Fusion Authority The House of Fusion Technical Magazine	Issue: 120 February 24, 2003 April 25, 2003
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Specials

Macromedia Announces Updater 3

 

Community

Early Bird Price for CFUN-03 Ends April 30!

Vote for this Year's Readers' Choice Awards (CFDJ)

 

News

Macromedia Introduces Breeze Product Line: Interactive Web Presentations for the Corporate Market

 

Tech and Tags

Macromedia Central: A Closer Connection Between the Web and your Desktop

 

Best of ColdFusion Talk

Best of Talk (12/09/02)

Best of Talk (12/10/02)

Best of Talk (12/11/02)

Best of Talk (12/12/02)

Best of Talk (12/13/02)

Best of Talk (Weekend, 12/14/02 - 12/15/02)

Best of Talk (12/16/02)

Best of Talk (12/17/02)

Best of Talk (12/18/02)

Best of Talk (12/19/02)

Best of Talk (12/20/02)

Best of Talk (Weekend, 12/21/02 - 12/22/02)

Best of Talk (12/23/02)

Best of Talk (Christmas, 12/24/02 - 12/25/02)

Best of Talk (12/26/02)

Best of Talk (12/27/02)

Best of Talk (Weekend, 12/28/02 - 12/29/02)

Best of Talk (12/30/02)

Best of Talk (12/31/02)

Best of Talk (1/1/03)

Best of Talk (1/2/03)

Best of Talk (1/3/03)

Best of Talk (Weekend, 1/4/03 - 1/5/03)

 

Specials

Macromedia Announces Updater 3

In addition to a heavy focus on web server connector stability, says Costa, Macromedia has released the source code for the connector, ensuring that users can integrate ColdFusion with current and future versions of the Apache Web Server.

Programmers who use Bob Denny's Website will be happy to hear that there's a new Website connector for CFMX.

Updater 3 also brings the ColdFusion MX Server and ColdFusion for J2EE products onto a common code base, with all fixes available for both products.

Macromedia has also included several updates to ColdFusion, including version 1.0 of the Apache Axis web services engine, as well as updated database drivers, and fixes for some internationalization issues related to doube-byte characters.

You can read more about the Updater at the following links:

FAQ: http://www.macromedia.com/software/coldfusion/special/updater/faq/.

Release Notes Part I (Known Issues and Installation Instructions): http://www.macromedia.com/support/coldfusion/releasenotes/mx/releasenotes_mx_updater.html

Part II (Issues in this Release): http://www.macromedia.com/support/coldfusion/releasenotes/mx/releasenotes_mx_updater01.html

Part III (Issues Fixed in Previous Updater Releases): http://www.macromedia.com/support/coldfusion/releasenotes/mx/releasenotes_mx_updater02.html.

Part IV (Installed Files, Uninstalling, and Installing the Update Silently): http://www.macromedia.com/support/coldfusion/releasenotes/mx/releasenotes_mx_updater03.html.

You can download the Updater by going to http://www.macromedia.com/go/cfmxupdate.

Macromedia has also launched a new resource center called the ColdFusion MX migration resource center. This puts all technical information connected to migration in one site. Macromedia hopes to simplify people's planning for making the move to ColdFusion MX. You can get to the site by going to http://macromedia.com/go/cfmxmigration/. Costa says that Macromedia will be updating that site regularly, so keep your eyes peeled.

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Community

Early Bird Price for CFUN-03 Ends April 30!

This year, the conference features four tracks (Advanced CF, MX Integration, Empowered Programming and CF Bootcamp), and you can mix and match your sessions or just sit in on one. Some of the featured speakers include Charlie Arehart, Vince Bonfanti, Michael Dinowitz, Christian Cantrell, Shlomy Gantz, Hal Helms, Simon Horwith, Jeff Peters and Many More!

For more information, see http://www.cfconf.com/cfun-03/.

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Vote for this Year's Readers' Choice Awards (CFDJ)

http://www.sys-con.com/coldfusion/readerschoice2003/

Best Web Site or Community Category

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News

Macromedia Introduces Breeze Product Line: Interactive Web Presentations for the Corporate Market

Macromedia Breeze Training (formerly Presedia Express Trainer) is a fully automated learning solution that leverages common business tools like Microsoft PowerPoint and the web for rapid, easy, and consistent online training. This program allows users to quickly and easily create, manage, deliver, and measure multimedia courses delivered with Macromedia Flash. Macromedia Breeze Presentation (formerly Presedia Express Presenter) allows people of all skill levels to create, deliver, and share online presentations with ease. Both products feature a new user interface to further streamline the process of rapidly delivering online courses and presentations as interactive, Macromedia Flash applications. They are available through either a hosted or licensed enterprise solution that addresses business users looking to easily and cost-effectively create, deliver, and manage online presentations and training content.

