Objective Action - Scorpio

CF7 to CF8 difference

Tue, 13 Nov 2007 14:49:00+0100

CF8 just gave me an error in some code that ran OK on CF7. The error message is: coldfusion.compiler.ASTsimpleVariableReference cannot be cast to java.lang.String Which was caused by the use of a variable as an index in a loop. This would have taken ages to find but for a blog posting by Mike Rankin, thanks Mike.

TVCFUG - CF8 on the 8th of the 8th

Tue, 31 Jul 2007 19:43:00+0100

ColdFusion 8 has now started shipping. Come along to discover and discuss the new features that make this new release a must have upgrade. We will be showing an exclusive Video specially prepared by Ben Forta for user groups. * Where: Phones International Network House Globe Park Marlow SL7 1LY
* When: Wednesday 8 Aug 2007
* Meeting starts: 19:00
* Meeting ends: 21:00
Some of CF8s new features include: * Performance increases
* Server Monitor
* PDF features
* Ajax features
* .NET integration
* Microsoft Exchange Server integration
* Interactive debugger
* Adobe Flex integration
* Per-application settings
* Multi-threading
* Image manipulation
* Presentations on demand
* Atom and RSS feeds
* ZIP and JAR file features
* User-based Administrator and RDS access
* Improved file manipulation functions
* JavaScript operators in CFML
* CFC improvements
* Strong encryption libraries
* Reporting enhancements
* Database interaction improvements
* Argument collections
* Array and structure creation improvements
* Expanded platform, OS, and database support
Come along and see why you just have to have this new release. More details on the UKCFUG web site.

CFUnited - Advanced AJAX Development - Rakshith N

Sat, 30 Jun 2007 14:21:00+0100

I went to another CF8 session with Rakshith N who was covering some of the new AJAX features. CF8 now has an easy way to handle JSON. JSON is Javascript Object Notation and represents the data in Javascript. Based on array and object literals. It is less heavy than XML.


{ books:[
{isbn:'00230', title:'xyz'}
{isbn:'00231', title:'abc'}
}

CF8 has new functions to deal with JSON

SerializeJSON()
DeserializeJSON()
IsJSON()

When CF8 creates the JS data types, simple types remain as simple types, Arrays and Structs get converted to JS arrays and JS Structs. There are two different formats of Query, Row format and Column format.

AJAX Plumbing

Essentially when we use AJAX some area of the page will be updated by a call to the server from a Javascript program. There is some HTML markup for the area of the page we want to update. We can now define an AJAX region with a cfdiv tag. cfdiv uses the bind parameter to link to a cfc or cfm page that will be called to create the content for that area of the page.

OR

There are four types of bind

CFC
Javascript
URL
Plain

A new cfajaxproxy tag will create a JS proxy for a cfc method, allowing you to call the cfc from within javascript. A ColdFusion object in the client JS code can be used to get information from ColdFusion. For example you can use "ColdFusion.navigate" on a link to make it download a JSON object from the server. Other examples:


ColdFusion.Ajax.submitForm(fomnId, url, callBasckHandler, errorHandler, httpMethod, asynch)

ColdFusion.log.dump(message.component)

In addition there are now AJAX versions of the tree and grid controls which can replace the Java versions in earlier CF.

There are tags to do layout like the flash form layout tags.

CFUnited Day 2 - CFML Enhancements - Rupesh Kumar

Sat, 30 Jun 2007 13:44:00+0100

Yesterday there were a few problems with the network connections here at the conference. It seems thay have 4 lines this year versus the one they had last year but its still overloaded. The first session I attended was a session on CFML enhancements by Rupesh Kumar one of the Adobe CF Developers. [More]

ColdFusion 8 Performance Figures

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 18:28:00+0100

Ben Forta has posted the expected improvements in performance on the various tags that have been improved in CF8.

CFUnited - The CF8 Server Monitor - Adam Lehman

Thu, 28 Jun 2007 13:11:00+0100

Adam Lehman, gave an interesting presentation on the new CF8 Server Monitor which was built using Flash Player 9 as the presentation engine. The first point he made is that it is not just for use in production for monitoring your live server, 80% of use should be in development. You need to understand what your code is doing so that there are no surprises when application goes into production. In fact you should never run the memory tracker in production, as it will place too much load on the server. [More]

CFUnited Day 1 - CF8 and LiveCycle Data Services - Tom Jordahl

Thu, 28 Jun 2007 13:03:00+0100

Live Cycle Data Services can be used for RPC, Messaging and Data Management. There is a free updater to CF7 which does most of this. But in this case you have to install two copies of JRun. One for CF7 and one for Data Services. With CF8 it will be installed with both Standard and Enterprise in same JRun instance, unless you untick the box in the install. It is difficult to update later, so may be worth installing it from the start. This allows the Live Cycle APIs to be called directly which improves performance. There is no need for the RMI interface that would be required in earlier versions. Flash Remoting has also been updated and can be used to connect Flex to ColdFusion. [More]

Ben Forta and Tim Buntel on CF8 - 8 Reasons you want it now

Wed, 27 Jun 2007 13:33:00+0100

The W8 is almost over. Ben's slides were GR8! Well for those who are there you will know what I mean. For those who weren't there here is the reasons why CF8 is a must have release. [More]

Free CF8 Hosting

Thu, 07 Jun 2007 15:44:00+0100

HostMySite are offering Free Hosting for CF8.

