Cobra January 2009 Update

[Charles]

(This can be responded to on the Discussion Forum.)

This is a new update for January, covering improvements since the last update for December.

To get access to these improvements, there is a HowToInstallFromSource wiki page covering the ease and benefits of using Cobra from the source repository, and how to do it.

The following improvements are due to patches and feedback from the community as well as my own efforts. Thanks to all contributors including hopscc, gauthier and others!

Language

-- Improved and clarified the behavior of surrounding namespaces and "use". See discussion for details.

Library

-- Added extension methods to IEnumerable and IList<of T> that are immediately available in Cobra programs. See StandardLibraryExtensionMethods.

Misc

-- Added or improved 9 error messages.

-- Fixed 14 bugs.

-- Made 1 optimization regarding numeric for loops. (credit: hopscc)

Docs, Samples and How-To's

-- I presented Cobra at SoCal Code Camp Fullerton 2009-01. Here are the slides in PDF format.

-- New Cobra related project: http://code.google.com/p/nant-cobra-tasks/ by gauthier

-- We worked out some new sample code for writing a number in plain English via this discussion thread.

-- New or update wiki pages this month:
---- RelatedProjects
---- NAntCobraTasks

-- New or updated wiki pages in the past couple days:
---- TypesOverview
---- StreamType
---- StandardLibraryExtensionMethods

-- Added Shapes sample whose purpose is to "see this small problem written in several different OO languages".


The next update will be around March 1 for the month of February, but you can always keep up to date by following the discussion forums.

We hope you'll try out the latest Cobra!


Best regards,

Chuck Esterbrook