CFB Extensions Development Google Group

I am huge fan of ColdFusion Builder and I love how easy it is to create extensions. I decided today to create the ColdFusion Builder Extensions Development Google Group. This will be a group where we can discuss extension development. The idea to create this group came from the ORM dev group. That group is a great centralized location for ORM specific questions and I can see this group providing the same service. Please sign up for the group today and start asking questions.

ColdFusion Builder Extensions Development Google Group

ColdFusion Builder Extensions Metadata

You probably already knew that you could supply a description and a license using the configuration file. This is an example of a basic extension. <application> <name>ORM CFC Generator</name> <author>Adobe</author> <version>1.0</version> <email>user@xyz.com</email> <description>ORM CFC code Generator</description> <license>This is my license</license> </application> What you may not know is that you can point to html files for the content. This is really helpful when you have a ton of text for your description or license. Simply create a folder in your extension named install and create an html file. From there you can just specify the name of the file that you are using for either. <application> <name>*****</name> <author>Dan Vega</author> <version>0.1</version> <email>myemail@gmail.com</email> <description>about.html</description> <license>license.html</license> </application>

ColdFusion builder bug using java doc syntax

I get that not everyone likes to write code the way that I do and at the same time I don't like to write code the way that you do. I have recently come across 2 bugs that I combined into 1 bug because I think they are related.

First we have a basic ORM component here. I have declared this component as persistent using the attribute in the java doc syntax. This is a perfectly acceptable code and ColdFusion will run it just fine. The only problem is when your using builder and your using code insight and type EntityLoad(" you will only get a list of entity's that have persistet = "true" on the component tag. /** * @persistent true * @table PRODUCT * @schema ********* * @output false */ component { property name="productid" type="numeric" ormtype="double" fieldtype="id"; property name="categoryid" type="numeric" ormtype="double" ; property name="name" type="string" ormtype="string" ; property name="qty" type="numeric" ormtype="double" ; }

Just as above you will have the same issues when you are extending your components. In the following component I have ClassB that extends ClassA. When I create a new instance of b and type b. I will only get a list of methods that are in b. If I added extends="ClassA" to the component than the insight would work out great. /** * @output false * @extends ClassA */ component { public ClassB function init(){ return this; } public void function brun(){ } }

Again if you don't like coding this way I completely understand but I think if its valid syntax then it can be considered a bug If builder does not support it. Please help me out and go vote for it even if it is not your cup of tea!
http://cfbugs.adobe.com/bugreport/flexbugui/cfbugtracker/main.html#bugId=81258

ColdFusion Builder sub class code insight

I wanted to put this out there and see if anyone else is experiencing the same issues as me. From what I can tell this should be working in builder but for me it's not. What I am trying to figure out is how to get code insight for a class that extends another one. In this example we have 2 components, class a and class b. ClassA is our concrete component that other components will extend. /** * @output false */ component { public void function arun(){ } } ClassB extends ClassA. /** * @output false * @extends ClassA */ component { public ClassB function init(){ return this; } public void function brun(){ } }

ClassB is extending ClassA and because it does so it has access to the arun method from class a. The only problem is when instantiate class b and go to get a list of methods only the methods in b are listed in the drop down. Is everyone else having the same issue or are you seeing the methods from a. From what I know this is supposed to work so if it's not let me know and I will file a bug.

ColdFusion Builder component wizard interface feature

A fond a cool little tip in ColdFusion Builder that for whatever reason I did not know existed. If you have an inteface that you are working with and you need to create a component that will implement I suggest using the new component Wizard. If you have worked in ColdFusion Builder you most likely have already seen the screen below. What you may not know though is that if you select an interface to implement and click finish it will read interface details and create your code for you.

component implements="IValidator" output="false" { public string function getMessage( Struct prop, String message) { } public boolean function isValid( Struct prop, val) { } }

CFBuilder, old projects and the deep freeze

ColdFusion builder has been freezing on me at work lately and I could not figure out why. Basically every time I started it back up It would freeze and never recover. The only way to use the editor again was to delete the workspace or start a new one. This was a big pain in the butt for me because I had to import all of my old projects. in. I was digging through the logs and came across this.

