Classic Cold Fusion for the Masses!

Time to Stand By Adobe November 14, 2011

Friends,

Adobe has dumped Flash and Flex.

This is bad news for many of us, and there are quite a few people complaining.

I am here to tell you: Fear Not! There is nothing to worry about. All is well.

Here is why:

When we all became Adobe Fan Boys, we did it because of Adobe. We didn’t love what Adobe did, we loved Adobe for what it WAS. The BEST company ever.

Now since Adobe is maybe doing somethings that cause minor impacts to people, everyone is turning their backs on Adobe. Do not turn your backs! Adobe is still Adobe!

They know what they are doing. You will see. They will come up with tools and solutions that leverage your existing skill set and then you will be able to use those tools to continue to make a living. Adobe will take care of you. Do not fear, Adobe has your back YO!

Adobe does not like your compalining, or your bickering. Adobe wants you to do what Adobe wants. Are you going to do it? Will you Answer the Call?

Think about this: Peopple Complained when Steve Jobs took away the CD-Rom from the IMAC.  They thought it was the end of the world!  But guess what!  Steve Jobs was VERY SMART, and he ended up doing the right thing.  Adobe is BETTER THAN APPLE.  And they have something BETTER IN MIND.

I stand by Adobe. Do you?

Thank you,

Brock!

Ask Brock, Episode 1 March 23, 2011

Q: Brock, I’m having trouble with ColdFusion Builder. Could you give me some ideas on how to get this thing working better?

A: First off, if you’re using Cold Fusion Builder, I can only guess that you’re using Cold Fusion 9. This is not Classic Cold Fusion! Classic Cold Fusion is best done with dreamweaver. I’d highly recommend upgrading to dream weaver.

Q: Brock, I’d like to learn more about using CFScript. I hear it’s the greatest thing ever

A: Friends, do not use, under any circumstances, CFScript. It is not Classic Cold Fusion. Cold Fusion is a Markup Language. You need markup! Where is there markup in CF SCript? There is not. There is none.

Q: Brock, Can you recommend any resources for Learning how to do use CFSPreadsheet?

A: Friends, I would recommend avoiding CFSpreadsheet. I looked through the manuals for CF5, 6.1MX, and 7–and there is no mention of this! I can only guess that you’re either making this up, or it’s some third-party application you downloaded from the internet. You shouldn’t just download things from the internet and install them, you might get a malware or get trojaned! I’d recommend runnign Malware Bytes as soon as you can, and maybe reinstalling your OS.

Q: Brock, can you give me suggestions on how to tune my JVM?

A: Yes! Tuning your JVM is one of the best ways to improve the performance of your Cold Fusion application. JRUN is a fantastic platform, but you still need to tweak many configuration settings, and I have seen miracles take place as a result of good tweaking. Sometimes I’ll take a perfectly-running app and make it BETTER just by adjusting these configuration settings.

Here’s how the hard-core pros do it:

1. Add the ‘-server’ option. This means you are running a server! Look out world!!
2. Change the -Xmx and -Xms settings. I usually make these equal the number of RAM in my machine. If I have a 3GB machine, I make these both equal to 3GB. Or even higher–the system will swap if you need it to!
3. If that doesn’t work, or you want to try something else, lower those to about 128M each. You will probably want to buy additional Cold Fusion licenses to handle the load, but things will run very fast for you and your team. I’d recommend trying this!
4. Try adjusting the classpath to include different bootstrap.jar, jmx.jar and servlet-api.jar versions. The best performance I’ve had is using a bootstrap.jar from an IBM websphere installation, a jmx.jar from Apache Tomcat 4, and a servlet-api.jar from Jrun 3.1. Your mileage may very of course!
5. Tweak your /conf/catalina.policy file. This can really help with security problems.

Well, that’s it for today. I can go on and on but I’m runing OUT OF TIME. Have fun, and keep using Classic Cold Fusion!

Classic Cold Fusion: What You Need To Put In Your Arsenal March 23, 2011

These are the most handy things there is for the Classic Cold Fusion Programmer:

Flash-based forms – I love this! Flash 4 Ever!
XForms – Fantastic tool, wouldn’t be without it
CFDocument, FlashPaper – I don’t know what I would do without this
Verity search engine – Probably the best IMHO there is.
Query of Queries – This is Very Important, and I know we’d all be sunk without it
CFMail – They really got this “right” with the release of Cold Fusion MX 6.1
CFHTTP – I haven’t figured this out yet but they tell me it’s useful
CFLOGIN – This makes logging in a lot easier!

So, there you have it! Learn these new (or newer) techniques, and you’ll be programming with Class!

March 23, 2011

Friends,

If you’ve been doing Cold Fusion as long as I have, you still catch yourself calling it “Cold Fusion” sometimes. Sure, you say it is now one word: Coldfusion, and we all use frameworks now, but something in you makes you want to…go back.

Well, I am here to say, friends, that you can! With this blog I am throwing down the gauntlet and saying that “It is OK to use Classic Cold Fusion.”

But What is Classic Cold Fusion, Anyway?

I take my inspiration from the heavies in the cold fusion industry: Brian Melosche, Sean Corfeld, Isaac Dealey, Ray Camden, and Adrock himself, these men being pioneers that have shown us that you do not need to use fancy frameworks, object orientation programming, or any of that fancy stuff!!

