Dare to Dream? » AdoMado

Simple MapReduce with Javascript

Mayank Jain (makuchaku) — Sun, 08 May 2011 06:40:20 +0000

The best way to understand MapReduce is to actually see & feel it in action. Following is the simplest possible example I could cook… (Gist link)

var Job = {
data : [
"We are glad to see you here. This site is dedicated to",
"poetry and to the people who make poetry possible",
"poets and their readers. FamousPoetsAndPoems.com is",
"a free poetry site. On our site you can find a large",
"collection of poems and quotes from over 631 poets",
"Read and Enjoy Poetry",
"I, too, sing America",
"I am the darker brother",
"They send me to eat in the kitchen",
"When company comes",
"But I laugh",
"And eat well",
"And grow strong",
"Tomorrow",
"Ill be at the table",
"When company comes",
"Nobodyll dare",
"Say to me",
"Eat in the kitchen",
"Then",
"Besides",
"Theyll see how beautiful I am",
"And be ashamed",
"I, too, am America"
],
map : function(line) {
var splits = line.split(" ");
var temp = [];
for(var i=0; ilength; i++)
{
temp.push({key : splits[i], value : 1});
}
return temp;
},
reduce : function(allSteps) {
var result = {};
for(var i=0; ilength; i++)
{
var step = allSteps[i];
result[step.key] = result[step.key] ? (result[step.key] + 1) : 1;
}
return result;
},
init : function() {
var allSteps = [];
for(var i=0; idata.length; i++)
allSteps = allSteps.concat(Job.map(Job.data[i]));
var result = Job.reduce(allSteps)
console.log(JSON.stringify(result));
}
}; // Job
Job.init();

Copy & paste this code in your browser’s JS console.

Console output…

{"631":1,"We":1,"are":1,"glad":1,"to":5,"see":2,"you":2,"here.":1,"This":1,"site":2,"is":2,"dedicated":1,"poetry":3,"and":4,"the":5,"people":1,"who":1,"make":1,"possible":1,"poets":2,"their":1,"readers.":1,"FamousPoetsAndPoems.com":1,"a":2,"free":1,"site.":1,"On":1,"our":1,"can":1,"find":1,"large":1,"collection":1,"of":1,"poems":1,"quotes":1,"from":1,"over":1,"Read":1,"Enjoy":1,"Poetry":1,"I,":2,"too,":2,"sing":1,"America":2,"I":3,"am":3,"darker":1,"brother":1,"They":1,"send":1,"me":2,"eat":2,"in":2,"kitchen":2,"When":2,"company":2,"comes":2,"But":1,"laugh":1,"And":3,"well":1,"grow":1,"strong":1,"Tomorrow":1,"Ill":1,"be":2,"at":1,"table":1,"Nobodyll":1,"dare":1,"Say":1,"Eat":1,"Then":1,"Besides":1,"Theyll":1,"how":1,"beautiful":1,"ashamed":1}

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Why jQuery.proxy rocks my world!

Mayank Jain (makuchaku) — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 08:39:08 +0000

Its been very recent that I’m seriously looking into Javascript – and trust me, there is no dearth of stuff that can be achieved with purely client side code (HTML/CSS/JS). With the modern browsers churning out best of the breed in JS environments (both headed & headless), everything is going to come to a browser near you! Its just a matter of time!

Anyways, on more subtle issues, while writing a purely client side JS app using Backbone.js & jQuery Mobile I came across jQuery.proxy method – something that I’ve really started using almost everywhere.. The method is so useful that sometimes I wonder – why jQuery did not implement it in callback mechanism by default.

