The Wiert Corner – irregular stream of stuff

Jeroen W. Pluimers on .NET, C#, Delphi, databases, and personal interests

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Archive for the ‘Software Development’ Category

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Cool visualisations of graph searching: Introduction to the A* Algorithm

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/21

This is so cool: graphical [Wayback/Archive] Introduction to the A* Algorithm

It is still being updated, which is even cooler:

Created 26 May 2014, updated Aug 2014, Feb 2016, Jun 2016, Jun 2020, Jul 2023

These are for general graph traversal. That Wikipedia article only mentions depth-first search and breadth-first search, but forgets the A* search algorithm which is an extension of the also not mentioned Dijkstra’s algorithm which in turn is based on breadth-first search.

The visualisations cover the breadth-first algorithms.

The example code is Python based, but easy to translate into other languages.

The visualisation code is in JavaScript, using these files (they Archive.is versions are more accurate than the Wayback Machine ones):

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Posted in Algorithms, Conference Topics, Conferences, Development, Event, Python, Scripting, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

Turning off AI during Google Search with the “new” UDM parameter

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/17

It looks like I missed that Google has added a new URL parameter to its search engine quite a while ago.

In the past, you could turn on image search using the tbm=isch URL parameter (“to be matched” and “image search”).

That still works, but there is a new parameter on the block that is officially undocumented, and can be used to switch into various search modes including image search but also AI-less search.

This drastically lowers the carbon footprint and also gets you far less speculative information.

Edit 20251023: I forgot to save the below part before the scheduled post got published. So here we go

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Posted in AI and ML; Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning, Chrome, Chrome, Chromium, Development, Edge, Firefox, Google, Google AI, GoogleSearch, LLM, Mastodon, Power User, Reddit, SocialMedia, Software Development, Twitter, URL Encoding, Web Browsers | Leave a Comment »

A Tour of the .NET Functions Framework – Jon Skeet’s coding blog

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/16

From a long time ago, but forgot to queue it because I bumped into it in the midst of my cancer treatments when my memory and executive functions were hardly existent:

https://codeblog.jonskeet.uk/2020/10/23/a-tour-of-the-net-functions-framework/

Via [Wayback/Archive] Tweet:

Blogged: a tour of the .NET Functions Framework – https://t.co/5xpjNyux5q So excited to write this post – I’ve really enjoyed working on this framework, and I’m really looking forward to getting feedback.

--jeroen

Posted in .NET, Development, Jon Skeet, Software Development | Tagged: , | Leave a Comment »

b0rk (Julia Evans) on Twitter: “integer overflow”

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/16

Even seemingly simple data structures are worth explaining, especially when debugging. So I was glad with the explanation of [Wayback/Archive] Julia Evans on Twitter: “integer overflow”:

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Posted in Conference Topics, Conferences, Debugging, Development, Event, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

The confusing case of two Android “NFC TagInfo” apps

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/15

For a long time, I had an “NFC TagInfo” app on my phone. It worked well, and combined simplicity with straightforward easy use.

To my dismay, when upgrading to a new phone, the icon had been copied over, but the app was unavailable as per the cropped¹ image on the right.

The important message there was “Your device isn’t compatible with this version” which, as I quickly discovered, means “This app has not been updated to be compatible with the Android version you run” (without telling up until which Android version it would run on).

What I however initially missed on the screenshot was the [Wayback/Archive] Michael Roland bit (this is his Stack Overflow profile link where he, as on [Wayback/Archive] User Michael Roland – Stack Exchange, explicitly mentions [Wayback/Archive] NFC TagInfo – Apps on Google Play²).

However, when you search you get another NFC TagInfo app: NFC TagInfo by NXP.

The confusing bit

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Posted in Android, Android Devices, Development, LifeHacker, Mobile Development, Power User, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

skia4delphi/skia4delphi: Skia4Delphi is a cross-platform 2D graphics API for Delphi platforms based on Google’s Skia Graphics Library. It provides a comprehensive 2D API that can be used across mobile, server and desktop models to render images.

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/15

This is a cool library which I missed when it was introduced while recovering from my extensive cancer treatments:

[Wayback/Archive] skia4delphi/skia4delphi: Skia4Delphi is a cross-platform 2D graphics API for Delphi platforms based on Google’s Skia Graphics Library. It provides a comprehensive 2D API that can be used across mobile, server and desktop models to render images.

Skia4Delphi is a cross-platform 2D graphics API for Delphi based on Google’s Skia graphics library.

The foundation is the cross platform Google 2D Skia Graphics Engine:

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Posted in Delphi, Development, Google, Power User, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

From 2023: It’s Time For A Change: datetime.utcnow() Is Now Deprecated – miguelgrinberg.com

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/14

I forgot how I bumped into this, but a while ago I found this interesting 2023 post: [Wayback/Archive] It’s Time For A Change: datetime.utcnow() Is Now Deprecated – miguelgrinberg.com explaining naive (without time zone) and aware (with time zone) date time objects.

It reminded me of Delphi, where NowUTC – as Delphi does have neither naive or aware date time objects – returns  a floating point value (yes, it has a separate TDateTime type, but it represents the number of days that have passed since December 30, 1899 which in face stems from the Windows OLE Automation era* (OLE Automation is a subset of COM), see [Wayback/Archive] DateTime.ToOADate Method (System) | Microsoft Learn.

That method is mentioned in [Wayback/Archive] Why You Should Use NowUTC Instead of Now in Delphi: A Quick Guide – YouTube and Delphi deserves a way better infrastructure of date and time handling.

So this post is also a reminder to myself: figure out if there is an object oriented DateTime library for Delphi yet, and if not see if there is interest to create one similar to [Wayback/Archive] Noda Time | Date and time API for .NET by Jon Skeet.

Delphi references

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Posted in .NET, .NET Framework, .NET Standard, C#, Conference Topics, Conferences, Delphi, Development, Event, Jon Skeet, Python, Scripting, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

Algorism and algorithm are named after Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, founder of algebra (via @annefleurdd)

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/14

I was in my 50s when I learned that both algorism and algorithm are named after the 9th-century Persian mathematician Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi who founded algebra.

Related:

Via:

–jeroen

Posted in Algorithms, Conference Topics, Conferences, Development, Event, History, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

ibm midrange – Syntax higlighters for RPG And CLP that generate HTML and/or RTF? – Stack Overflow

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/09

In case I ever need this for the future: [Wayback/Archive] ibm midrange – Syntax higlighters for RPG And CLP that generate HTML and/or RTF? – Stack Overflow

Thanks [Wayback/Archive] aaronbartell and [Wayback/Archive] Mike Wills for your answers there.

Oh, an if you wonder what these ancient abbreviations mean:

--jeroen

Posted in Development, RPG, Scripting, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

auroraoss.com: AuroraStore can help to bypass Google Play Store region blocks

Posted by jpluimers on 2025/10/09

[Wayback/Archive] auroraoss.com

Via:

–jeroen

Posted in Android, Development, Mobile Development, Software Development | Leave a Comment »

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