Kevin M. Lynch, Vice President of Sales and Product Marketing of the Breeze Solution (not Kevin Lynch who is Chief Software Architect of Macromedia), stressed that the whole point of these new Breeze products is that they make information (in this case the Powerpoint slides and presenter’s voice that are so widely in use in businesses today) more convenient for users, no matter what their knowledge of the Web or of programming. "Breeze uses the great technology that MM has developed [(Flash)], but it's not really a high tech product that you're overwhelmed with -- It's like a car. You don't really care how the engine works. We are trying to take the technology we have and make it accessible to line of business owners and marketing managers."

This is part of what Macromedia is calling their new Macromedia Information Convenience product line. In issue 116, I wrote up a piece on Macromedia Contribute, a recently released product that allows any user to create and update their static web pages. Like Contribute, these Macromedia Breeze products are designed for corporate users who may not be knowledgable in HTML, CFML or other Web languages.

Visit http://www.macromedia.com/software/breeze/ for more information on Macromedia Breeze, including testimonials, product overviews, and a showcase of two major early adopters of the products.

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Tech and Tags

Macromedia Central: A Closer Connection Between the Web and your Desktop

Here’s basically how Central works: The user downloads a free copy of Central that sits on his or her machine. Macromedia promises a very easy download and install process for the application. When the user is in the Central environment, he can find various applications written in Flash that can be “imported” into Central. These applications may be free or have a charge associated with either the application or the application data. For most applications, there will be a temporary grace period where people can try them out before paying and Macromedia will be handling the processing of all payments through secure back-end. Application data will be provided through web services, as well as other communication protocols, and the applications themselves can be almost anything written in Flash, which means they can range from simple games to complex business applications. The examples shown for Central include such live data feeds as stock and weather services, as well as live lookups to secure company data.

A major advantage of Central is that is designed for both desktop applications and communication with the Net. Because the Net is so central to its operation, steps have been taken to make sure that when Central does not have access to the Internet, the data inside it is cached in an intelligent way so that it can be accessed offline. The default is 2 megabytes of information per application, but the user can change this if they’ve got more space on their drive. In his presentation to Fusion Authority, Mr. Lynch called this a “persistent desktop presence.”

On the business side, Macromedia will be taking a percentage of every sale that is made for applications and services through Central, generating a continuous cash flow, which will look good on the corporate spreadsheet. The fact that Central is in many ways almost a replacement for the desktop, and as it’s a Flash application (hopefully meaning that it can be moved to any platform that supports Flash) means that Macromedia is walking into territory owned by Microsoft and doing so with a strong product. The ubiquitousness of Flash, as well as the ability in the latest versions to build complex applications, means that Central has the potential to be a strong player in future markets. (With the scheduled release of various additions to Flash that make the programming of it faster and easier, this raises the bar even more so.)

Michael and I are very excited about what Central can do for information and code sharing. We feel that Central has a lot of potential, especially with all of the tools that Macromedia is providing. We plan to make all House of Fusion resources available through Central. In addition, the Best of Talk compiled digests of CF-Talk will be available as a subscription service through Central.

Macromedia is already working with some highly visible companies, such as PriceGrabber.com, to develop Central applications. Look out for the announcement of the Central beta if you’d also like to experiment with this new technology. You can find out more about Macromedia Central by visiting the following links:

http://www.macromedia.com/macromedia/proom/pr/2003/central_announce.html

http://www.macromedia.com/software/central/

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Best of ColdFusion Talk

Best of Talk (12/09/02)

Title:	CFC's and transactions
Date:	12/09/02      3 Posts
Summary:	CFTRANSACTION's rollback feature is not fully supported in MX for multiple function calls that perform database operations. In other words, if you have two CFFUNCTIONs within a CFTRANSACTION, one with an insert query and another with an update query, only the update query gets rolled back if any part of the transaction fails. This is a known issue.
Title:	Lists vs. Arrays vs. Structures
Date:	12/09/02      18 Posts
Summary:	This discussion centers around the best way to handle heirarchical information. One developer suggests using a heirarchical engine and hash strings rather than a relational engine and nested sets.
Title:	MS Word/CFOBJECT Help
Date:	12/09/02      3 Posts
Summary:	Need to format a Word document via CFOBJECT? This thread includes code that will set print orientation and margins, add and format a header, then print the specified document.
Title:	Warning: Page has Expired
Date:	12/09/02      4 Posts
Summary:	Check out the cache control code included in this thread to prevent users from "filling out a form, clicking submit, hitting back and clicking submit again."