A quick overview about the problem…

var FBNotificationWatcher = new JS.Class({
initialize : function(timeout) {
this.url = "http://foo/return/json";
this.getNotifications(); // initiate the first fetch
},
getNotifications : function() {
$.ajax({
// do your ajax call
url : this.url;
success : this.processNotifications
});
},
processNotifications : function(rawNotificationData) {
// process notifications… AND
setTimeout(jQuery.proxy(this.getNotifications, this), this.timeout); // start all over again…
});

When a new object of FBNotificationWatcher is created, all goes well. this.getNotifications gets the JSON & this.processNotifications processes it. However, when setTimeout’s occurs and this.getNotifications is called again, the context of “this” is set to the “window” object. And because of this, the code breaks in this.getNotifications method.

Now this is very frustrating – as you just lost the object you were operating within.

Solution? jQuery.proxy comes to rescue!

processNotifications : function(rawNotificationData) {
// process notifications…
setTimeout(jQuery.proxy(this.getNotifications, this), this.timeout); // start all over again…
}

If we setup the setTimeout call like this, jQuery will guarantee that the context of “this” when this.getNotifications gets executed, will always be set to the original FBNotificationWatcher object which had setup the timer. The second argument to jQuery.proxy defines the context you want to get back when the setTimeout callback gets executed.

This concept can be used anywhere you want your callbacks to retain their context.

Read more about the method at jQuery API docs.

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Kickass MCV for your Javascript Apps

Mayank Jain (makuchaku) — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 19:29:11 +0000

Very recently, I had an opportunity to work on a completely client side Javascript App – a Facebook stream reader. Since FB Graph API returns JSON, it can be directly consumed via JSONP. This app used JQuery Mobile for the UI screens (which totally rocks btw!).

I wanted to keep all the logic on the client end to as much extent as possible – with just a Sinatra component as a cross-domain proxy for post requests.

To my surprise, writing & consuming the Graph API via JSONP was the easiest – while managing the UI, writing the glue code between callbacks, data & UI was the messiest. I spent 3 days writing this spaghetti of callbacks coupled very tightly to the DOM ids/classes. At the end of 3rd day, it became almost impossible for me to extend the logic to include more functionality.

The code had become ugly – and I wasn’t too happy with this.

I started my search for a good MCV framework with a very simple objectives

Since I was already using JQuery Mobile, I did not wanted to program with another UI library
As lightweight as possible
Simpler learning curve
Should not get in the way of my programming style.
Well documented

I tried the most popular MCV frameworks – SproutCore & Javascript MCV – but didn’t really found them fitting my needs.

Then I came across – Backbone.Js – someone on Stackoverflow mentioned – “Thank god I found backbone.js”.

I took that review seriously & spent a night reading the API documentation. Even when I slept, my mind was trying to understand how I could use backbone.js in my architecture (wink wink).

I woke up 7 am the next morning & by 9 am, I had a very minimal architecture written.

By the time I wrapped up office today, I had completely re-written the App into a very nice looking MCV architecture, neatly placed into model/view/collection directories. Being able to re-render a view by just changing an attribute on the model object is a state of pure bliss.

I highly recommend checking out Backbone.js if you are even a wee bit serious about your Javascript App. Invest some time understanding how things are done with backbone.js … & I can bet that you will never want to directly tie your business logic to the DOM again!

Happy Hacking!

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How to commission developer machines in an agile way?

Mayank Jain (makuchaku) — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 08:35:25 +0000

During the past year – working at AdoMado, I’ve seen myself & our developers wasting a lot of time in maintaining their own dev machines. Package install/upgrade/dependency failures, OS upgrade failures, hard drives failures, the machine not being available physically (in case of laptops), etc – are just a few cases.

Can there be a more agile way of working for developers? Given that the technology stack an organization runs on is often well defined, this should be fairly possible.

Very recently, I came across a project from one of the Slicehost founders Matt Tanase – BluePrint. The project lets you create versionable configurations from an existing installs. Just setup your machine the way you want it to be, run blueprint & wallah, you have a re-deployable configuration. Everything is created as a Git repository, hence any change you make to the configuration – is also versionable.

Next, if we can somehow automate the process of creating the machine images, we will be almost there. Luckily, there’s Vagrant. Its a tool to build & distribute virtualized environments. Blueprint also supports Vagrant.

