I've been a bit slow in blogging, but thanks to a hard working team, CFObjective is coming downunder!

They have secured a stelar line up of speakers, from both down under and up-over!

CFObjective is "The Only Enterprise ColdFusion Conference", so expect a lot more than intro sessions here!

Website: http://www.cfobjective.com.au/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/cfobjective_anz

Frameworks: Whats good about them, whats bad about them.

In my years programming, I've always advocated the use of frame works. While I have only every really used a handful of them myself, (across CF,PHP and Flex) there are underlying principles around frameworks that really appeal to me.

But there are things about using frameworks you need to keep in mind.

But first, some of the good things (a non-complete list):

1. Most frame works have the MVC paradigm at their heart. This is GOOD

2. Force some degree of fore-thought before launching in to code

3. If you use a documented framework consistently, handing over of projects is simpler. (key word "documented"! )

4. Enforces a structure to your code base, which, once you understand it, *usually* means you can de-bug it better

Now the bad things (also a non-complete list):

1. You are trusting code you may not fully know, or even blindly trusting this code.

2. Frameworks are not "silver bullets" that make you problems go away.

3. "Roll your own" frameworks are often badly documented, so hand over can be a real nightmare

4. You can get (feel?) trapped in a framework if it starts to fail you in anyway

5. There is no "perfect" framework. All have pros and cons. You'll need to find them and work with them.

I used to say "The more something does for you, the less you can do with it". Of the past 5 or so years, this statement is less and less true, as there are some very comprehensive frameworks out there that do a very good job of empowering you to do what you need to do, while doing a lot of under-the-hood stuff too.

To expound on a couple of the "Bad things"

While trusting code you don't "know" isn't always bad, it is bad if you start having issues with it. You are faced with some options.

- Abandon it

- Dig in to it and "learn" it so you can fix it

- Work round it's limitations

While I like using frameworks where I can, there is always the "can-o-worms" fear that maybe framework "ABC" or "XYZ" isn't quite a clever as I was expecting under the hood...

On the non-silver bullets of frameworks: sometimes it seems (particularly in the "Which framework is king" flame wars discussions), that people are looking for a framework to make all the hard work go away.

Unfortunately this isn't what frameworks are for or about. Which ever framework you pick, you will have to learn how it works.

You will be slower with it than not using it at first. You will be faced with learning the framework AND solving the problem(s) you are developing to.

But...

- the more you use it, the faster you will get at it

- When faced with problems, you'll know how to solve them within the framework, so you time isn't eaten up with "what goes where", but you can focus on the problem at hand.

While the above is by no means complete, I had to let it out somewhere! Thanks for listening!

PS: I have nothing but absolute respect and props for the men and women who give up so much of their (usually personal) time to create/code and manage any framework! My hat is off to them!

PPS: One other thought: A lot of what I've said above is also true for application platforms too!

Today I listened to the ColdFusion Weekly podcast.

The topic was Flex Frameworks Roundtable

Peter and Matt got together the different "voices" of the Flex Frameworks out there and got them talking.

Speaking personally the saying, "If all you have is a hammer, then everything is a nail" rings true for my experience with frameworks. I tend to find once I get my head-space in a particular framework I find myself approaching all the problems I need to solve within that framework.

In ColdFusion, "Fusebox" was that framework for me for a while, and currently "Cairngorm" is the Flex one.

While it is not a bad thing to actually learn a tool/framework well, it's great to listen to well respected members of the various framework communities flesh out what problems their favorite framework is trying to solve, and how.

A couple of the things that stuck with me are:

- the less "boiler plate" code you have to write to add functionality to an Application, the better

- MVC is not a framework, but applications should be MVC, no matter what framework/approach you take [that's a *whole* other blog post I've been thinking about for a while now!]

At the end of the day, no matter what framework/style/approach you take, if you are going to create a non-trivial application, there is still a lot of work to do! Even if you use one of the plethora of code-gen tools out there, you will still have a lot of leg work!

Near the end of the podcast (64mins) there is some great talking about what these guys would like to see in Flex/Framework in the future.

Well done Matt and Peter for setting this up, and thank you!

I also listened to this one, which is great for a more in-depth on Cairngorm: www.theflexshow.com: Universal-Mind-Cairngorm-Extensions-w-Thomas-Burleson

Enjoy!

I had a situation where because of the incredible LONG file names generated by a ColdFusion application, I couldn't delete them.

I kept getting WindowsXP telling me that it couldn't find the file.

I thought I would use the DOS command "deltree", but discovered that the WindowsXP DOS doesn't come with this command.

But this works...

RD [Your dir here] /S /Q

be careful cause no prompts or nothing. RD is the Dos Command for Remove Directory.

This command comes with no Warranty, implied or otherwise!

I found this useful SQLite admin tool and thought I would share: http://sqliteadmin.orbmu2k.de/

...I'll use this one until a comprehensive AIR one is available! ;-)

(Feel free to point it out to me if it already exists!)

I've tried https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5817, but my Firefox seemed to crash more with it turned on...

I am just sitting down to prepare for the next NZ CFUG meeting and am yet again finding myself downloading "FreeMind", a free mind mapping tool.

[Quote]FreeMind is a premier free mind-mapping software written in Java[/Quote]

I've used it a few times now and find it very useful to get my thoughts down, so thought I would mention it to you!

so, which one of you is doing a free AIR mind mapping tool? - or maybe I should...hmmm

Straker have just announced that Web on the Piste is happening again.

The conference is a deliberately smaller conference of only the low hundreds of attendees available. This means you get get access to the speakers to talk to between sessions etc.

The years theme is "Usability and Rich Internet Technologies" and one of the speakers that has been secured at this stage is Robert Hoekman Jr, author of the best selling book "Designing the Obvious" with more speakers to come.

So it could be good.

Last year I organized User Groups on the Piste which was a chance to get the Adobe Development community together to hang out and talk geek. If you are coming this year, keep an ear out for this event, as I am hoping to organize (or help organize) something similar again.

New Zealand has 2 official Adobe User groups:

- http://www.cfug.org.nz

- http://www.fxug.org.nz

so WOTP is a good chance to get us all together in one place!

Just reading over my blog feeds this morning and I noticed Campbell Anderson has become an Adobe Ambassador!

Congratulations Campbell.

I have been on the receiving end of his help, and think Adobe (via Andrew Spaulding) have made a good choice in asking Campbell for this role.

Campbell's knowledge in Flex and willingness to share that knowledge has helped me out a few times my Flex forays.

So go along to NZ Flex User Group and congratulate the man in person!

[Edit] Does anyone know if there are other "Adobe Ambassadors" in New Zealand? Campbell is the first one I am aware of...

Just noticed the other day that on the http://www.msn.co.nz/ home page there are some ColdFusion links (under the "News Headlines")

From there, the links go to http://msn.nzherald.co.nz

Great use of ColdFusion, keep up the good work APN!

Props to Nick Tong for setting up http://www.coldfusioncommunity.org/

If you think of yourself as a CFer, sign up! My profile is here

It'll be interesting to see how this developes in the days ahead...

I read the other day that the "Call for Papers" for WebDU 2008 has been put out.

WebDU is an awesome conference and I would recommend you start saving your money and making your plans!

I only know it is an awesome conference by reputation at this stage, as I've never actually been to one, but if I follow my own advice above, hopefully I can make it in May.

...if I can think of something to say that I think is worth listening to, I could save the cost of the conference...

Details of the event:

After being involved in organizing Web On The Piste, I have great respect for Geoff and his team @ Daemon for all the effort, lack of sleep and planning that events like this take to make happen 6 years running!