my project in brief (was Re: inheritance and problems with #include statements)

[Joseph & Kathleen Villa]

Glen,

As always, thanks for the speedy response. I can't find anything obviously 
wrong with my interface declarations, so I'll let it be and schlog along 
with redundant methods in my subclasses.

I thought I'd say a few words about my project hoping that the collective 
will find it at least a little interesting.

I'm the would-be founder of a would-be software start up company. (Silicon 
Valley is always full of us 'would-be' types.) I'm using Swarm in three 
capacities:

1) Financial Planning: I've got a Swarm model that simulates the INTERNAL 
operations of my would-be company and generates pro-forma financial 
statements. (It's pretty cool.)To my way of thinking, simulation provides a 
number of advantages over standard spreadsheet financial modeling. a) it's 
easier to change assumptions and re-run the model. b) it allows for far 
more sophisticated performance data creation and analysis. c) it forces 
clearer articulation of underlying assumptions. d) it allows for the 
inclusion of stochasticity in the business model. e) I'm sure there are 
more, but after having built MANY painful spreadsheet models in my career, 
those reasons were enough.
2) Domain Analysis: I've got a second Swarm model that simulates the 
EXTERNAL business domain in which my would-be company aims to operate. 
Benefits: a) it provides a great heuristic device for understanding the 
real business dynamics in the proposed marketplace. b) it forces clear 
articulation of the business process changes that would accompany the 
proposed software system, and c) it allows for financial benefits 
estimation for potential clients. (I'm still working on this part, but I 
hope to get some cool reuse from the first effort and generate before and 
after proformas for clients to help them with the return on investment 
calculation. I also plan to link this model back to the first so my 
clients' [er, their agent representations] activities drive the revenue 
estimations in my financial models - likely to be today's task.)
3) System Testing: The software system under development is written in 
Java. Scalability is a big issue. So is the integrity of distributed 
transactions. I plan to let my agents 'use' the system via the Java 
interfaces (the software system won't be able to distinguish between agents 
and 'real' users). Of course, I won't get usability feedback (at least in 
early versions of the model *s*), but it's a great way to get some baseline 
system and stress testing going without bumming out real users.

Well, that's the thumbnail. If anyone's interested in more, let me know.

BTW, I'm sort of a UML (unified modeling language) junkie. We don't talk 
much about notational and design methods, approaches, or methodologies 
here. Which seems a bit of a shame because the technical challenges of 
using Swarm are the more obvious but not necessarily the more important 
ones in building really robust and useful models. IMHO. If anyone wants to 
talk about good object design - I'm always up for it.

Cheers!

Joseph.



At 07:42     1/5/00 -0800, you wrote:
> At 01:02 AM 1/5/00 -0800, you wrote:
> > address@hidden/Swarm-2.0.1/cassian/system] $ make
> > gcc -c -g -O2 -Wall -Wno-import -Wno-protocol -Werror   -DAPPNAME=cassian 
> > -DAPPV
> > ERSION=2.0  -DDLL -I/Swarm-2.0.1/include EmployedRole.m
> > In file included from HRCoordinator.h:2,
> >                  from CompanyWidget.h:3,
> >                  from ModelSwarm.h:5,
> >                  from God.h:4,
> >                  from JobPostings.h:1,
> >                  from JobSeeker.h:3,
> >                  from Person.h:3,
> >                  from Role.h:5,
> >                  from EmployedRole.h:1,
> >                  from EmployedRole.m:3:
> > Employee.h:15: Cannot find interface declaration for `EmployedRole', 
> > superclass
> > of `Employee'
> > make: *** [EmployedRole.o] Error 1
> > address@hidden/Swarm-2.0.1/cassian/system] $
>
> It looks to me like @interface EmployedRole ... @end isn't being found
> in EmployedRole.h.  I'd look for misspellings or a malformed interface
> declaration.  I can't tell more without seeing the files, though.
>
> Interesting looking application, Joseph.  What are you studying?
> ...the fluidity of the job market?
>
> glen
>
> --
> glen e. p. ropella =><= Feeding the hamster wheel.  Hail Eris!
> Home: http://www.trail.com/~gepr                (505) 424-0448
> Work: http://www.swarm.com                      (505) 995-0818
>
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                 ==================================
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  to day usage of Swarm.  For list administration needs (esp.
  [un]subscribing), please send a message to <address@hidden>
  with "help" in the body of the message.