ColdFusion | Serge Jespers

Tag Archives: ColdFusion

Getting started with Flex 4, Flash Builder 4 and ColdFusion Builder

by Serge Jespers on 22. Mar, 2010 in ColdFusion, Flash Builder, Flex

Andrew Shorten: In the Flex 4 SDK, we’ve implemented a completely new component and skinning architecture (Spark) that supports a level of expressiveness in RIAs not seen previously.

In Flash Builder 4, the team has made it easier than ever to connect to back-end services with a complete set of data centric development features, enabled new design and development workflows with Flash Catalyst and Flash Professional, as well as enhancing the core code development features that are essential to developer productivity.

We also released a completely new IDE for rapidly and efficiently building ColdFusion applications.

ColdFusion Builder is built on Eclipse and is integrated with Flash Builder 4 for fast, easy RIA development. ColdFusion Builder is packed with features and also allows you to easily build your own extensions. RIAForge already has a bunch of these that are ready to go.

When we first introduced ColdFusion Builder to the community, Ben Forta (Mister ColdFusion himself ;-)) wrote an article on how to get started with ColdFusion Builder.

Flex.org got a fresh new look and new/updated content including a new resources page to help you get started. We also launched a new Flex showcase. If you feel that your app belongs in the showcase, make sure you let us know! Tour de Flex has also been updated with new samples.

If you’re new to Flex or just want to update yourself on the new features in the Flex 4 framework and Flash Builder 4, you may want to take the Flex In A Week course. If you just want a quick taste of what Flex is, have a look at the Flex Testdrive.

Adobe’s Devnet and Adobe TV have a ton of new content on how to get started and use Flex 4, Flash Builder 4 and ColdFusion Builder. But before you get started, you may want to download the trial versions for Flash Builder 4 and ColdFusion Builder. Quick note: If you already played around with the beta versions, make sure you uninstall those first before installing the release versions!

There… That should keep you busy for a while. ;-) Flash on!

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ColdFusion on tour – SOTR Europe

by Serge Jespers on 07. Sep, 2009 in ColdFusion, Events

coldfusion.jpg-jpeg-image-253x250-pixels-1.jpg After a very successful and fun tour though the UK, SOTR is now going to mainland Europe. Most of you know that my love for ColdFusion is growing with every project I do using it. I think you can really only appreciate ColdFusion after getting a taste of it and SOTR is the perfect place to get that taste. With SOTR Europe being a free event, there really is no excuse to not be there. ;-)

Hope to see you in Munich, Zurich, Milan, Amsterdam, Brussels or London!

More info and free registration on http://www.scotch-on-the-rocks.co.uk

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My 9 favorite ColdFusion 9 features

by Serge Jespers on 13. Jul, 2009 in ColdFusion

coldfusion.jpg (JPEG Image, 253x250 pixels)-1.jpg In case you haven’t heard: ColdFusion 9 Beta and ColdFusion Builder Beta are now available on Adobe Labs. Some of you may find this surprising (;-)) but I’ve been playing with CF9 for a few months now and actually really love it!

To give you a bit of an idea on what I like about CF9, I’ve listed my 9 favorite features.

1) Adobe AIR database synchronization
By enabling this feature in your AIR application (both on the server and in the client app), the application syncs the data from a ColdFusion datasource to a local SQLite database. On the server side, it’s as simple as setting the persistent property to true on an ORM component. On the AIR side, it takes a little bit more depending on the features you need. In some cases you may need things like conflict management but even something as complicated as that can be done with just a few lines of code. Read more about this feature.

2) Object Relational Mapping (ORM)
This was a true eye-opener for me. ORM allows you to do complex database calls without writing a single SQL query thus making your code a lot cleaner and more manageable. This is a serious time saver and your apps will even run faster because of the built-in ORM optimizations. Read more about this feature.

3) Flex integration
I’m not just talking about the data centric development features in Flash Builder here. By using the ColdFusion proxy ActionScript classes, you get access to several ColdFusion services without actually writing any ColdFusion code. You just call the ColdFusion service straight from your Flex code. Read more about this feature.