Add to this, a web based editor (Bespin or Ace) – and you have a perfect recipe for dishing out pre-built images of your technology stack which are just perfect enough to be run on VirtualBox.

Imagine, its the first day of the developer. He can simply checkout such an image from a dashboard, run it on a VM & he’s ready to rock’n roll!

Since all of this is automated, this process can be improved & repeated as many times as one wants.

Sweet, aint it!

Ever since I started working on a Desktop as a full time machine, the only access to after-office-hours machine I have is my wife’s laptop – which being a WinBlows box, creeps me out. Such a setup, even if remotely possible – will give me the freedom I need to stretch my legs & utilize my free time

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Just a single objective for 2011

Mayank Jain (makuchaku) — Sun, 13 Mar 2011 15:36:08 +0000

Get adomado.com funded!

This year, there are no multitude of objectives, just this one.
The more focus I have, the better I can deliver.

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Looking forward to an awesome 2011

Mayank Jain (makuchaku) — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 18:06:22 +0000

The past few years have been a complete roller-coaster ride! With each passing year – I was getting closer to my ultimate objective.

2007 – This was the time when SammyTammy, Sandy and I teamed up to kickstart our entrepreneurial stint with ApnaBill.com
2008 – We brought ApnaBill.com into existence. Jan 28 was when we hit the 400 mark for our beta signup list!

2009 & 2010 were the magic years when things started going really well. My single minded objectives for 2009 included getting aboard full time, getting INR 1M in profit for the year, moving into a full time office, etc. As it happend, our (then) experimental idea AdoMado.com also sprung to life in 2009 – and was selected as top 10 finalists for IIMA BPlan contest. We met some really good folks & finally partnered with them to bring into existence – AdoMado.com, the AppStore, Custom Toolbars, etc.

Today, as I look back at the objectives I had set for myself in 2009 – I feel glad that each one of those objectives were achieved in 2009 & 2010. It took us (& me personally) 2 years to achieve all of them – but we did it.

Bring ApnaBill.com out of Beta
- I don’t remember exactly, but we hived off the beta status somewhere in early 2009.
Graduate the experimental projects to Betas
- AdoMado.com was one of the experimental projects we were cooking up. What started as a simple ad serving technology, has evolved into a wonderful self serve custom toolbar platform - and we are still scratching the tip of an iceberg!
Rake in first Million Rupees for Four Fractions
- With the products still being in early beta, the team has pulled this one through. The business is doing good!
Start working for Four Fractions full time
- Though I had been working 100% with the AdoMado team for about 6 months now, January 2011 will see me getting aboard AdoMado as Chief of Technology – with no strings attached to my past. There couldn’t have been a better start for 2011.
Build a full time team
- SammyTammy was the first to take the plunge in Feb 2010. I used to help him part time – however I could. After my engagement, my part in AdoMado got significant. And from past couple of months, leading the Engineering Team @ AdoMado has been my sole task.
Convert JD 10-B as Four Fractions office.
- Dec 25th, 2010 was the day when this finally happened. A souvenir from the day’s party. JD 10 B is now an happening workplace.
Outsource finance, monitor it personally
- Something that I’ve learnt during these last years of my entrepreneurship is that one single person cannot do everything. Each one of us has tried doing everything (Sam had even tried reading C programming) – but it obviously did not work out. Now we divide work as per our knowhow and do it to best of our ability. Since Sam handles all the finances now (sort of), things are much more streamlined now that they were 2 years ago.

2010 was also a wonderful year for me personally. I found the love of my life in Kanika. We committed in Feb 2010, got engaged in June 2010 & got married on 13th November 2010. I love you Kannu!

As I start the new year 2011, I want to thank my family for being there when I needed them the most. Now with Kannu by my side, there’s nothing out of my reach. The destination may be a bit far… but hey, isn’t the journey worth more than the final destination?

More about my objectives in 2011 to follow…

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