other popular related materials. Another
reason may be that I have fully verified HTML which won't trip up the
spiders.

> Ironically I have not made any special effort to rank highly.

You post links to them frequently ...

Arne

 

[David Segall]

Oh. Now THAT is very useful information. Thanks!

To you. Anybody else would have put the word into Google and
discovered it for themselves _before_ sounding off about it.

 

[Daniele Futtorovic]

JSH a écrit :

One of the other good things about Usenet is that anyone, including
people who are not Americans and are not native English speakers, can
post. Daniele is, for example, a usual male Italian first name.

Thanks for putting that straight, JB. I was too lazy to do it myself.

 

[JSH]

 [about Class viewer]

I had a look at your sourceforge page, and was unclear
about a few things:
 - why only "public" members?

     (even for the standard class library, protected methods
      could be relevant for the user if it's in a class that's
      designed for being subclassed)

More of an arbitrary thing where I just went that way.  I was taught
use public classes and stay away from protected, if possible.

But if I had a user base that was clamoring for that I'd guess I'd do
it, though individual developers can, of course, simply make the
change in the code themselves.

It is an open source product for developers, so I keep thinking that
people can just make changes to suit their own styles.

 - It doesn't seem to extract any more information from
     the class, than what can be seen in Javadocs in the
     first place.

please clarify.

Yup. It's a quick reference tool.  It's not about giving you more info
than you can get from other sources but about presenting basic class
information so that it is easy to look over and getting you javadocs
easily, as in a double-click.

So I can go in, type "String" and look over every public method that
has "char" in it because I'm looking for a method that returns chars,
but am kind of vague on which it is...

char[] toCharArray()

Ok, yeah that's it and that's the ONLY public method that returns
chars in the String class, which I also know from Class Viewer.

Correction, there is also

char charAt(int)

though maybe I could say that was technically correct as it only
returns a char.

But it was just a mistake as it was in the top of the list returned by
Class Viewer when I did a search on "char" but I just didn't notice it
when I was doing the post.

Double-clicking on it calls Firefox to open the following URL:

http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/lang/String.html#charAt(int)


James Harris

 

[Mark Murray]

Oh. Now THAT is very useful information. Thanks!

While the apology is heartening, the situation you are apologetic about
is rather representative of your approach. You have no useful
self-criticism feedback loop, useful for finding this sort of error
BEFORE you act on it. Thus, you are destined to repeat this error.

You will make a hasty judgement, you will assume it is correct, you will
make a fool of yourself as a result. You will not learn by this.

How do I know this? because you have done it HUNDREDS of times.

What is unusual in this case is how close you came to making this one an
actual apology.

M
--

 

[Daniele Futtorovic]

While the apology is heartening, the situation you are apologetic about
is rather representative of your approach. You have no useful
self-criticism feedback loop, useful for finding this sort of error
BEFORE you act on it. Thus, you are destined to repeat this error.

You will make a hasty judgement, you will assume it is correct, you will
make a fool of yourself as a result. You will not learn by this.

How do I know this? because you have done it HUNDREDS of times.

What is unusual in this case is how close you came to making this one an
actual apology.

Sigh. This is already gone far beyond being even remotely on-topic, and
I'd be glad if it could end here.

The specific mistake James made is one I'd wager four out of five
English speakers would make and, as far as I can tell, have made. I
can't say it really bothers me that much, and surely it doesn't warrant
an apology. Meanwhile, bashing him for it and trying to deduce broader
character traits from it seems to me like grasping at straws just to
land a punch. But if you're that desperate to flame him, there surely
are more adequate aspects of his demeanour to start with.

HOWEVER, please note that my efforts are directed towards getting JSH,
ideally, to take his lucubrations somewhere they will be welcomed, or,
barring that, to get him to remain at least slightly on-topic -- say
about the maths stuff; and consequently to get rid of all this idle
talk, that about his Google rank as much as that about his person. While
I am of course powerless to enforce that policy, I would at least demand
of everyone to put a lid on that particular bit of idle talk sparked off
directly by my origins. TIA.