Develop Reference

Can I use MySQL from AWS Lambda in Python?

Is the MySQL connector for Python or some equivalent module available in a form I can zip up and included in an AWS Lambda function, or is that just asking for trouble? Apparently Lambda functions written in Node.js can use a builtin library to talk to MySQL on RDS, but I don't see an obvious way to do that in Python.
I wouldn't want to try to install something that takes a long time or requires any assumptions about the underlying operating system. On Windows at least, it's a whole separate installer.
Same question for Java: does this work out of the box, or are there machinations necessary to package a MySQL jar file?

If in some cases you need to uses native library (which mysql should have), you can uses pure python implementation using PyMySQL, and include it in the deployment package of lambda.
More detail on how to create deployment package for python is here https://docs.aws.amazon.com/lambda/latest/dg/lambda-python-how-to-create-deployment-package.html
See the advanced version.
For java, I guess it will work out of the box as long as you include all dependency in jar.

I think I got it. Being on Windows added some steps.
I got Python 2.7.10, which comes with Pip. I then installed mysql-connector-python using the trick here.

how to use java based project in firebreath plugin framework

I am trying to develop a HTML5 plugin using NPAPI and firebreath framework. The code which needs to be used, is written in java but I need to convert it into C++. The only way i know is via JNI where i need to convert each .java file into .cpp file. However there are over 200 files in my project. Is there a better way to achieve this??

Any "simple" way would be more of a c++ question than a plugin or firebreath question. My guess is that you'd be far better off just making it an applet rather than a plugin if you want it mainly in java. There is nothing that I'm aware of that will make it easy for you to do what you want to do using FireBreath or NPAPI directly.

JNI doesn't convert Java to C++, it is a technology for calling native code (such as C or C++) from Java code. It doesn't seem relevant to your problem: Either you (manually or robotically) convert all your Java to C++ (which you can then call from Firebreath), or you keep your code in Java and run an applet (with no C/C++ code involved.)
If an applet as suggested by #taxilian isn't a good choice, why not turn your Java project into an application, and have your Firebreath plugin launch that and communicate with it? Your plugin could even download and install the Java app, for example in a temp folder. One limitation: The Java code won't have any direct access to internal browser API's, the Firebreath plugin would have to make any such calls on behalf of the Java app. How hard this all is would mainly depend on the complexity and bandwidth of communication needed between the web page and the Java code.

Using Java Web Start with JavaFX's Native Bundles

I have developed a JavaFX app and I am going to distribute it as a Native Package to avoid headaches with users having a Java version lower than 7 (and thus, without JavaFX) or having no Java at all.
However, I also want to be able to deliver updates of my application. One solution is for the app to call home (its already communicating with the backend via XMLRPC), fetch a JAR and self-update. I can see potential problems with the actual update process though (would need to build a separate updater program, but how do you update the updater?).
I know about and would love to use Java Web Start. However, I have no idea if this will work with the Native Package thing. If the user already has Java installed, it will disregard my bundled JRE. If he has no Java... well, he can't use Java Web Start, right?
How can I solve this problem in an elegant way that will not have a detrimental effect on user experience? (and preferably won't be very long to implement)
note: I am using e(fx)clipse as build tool.

If he has no Java... well, he can't use Java Web Start, right?
True, but as mentioned in the JWS tag Wiki:
Java Rich Internet Applications Deployment Advice. Describes the deployJava.js
script designed to ensure a suitable minimum version of Java is installed before
providing a link to a
JWS app.
or launching an
applet.
Note that JWS also offers fine grained versioning as detailed in Java Web Start - Runtime Versioning.
Saying that, JWS can allow you to support earlier systems by adding the JavaFX 2 API selectively to those earlier systems. That is achieved using a version based resources section in the launch file.
So, JWS combined with deployJava.js would actually be 'the alternative' to the Native Package that page discusses.

J2ME java target problems?

I have a largish app in Java to port over to j2me and it's proving quite tedious.
The target java (1.3 I believe) is making porting this over to j2me very difficult.
I'm working in Netbeans and I was wondering if there was a way to change the target java to a higher one to avoid reprogramming tons of classes to comply with 1.3 and if I did change it could I expect it to run on any device?
I've looked around on my IDE and can't find an option to change the target.

It is not possible to change the java target of a Java ME app, so you will have to use only what its available from CLDC, but you can try The J2ME Polish Client Framework http://www.enough.de/javadoc/j2me/index.html
Take a look at de.enough.polish.util package.

Is there a way to programatically retrieve files from TFS using Java?

Basically I would like a TFS SDK that I can uses to retrieve files from source control.
Does something like this exist for Java? My searching only returned results from 2007 about rumors that Teamprise was working on a SDK.

You can now download a TFS SDK for Java provided by Microsoft here.

I don't know about an SDK, but if you connect to the TFS URL, you will see that it's actually a standard SOAP webservice with functions pretty much matching the .NET SDK functions 1:1. The rest should be straightforward.

Teamprise plugin is now called "Team Explorer Everywhere" and has a java based command line client (TEE-CLC), also have a look at SvnBridge which would let you use subclipse/other svn clients to connect to TFS.

Another way, suggested by Robaticus in comments is to use the command line utilities that come with TFS. Simple and reliable, although less integration.
Added: The CLI utilities come with TFS itself. A quick google query reveals the official documentation.

A third possibility that came to my mind is to use a Java-to-.NET bridge. There are a few to choose from. This way you can use the original MS libraries.