Once I figure out how to imbed code in wordpress, I will show you examples. But until then, I will list the reasons why you should DUMP YOUR FRAMEWORKS, CFCS, AND ORMS–TODAY.

1. People say that OO helps you reuse code. Who reuses code? Nobody. I can’t tell a client that I’m gonig to re-use their banner ad on someone else’s site. I can’t take someone else’s code and re-use it.
2. Everyone talks about how frameworks are cool, but they don’t actually help you go any faster. Need proof? Look at HTML. Everyone knows HTML. What is Cold Fusion? Why, Cold fusion is a MARK UP LANGUAGE, which means you SPEAK in Cold Fusion. Therefore, if you are a Cold Fusion programmer, you write in the COLD FUSION LANGUAGE, not using a framework.
3. CFCs are the worst. Object Orientation programming will fail you–and it does. What’s a webpage? A bunch of HTML and Cold Fusion. There are no objects on a Web Page.
4. What is an ORM? An objective relational model. All it does is store CFCs in a database. What is a database? Tables with rows and columns. It does not hold objects. You are wasting your time using an ORM!!

Anyway, that is it for today. I will go back to writing Classic Cold Fusion (I don’t have all day to write blogs like some people do). People want website that work, and that’s what Classic Cold Fusion is: Websites that Work.

Top Five Reasons NOT to Leave ColdFusion November 23, 2009

Friends,

Lately there has been a lot of talk about people leaving ColdFusion.  Hal Helms, irstwhile ColdFusion programmer extraordinnare even said as much in his blog (see http://www.halhelms.com/blog/index.cfm/2009/11/16/Why-Im-Moving-to-Ruby-On-Rails).  I wish him the best.  He is a genius, and can do whatever he wants.

To me though this is a bad move.  In some cases I almost have to question people’s motivation, or even their sanity!

Here’s a list of the top five reasons you should stay with ColdFusion.  There are many more but time does not permit:

1.  Why limit yourself?

Ruby on Rails has ONE framework: the “scaffold.”  You build it one way, every time.  That’s it!  ColdFusion has MANY frameworks, almost as many as there are pebbles on the beach!  There’s lightfront, FW/1, ontap, datafaucet, and Mach 2. ColdFusion is all about choice.  I don’t want to be limited by someone else’s framework.

2.  What is Ruby anyway?

Everyone knows what HTML is.  ColdFusion is very similar to HTML, so there’s no learning curve.  Ruby?  Not so much.  It is hard to pick up, and it is limited in its usefulness.  So not only are you learning a new framework, you also get to learn a whole new language!  Lovely!!

3.  In business, time is money.  Period.

Nobody wants to pay you a lot of money to sit around and mess with some new weird language.  ColdFusion is easy, powerful, and fast!  With the frameworks and RIA stuff available, there’s no end to what you can produce.  The $7,000 price tag only SEEMS pricy, especially when you think of what you can get done!  It pays for itself!

4.  The wind is changing.  Fast.

Look at the numbers.  ColdFusion has more programmers now than ever before!  If you want to plan for the future, use ColdFusion.  It will always be there–it’s been there over a decade and will be around for many more to come.  These programmers aren’t just new programmers, they’re the ones who have stayed with it, and then the new ones.

5.  If you like people, you will like ColdFusion.

I have heard interviews with people like Ruby’s DHH and think that these people are too full of themselves.  Then, listen to a talk given by Brian Meloche, Sean Korfeld, Isaac Dealey (sorry if I ruined anyone’s name!)   These gentlemen are not pretentious or high-and-mighty, but they are good guys who happen to know an awful lot.  They are geniuses!  The community is filled with friendly people happy to help out a noob.

Well Friends, there it is.  Five good reasons.  I’m sure I will think of more soon.

Happy CFing!

There’s nothing to fear….but fear itself! October 13, 2009

The latest release of ColdFusion (CF 9) is, in my opinion, the most exciting release to date.  Congratulations to Adam and the rest of the CF team for reaching this milestone!  This is great news for everyone!

I won’t mention any names, but there have been blogs where people talk about CF8 being shipped on the CF9 DVD, etc.  Other complaints center on performace, compatibilty and so on.

In the words of Sgt. Hulka, “Lighten Up, Francis!”

I can’t believe how much good stuff comes in CF9.   Enough good stuff, that even a minor glitch here or there should mean nothing.

You say you don’t like it?  Then that means you don’t like:

ORM

Better AIR integration

Free (for education)

Better CFScript

Microsoft Office Integration (a BIG feature, worth the $7,000 JUST FOR THAT)

And ON AND ON.

So, if you see a hater, tell them that this is without a doubt the most feature-packed release of CF yet, and that any minor grievances mean nothing compared to how much “Win” they’re getting.

Adobe Fail?  No!  Adobe FTW!

Frameworks, Frameworks Everywhere … What’s a CFer to Think? October 7, 2009

Hi, I’m Brock–you may remember me from such ColdFusion Meetups as, well, all of them! But I haven’t blogged before so here goes nothing.

Right out of the gate I thought I’d ask the perennial question: Which framework should I use? I mean there are so many to choose from and being new to frameworks I just don’t know which to choose. I like the idea of code standardization, but it seems like I have to give up a lot of control.

I’m particularly interested in LightFront and FW/1 since they’re so lightweight. But what’s the difference between the two? And what am I missing compared to another framework like ColdBox, Model-Glue, or Mach-II?

Thanks.

Hello world! October 7, 2009

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