4) ColdFusion Builder
Not really a ColdFusion 9 feature but ok… ColdFusion Builder is an Eclipse based IDE for CF development that is deeply integrated with CF9. So it’s ok to post it in this list ;-) I absolutely love how easy it is to create your ORM code. With just a few clicks, you can create all the necessary CRUD code to use in your CF application or your Flex application. I also really like that it’s extremely easy to extend ColdFusion Builder with your own extensions. You can easily write those extensions using CFML. Read more about ColdFusion Builder.

5) ColdFusion as a service
Ever tried calling an Exchange server from a PHP server (or any other server)? Or read a PPT, DOC or XLS file? Did you have fun? ;-) Next time, you should consider using CF9. ColdFusion 9 has an exposed service layer meaning you have direct access to a bunch of CF9 services from any server language you use. You can even call them using SOAP. Read more about this feature.

6) Server manager
If you work with multiple CF servers, this is surely going to make you very happy. Server Manager is an AIR-based desktop application that allows you to centrally manage multiple ColdFusion servers from one location. Apply hot fixes, change configs, create data sources, etc to all servers at once. Read more about this feature.

7) Office application integration
Ever wanted to create a presentation (PPT) from an bunch of images? Or from an HTML page? The <cfpresentation> tag allows you to do that and more! With just a few lines of code, you can create, convert and read presentation files. The same thing goes for documents and spreadsheets. Read more about this feature.

8) PDF integration
With the enhanced PDF support in CF9, you can extract all the content form a PDF file. You can also update PDFs and even optimize them on the server. Read more about this feature.

9) <cfscript>
The <cfscript> tag was really confusing to me when I first started playing with CF. Some CFML tags could also be scripted and others couldn’t. With CF9, everything you can do with CFML, you can also do with <cfscript>. Read more about <cfscript>.

Obviously there are a lot more new and cool features in ColdFusion 9 and ColdFusion Builder but I thought 9 was an appropriate number ;-). Go ahead and download the public beta versions available on Labs and start playing with it yourself.

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A sneak peak at the future of ColdFusion

by Serge Jespers on 01. Apr, 2009 in ColdFusion, Events

coldfusion.jpg (JPEG Image, 253x250 pixels)-1.jpg Ben “ColdFusion” Forta is coming to the UK and Belgium to give you a sneak peak at the future of ColdFusion.

This is your chance to find out more about Centaur and Bolt on April 21st in London and April 22nd in Brussels. Registration is free but required and seats are limited!

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ColdFusion rocks! Come see for yourself at SOTR.

by Serge Jespers on 11. Mar, 2009 in ColdFusion, Events

Yes… I know… It may be a little bit strange to read this on my PHP driven WordPress blog but hear me out for a second. I used to be like many of you. I used to think that ColdFusion could not even touch the capabilities of PHP and I’m sure many of you still think that. But have you really seen the power of ColdFusion up close and personal? Have you downloaded the developer version and played with it for a while? Well, I did and it blew me away. I always find it so amazing to see that CF can do the same task in only a fraction of the code needed in other languages.

You really have to see it and/or play with it before you can really appreciate the power of ColdFusion. Scotch On The Rocks, the ColdFusion conference, is giving you the opportunity to do just that. They’re going to try and reach out to the non-CFMLers and see if they can’t offer them a little incentive to give CFML a go. They’re offering 10 tickets for each location to JSP/PHP/.NET/Rails developers to come along and see what all the fuss is, for absolutely zero cost.

Come and see the power of ColdFusion yourself!

PS: I am now working on a super-secret project powered by ColdFusion. So yes… I do use ColdFusion these days!

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Free ColdFusion workshops throughout Europe

by Serge Jespers on 07. Jan, 2009 in ColdFusion, Events

coldfusion.jpg-jpeg-image-253x250-pixels-1.jpg If you have any doubts, let me make this clear: ColdFusion is alive and kicking! Together with a number of European partners, Adobe is organizing a series of free workshops throughout Europe. If you want to find out more about what’s new in the latest version of ColdFusion or how to build ColdFusion-powered RIAs, go ahead and register for this event.

Cologne, January 20th
Amsterdam, January 22nd
Brussels (NL), January 27th
Brussels (FR), January 28th
Paris, February 3rd
London, February 5th

For more info and links to the registration forms, check out Andrew Shorten’s blog.

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Weekly blend – The MAX-edition

by Serge Jespers on 22. Nov, 2008 in MAX2008, Weekly blend

With so many announcements at MAX (and after), I thought it was a good idea to do a round up of all the cool stuff we announced/showed/released this week.