!SESSION 2009-09-21 09:31:53.038 -----------------------------------------------
eclipse.buildId=unknown java.version=1.6.0_11 java.vendor=Sun Microsystems Inc. BootLoader constants: OS=win32, ARCH=x86, WS=win32, NL=en_US Command-line arguments: -os win32 -ws win32 -arch x86 -data c:\workspace\cf
!ENTRY com.adobe.ide.coldfusion.core 4 0 2009-09-21 09:31:58.523
!MESSAGE Problem loading version node from dictionaryconfig.xml
!ENTRY com.adobe.ide.coldfusion.core 4 0 2009-09-21 09:31:58.632 !MESSAGE Problem loading version node from dictionaryconfig.xml

Something was obviously not loading correctly but I could not figure out why until today when I was coincidently using wireless instead of the LAN. When this happens I have no access to network drives so when I fired up Builder all of my local projects loaded up fine and it never froze up. This led me to believe something was up with all of my old lan projects. When I opened up the .project file I found this. <natures> <nature>org.cfeclipse.cfml.CFENature</nature> <nature>com.adobe.ide.coldfusion.projectNature</nature> </natures> I am not an eclipse expert but what I think was happening is that because we were still using the CF Eclipse nature it was trying to load some old data (dictionary) that was no longer there. I wonder if any of you really smart people out there can confirm this. Whatever the case is Builder is back to working how it should be all because of removing the cfe nature.

ColdFusion Builder workspace

If you haven't noticed ColdFusion Builder does not open up a workspace selector during startup. It refers to the default workspace and just automatically opens up that one. During different projects I will usually be in separate workspaces depending on what I am doing. Well today I was trying to figure out how I can launch ColdFusion builder to use a specific workspace and turns out its pretty easy. There is a data argument that you can use during startup that allows you to specify a path. If you are running it from command line it may look like this.

C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe ColdFusion Builder>cfbuilder.exe -data c:\workspace\cfbuilder

That works out great but what if you have a nice little icon in your start menu. No problems, you can apply the argument there as well. Right click on the icon, go to properties and select the shortcut tab. The target field is how it knows where the executable is, you can simply pass your startup arguments here.

ColdFusion Builder Bug Database - Vote Now!

I heard a lot of talk at CFUnited about ColdFusion builder both good and bad. A lot of people are really excited but it seems some people are not happy with it yet. Critics feel that its just not ready yet. I could agree that it needs some work but I am really happy with the product so far and I using it full time in my development at work. We are at a time though when Adobe could really use some feedback on what needs the teams attention the most. Please click on the link below to visit the ColdFusion Builder Bug Database and vote on current bugs or add your own. On Twitter this morning Adam Lehman said he was going over new feature ideas for ColdFusion Builder B2 and that he was looking for votes on your favorite features so do your community proud and vote!

Adobe ColdFusion Bug Database

ColdFusion Builder: Stop Startup Screen From Showing

If you have been using Eclipse or Aptana for any amount of time this will probably be no surprise for you. If you are new to the Eclipse world this may help you out. When ColdFusion Builder starts there is a start page that has to load up and can some times cause Eclipse to start up a little slow. Lucky for you there is an easy way to disable this. click Windows > preferences > ColdFusion > Startup and un check the check box for showing the welcome page. If you ever miss the weclome page or just want to check it out you can always open it by going to Help > Adobe ColdFusion Builder Start Page

ColdFusion 9 Script Enhancements

ColdFusion 9 brings a great set of new features and language enhancements but personally none greater then full cfscript support. I am not sure but there has been a large number of people who have spoken out against this enhancement so I wanted to take some time today and go over the new enhancements on cfscript and some personal thoughts on the feature.

First off I wanted to touch on the fact that a lot of people have come out against this feature which I really don't understand. I personally don't use cfscript a lot because of the fact that I had to switch between script and cfml when I had to use tags like cfmail and cfquery. That problem has been eliminated and the ColdFusion team has brought to us full cfscript support.

I am a huge fan of this for 2 reasons. I think that the script support just looks better but more for productivity. The one problem I have always had with writing components is the very verbose nature of components. This is going to drastically cut down some development time and since the bulk of my time is spent writing component I am going to be pretty happy. People have expressed that they really don't like this feature and to them I would say to you, that's fine. You can continue to write your components in CFML and there will be no change for you. Another great idea would be to a ColdFusion Builder extension that would be able to convert cfcs from cfml to cfscript and vice versa.

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