Too many functions!

[Kasracer]

Original article

As one of the more experienced C# coders in his group, Yakir is often asked programming questions. Recently, his colleague James asked him the best way to store hundreds of thousands of items in memory, to which Yakir replied "It depends on how you want to access your data. If you want to access your data by index, you should store it in an ArrayList. If its easier to store things as a key-value pair, then you should use a Hashtable."

James' particular application called for a Hashtable, so he decided to implement that. A few hours later, however, he ran into some trouble. "This Hashtable isn't really working," James explained, "do you know if there's something more efficient?"

"Errr," Yakir questioned, "there isn't really anything more efficient than a Hashtable. What exactly is the problem?"

"It's just too slow," James replied, "once I have real data in there, it takes almost five seconds to add, remove, or find, an item."

Yakir knew something was definitely wrong and sat with James to look at his code. Here's what he saw...

class HashTable
  {
    public object[] keys;
    public object[] values;

    public HashTable()
    {
      keys = new object[0];
      values = new object[0];
    }

    public void Add(object key, object value)
    {
      Array.Resize(ref keys, keys.Length + 1);
      Array.Resize(ref values, values.Length + 1);
      keys[keys.Length - 1] = key;
      values[values.Length - 1] = value;
    }

    public void Remove(object key)
    {
      object[] tempKeys = new object[0];
      object[] tempValues = new object[0];
      for (int i = 0; i <= keys.Length - 1; i++)
      {
        if (!keys[i].Equals(key))
        {
          Array.Resize(ref tempKeys, tempKeys.Length + 1);
          Array.Resize(ref tempValues, tempValues.Length + 1);
          tempKeys[tempKeys.Length - 1] = keys[i];
          tempValues[tempValues.Length - 1] = values[i];
        }
      }
      keys = tempKeys;
      values = tempValues;
    }

    public object GetItem(object key)
    {
      for (int i = 0; i <= keys.Length - 1; i++)
      {
        if (keys[i].Equals(key))
        {
          return values[i];
        }
      }
      return null;
    }

    public int NumberOfItems
    {
      get
      {
        return keys.Length;
      }
    }
  }

"Uhhh," Yakir said, baffled. "Why didn't you use the built-in Hashtable class from System.Collections that I showed you?"

"I checked it out," James explained, "but it had too many functions, which means it's slow. My class only has 3 functions, so it's much more efficient."

[wossname]

Less is more.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Can anybody actually see the link in that post?

[wossname]

Well, no, since it contains a word that VBF's nanny-ware regards as slightly rude.

Replacing the three asterisks in the URL with "doubleyou tee eff" seems to yield a post remarkably similar to the drivel that kasracer wasted all our time with.

[Kasracer]

crap

No original article for you then.

Daily Whiskey Tango Foxtrot DOT Com

[Shaggy Hiker]

Oh good. For a moment there I began to suspect QWest of being as incompetent as usual. I'm too lazy to look up Kleinma's post about the nefarious ISP that was redirecting some types of errors to their custom search engine, but QWest has just started doing that, too. This was the second post in 24 hours with a link that took me to their search engine, and I was beginning to wonder if they had just decided to re-direct pretty nearly anything. They really are laughably inept, but the errors have been mostly in my favor, so far.

[BillGeek]

it had too many functions, which means it's slow. My class only has 3 functions, so it's much more efficient.

At last! Someone that agrees with me!!!

[mendhak]

I name all my functions with a prefix 'static' because that makes it faster.

public int StaticGetEmployeeSalary(int employeeID)
{
//...
}

[DeanMc]

If you prefix them with virtual they are faster again because they are not really there....

[kregg]

At last! Someone that agrees with me!!!

[wossname]

HTML is faster than C! Plus it's OOP too!

[DeanMc]

Everytime you read HTML god kills a kitten. Just be warned.

[kregg]

Everytime you read HTML god kills a kitten. Just be warned.

That must be a lot of kittens then. Are you trying to say that Icanhascheezburger.com just recycles the 3 cats over and over again??

[FunkyDexter]

HTML is faster than C! Plus it's OOP too!

I recently read a CV where the applicant had listed one of his skills as OOPS.

[techgnome]

I name all my functions with a prefix 'static' because that makes it faster.

public int StaticGetEmployeeSalary(int employeeID)
{
//...
}

I finish all my functions with DoCommand.RunFaster..... and it works!

-tg

[techgnome]

If you prefix them with virtual they are faster again because they are not really there....

Only when being used to write vaporware.

-tg

[visualAd]

When I want to hide a function I use:

void _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________HiddenFunction(void) {
    ....
}

[techgnome]

you could also try applying the <nopeeking> attribute to it as well.... as does this attribute:
<jedi-mind-trick("This is not the function you are looking for.")>

-tg

[timeshifter]