Threading in ColdFusion 8

Mon, 04 Jun 2007 17:42:00+0100

Ben Nadel has posted three good blog entries showing how to do threading in Scorpio (CF8). Part 1 CFThread Part I - Data Exchange Part 2 CFThread Part II - Parallel Threads Part 3 CFThread Part III - Set It And Forget It

PHP in ColdFusion 8

Mon, 04 Jun 2007 17:39:00+0100

Sean Corfield has posted an interesting entry on his blog about using Quercus to allow ColdFusion to execute PHP tags.

Scorpio News

Thu, 10 May 2007 18:21:00+0100

There were a few already known facts about the new version of ColdFusion, known as Scorpio. As the tour of user groups to promote the new version progresses we are beginning to see some interesting postings on various Blogs.

The first one I noticed was Dave Shuck's Blog which has a really comprehensive list of the new features.

Dave reports on the capability of the new <cfimage> tag which I personally asked for in CF6 and CF7 but was disappointed. I don't expect to be disappointed this time as the tag seems to do everything I want.

I was also concerned by the lack of an upgrade for the KTML edit facility in the new Adobe Dreamweaver Developer Toolbox extensions which have replaced the Interakt Tools, which we made good use of. I need not have worried as a better and easier solution has bee provided by the new RICHTEXT="true" attribute on the <cfinput> tag.

Two new tags have been designed to allow easier construction of portal type sites. <cfpod> and <cfwindow> can be used to create panels that can be resized and moved around. Dynamic menus are also supported by the <cfmenu> tag.

If you want to read a file <cfloop> will now loop over a file.

The small number of architecture gurus will be happy by the introduction of the <cfinterface> tag which allows ColdFusion to implement object oriented interfaces.

To pass arguments to tags argumentsCollection can be used in most cases avoiding some need to create strange logic when different numbers of parameters are present.

Integration with other Adobe products is a major benefit in the new version. Adobe Acrobat Connect users will be pleased to see that presentations can be created easily with the new <cfpresentation>, <cfpresenter> and <cfpresentationslide> tags, while <cfpdf> allows access to the metadata within a pdf file, merge pdf files, generate thumbnails, and encrypt pdfs.

The facilities with pdf files are also enhanced to allow forms to be completed offline and submitted to CF8 for processing by use of the <cfpdfform> tag.

As far as the cold fusion engine is concerned there is now much better support for performance tuning, with real time monitoring and the ability to take snapshots of the server at points when problems occur. Its also possible to run CF8 in a virtual machine under VMware.

On Ben Forta's Blog Ben has added more snippets with the news of support for JSON in AJAX. Two new functions, SerializeJSON() and DeserializeJSON() make it easy to convert data to and from JSON which is generally regarded as the best way to move data to and from AJAX applications. In addition, CFC methods can now return data serialized as JSON by specifying returnformat="json".

Ben also tells us about another new tag <cffeed> which can be used to read and create RSS or Atom syndication feeds.

Regular Expressions get two new function too with the introduction of REMatch() and REMatchNoCase().

There are new security features in Scorpio, giving increased control and flexibility in managing ColdFusion Administrator Access and RDS access.

In his blog, Ray Camden reveals that CF 8 has a function that checks for the existence of an array element. There is no longer a need to use try/catch if you have arrays that potentially have null elements.

He also notes that there are new ways to create arrays and structs and that AJAX is going to be supported through a number of tags. For example <cfajaxproxy> will handle all the JavaScript plumbing to let you invoke any CFC method from JavaScript, and support for refreshing AJAX grid controls.

You can also create a Spry dataset in CF8.

Some people are worried by the new features and think they might be on the way out. But personally the <cfexcahnge> tag looks like it will make it possible to move into new areas of functionality, and Ian Smith has identified 9 ways for CF8 to rule web development.

The ColdFusion Muse has identified that Scorpio will support the standard set of operators we are used to seeing from other languages like "++" and "!=". He also says that <cfajaxproxy> allows you to instantiate CFCs from the client. This exposes the functionality of your CFC in your JavaScript.

Among the other good CF8 snippets I found in the blogs were:

getComponentMetaData - lets you get metadata by passing a path of a CFC.
<cfstoredproc> now supports caching
query caching now works even when using cfqueryparam
<cfftp> now supports sftp
cfc serialization for session replication
Flash form restrictions removed.
Apache Derby, a 100% Java database, will be supported.

I can't wait.....

Scorpio Tour

Wed, 09 May 2007 20:18:00+0100

We are starting to see Blog entries from people who have seen some of the Scopio Tour presentations. We have our own planned in London at the end of the month. I can't wait to see what other Londoners make of the presentation. Ben Forta can't make it to London and Adam Lehman will be standing in for him. We are looking forward to seeing Adam at our new London CFUG meeting place.