Programming ColdFusion MX, 2nd Edition

What’s New in ColdFusion MX

ColdFusion MX represents perhaps the single most revolutionary release of ColdFusion yet. The application server itself was completely rewritten in Java. All previous versions of ColdFusion were written in C++. The shift to Java has allowed ColdFusion MX to take advantage of the J2EE framework and all it has to offer in terms of standards, functionality, and scalability. So much has changed since ColdFusion 5 that it would be redundant to list it all here. I’ve decided to highlight the major enhancements instead:

• Because ColdFusion code now compiles to Java, execution of most code is now significantly faster than in previous versions of ColdFusion.

• There is tighter integration between ColdFusion and JSPs, servlets, EJBs, and Java objects than ever before.

• Enhanced support for both internationalization and localization has been added, and ColdFusion MX now supports Unicode.

• ColdFusion’s query of query feature has been greatly enhanced to support a wider array of options.

• ColdFusion MX uses JDBC (although it can still use ODBC) for database connectivity. In many cases, this eliminates the need to install separate client libraries on the server.

• Regular-expression support has been greatly enhanced in ColdFusion MX. Regular expressions are now “Perl compatible.”

• User-defined functions have been enhanced in ColdFusion MX. In addition to CFScript-based user-defined functions, you can now create them using CFML tags.

• The introduction of ColdFusion Components (CFCs) has added object-oriented techniques to ColdFusion.

• Working with XML is easier than ever, thanks to several new tags and functions in ColdFusion MX.

• Producing and consuming web services couldn’t be easier. In most cases, a single tag attribute is all that’s necessary to publish a CFC as a web service. Consuming web services can be as simple as providing a URL to a single CFML tag.

• The graphing and charting capabilities of ColdFusion have been improved. ColdFusion 5 used Macromedia’s Generator as the underlying graphing engine. ColdFusion MX takes advantage of an underlying Java engine that offers far more options for chart and graph generation.

• Application-level security has been greatly enhanced with a built-in roles-based security mechanism.

• Enhanced debugging and logging capabilities have been added.

• The need for locking access to shared scope variables, an often-misunderstood practice in previous versions of ColdFusion, has been greatly reduced.

• Major enhancements to the cfmail tag in ColdFusion MX 6.1 including the ability to send upward of 1 million messages an hour (in ColdFusion Enterprise), create multi-part mail messages, specify backup mail servers (ColdFusion Enterprise), and spawn multiple mail threads.

• Enhancements to the cfhttp tag in ColdFusion MX 6.1 to support additional HTTP operations beyond get and post.

• ColdFusion MX is integrated more tightly with Macromedia’s other MX products, especially Dreamweaver MX and Flash MX. With regard to Flash MX, ColdFusion MX supports a new technology called Flash Remoting, a Macromedia technology for tying a Flash front end with ColdFusion on the server. Flash Remoting opens up a whole new category of applications known as Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) that go beyond what’s currently possible with HTML/DHTML front ends.

Because there is so much new functionality in ColdFusion MX, as well as significant changes between ColdFusion 5 and MX, I’ve gone to great lengths to highlight the differences throughout the book.