Alchemy: Alchemy is a research project that allows users to compile C and C++ code that is targeted to run on the open source ActionScript Virtual Machine.

Bolt: Bolt is the code name for a new Eclipse based development tool that you can use to build applications for ColdFusion. Click to sign up for the beta.

Centaur: Centaur is the code name for the next release of ColdFusion. Beta applications are now being accepted. Click for more info.

Cocomo: Cocomo is a Platform as a Service that allows Flex developers to easily add real-time social capabilities into their RIA.

Configurator: Configurator is an open source utility that enables the easy creation of panels (palettes) for use in Photoshop CS4.

Durango: Durango allows developers, designers and end-users to easily mashup independent components to create new applications or extend existing Durango-enabled applications.

Flash Catalyst: Flash Catalyst is a new professional interaction design tool for rapidly creating application interfaces and interactive content without coding.

Genesis: Genesis is the code name for a new product initiative at Adobe with the objective of joining business applications, documents and the web on every knowledge worker’s desktop with integrated collaboration capabilities.

Gumbo: Gumbo is the code name for the next generation of Flex.

InContext Editing: InContext Editing is an online service that allows designers to create, manage, and control editable web pages.

PatchPanel: A first glimpse at combining the dynamic control of ActionScript with the power of Adobe’s Creative Suite.

Pixel Bender 5: An image and video processing infrastructure with runtime optimization on heterogeneous hardware.

Stratus: A new communications protocol called the Real-Time Media Flow Protocol (RTMFP). The most important features of RTMFP include low latency, end-to-end peering capability, security and scalability.

Text Layout Framework: The Text Layout Framework is an extensible library, built on the new text engine in Adobe Flash Player 10, which delivers advanced, easy-to-integrate typographic and text layout features for rich, sophisticated and innovative typography on the web.

Wave: Wave is an Adobe AIR application and Adobe hosted service that work together to enable desktop notifications.

Wow… That should keep you busy for a while ;-)

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ColdFusion is alive and kicking in Belgium

by Serge Jespers on 22. Sep, 2008 in ColdFusion, Events

coldfusion.jpg (JPEG Image, 253x250 pixels)-1.jpg I can’t keep count of how many times people have asked me if ColdFusion was dead and the answer is pretty simple: “Hell no!”. Actually, ColdFusion 9 is currently in active development and from what I’ve seen and heard, it’s going to kick some serious behind!

In Belgium, ColdFusion is powering some seriously big and high-traffic sites (like Kinepolis, Immoweb and ZDNet to name a few) and so it’s great to see that the Belgian ColdFusion user group is now being rebooted. Their first meeting is on September 29th at 2pm in Brussels. Fellow platform evangelist Adam Lehman is going to talk about CF and LiveCycle DataServices, monitoring and system alerts and will also let you in on the ColdFusion 9 (codenamed Centaur) roadmap.

More info on their Facebook event page or via http://www.cfforum.eu/ (currently only in French though).

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Learn about ColdFusion 8 in your backyard (free eseminars)

by Serge Jespers on 04. Jul, 2008 in ColdFusion, Events

I have to be honest with you guys. I have only recently started playing with ColdFusion 8 but I am rapidly falling in love with it. CF really does dramatically/extremely increase your productivity. The amount of code you have to write to do pretty complex things is amazingly small compared to other server-side code.

If you haven’t had a chance to dive in to CF8 yet, Kristen Schofield (ColdFusion product marketing manager) just published a list of free webinars starting on July 8th. This is a great opportunity for you to find out more about ColdFusion 8′s new features and powerful capabilities.

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CMS done right with ColdFusion

by Serge Jespers on 07. May, 2008 in ColdFusion, News

Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Can you tell I’m really excited? I was just reading up on today’s blog posts and came across a post that talks about something called “ColdBricks”.

Oscar Arevalo writes:

ColdBricks is a free and open source content management system specially tailored for highly modular websites like portals and dashboards. The current version runs on ColdFusion 7, 8 and Railo 2

I was immediately curious to see it in action. The ColdBricks website has a fully working live demo and I am totally impressed! This is a great piece of programming and it’s free and completely open source. Go ahead and try it yourself! I am sure you’ll be as pleasantly surprised as I am. This really is a serious competitor for the Drupals and Joomlas out there and it runs on ColdFusion ;-)

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