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Best of Talk (12/10/02)

Title:	Accessing Network Drive with CFFILE
Date:	12/10/02      7 Posts
Summary:	To use CFFILE within your LAN, set up the ColdFusion Application Service to run as an account that has access to the server's UNC and full file permission on the network share.
Title:	CFC output
Date:	12/10/02      53 Posts
Summary:	If the sole purpose of a CFC is to generate HTML for output, why not just output the HTML directly from the CFC? Flexibility is one reason. Results returned using CFRETURN can be sent to Flash or invoked as a web service. Note: There is currently a bug in CFMX that prevents the direct output of HTML in CFCs that are stored in a shared memory scope.
Title:	Instant SSL HELP!!!!!
Date:	12/10/02      30 Posts
Summary:	A CFHTTP request to a remote ASP server returns the desired XML feed when the server uses a Thawte security certificate, but fails when it's InstantSSL. MX reports a connection failure. Suggestions range from installing JRE 1.4.1 to using Stretch to view the HTTP stream.
Title:	Macromedia Contribute
Date:	12/10/02      26 Posts
Summary:	Contribute uses FTP to connect to the web server from the client box but, unlike ActiveEdit, it cannot be accessed via the Web. It is not a true content management tool but is meant to free developers from the mundane chore of implementing simple HTML content changes.

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Best of Talk (12/11/02)

Title:	Component Conceptual Conundrum - Continued
Date:	12/11/02      17 Posts
Summary:	You can post to a CFC, but you cannot post to an instance of a CFC. As a side note, "[it] is possible to use DHTML to hit any SOAP-based web service...the function is named XMLHTTPRequest(), which allows you to make raw XML posts to a web service." This process avoids page loads, which Macromedia developers typically handle by building a Flash front-end to access back-end data.
Title:	DWMX - Moving Blocks of Code.
Date:	12/11/02      10 Posts
Summary:	Does DWMX offer functionality to tab highlighted blocks of code forward and backward? Sure does. And apparently there are several ways to do it. To print a full list of DWMX shortcuts, click "Export to HTML" in the keyboard shortcuts dialog box.
Title:	MACROMEDIA PEOPLE....RE: Instant SSL HELP!!!!!
Date:	12/11/02      23 Posts
Summary:	Macromedia comes to the rescue of a developer who cannot send a successful CFHTTP request to an ASP server with an InstantSSL security certificate. At the root of the problem is the fact that InstantSSL, a new company, is not trusted by default in the Sun 1.3.1 JVM. The solution is to use the keytool to install the root CA certficate for InstantSSL into the JVM keystore.
Title:	Updater 2 Released
Date:	12/11/02      14 Posts
Summary:	CFMX Updater 2 is now available for download at http://www.macromedia.com/support/coldfusion/... If you experience problems with this link, delete your Macromedia cookie and try again. Note: Website users will need to install the Website connector after installing this Updater.
Title:	What is Blue Dragon?
Date:	12/11/02      10 Posts
Summary:	BlueDragon "[is] a CFML engine written in Java, by a company called New Atlanta: http://www.newatlanta.com/products/..." Keep in mind, though, that the BlueDragon feature set is somewhat different than CFMX. To learn more, take a look at December's issue of ColdFusion Developer's Journal (CFDJ), which contains a BlueDragon article/review.

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Best of Talk (12/12/02)

Title:	Another Newbie Problem
Date:	12/12/02      12 Posts
Summary:	Don't let the title mislead you. There's nothing "newbie" about this thread, which focuses on how to handle date parts in SQL...always a tricky problem. There's also a good discussion here about how the ISO SQL standard relates to Transact-SQL.
Title:	Application.cfm vs. CFInclude
Date:	12/12/02      12 Posts
Summary:	Is there any reason *not* to CFINCLUDE a DTD in Application.cfm? The general consensus is that Application.cfm and OnRequestEnd.cfm should contain only server-side code in the event you do not want or need the included content.
Title:	How to Change This Query from MS Access to MySQL Query
Date:	12/12/02      11 Posts
Summary:	After writing several queries that contain subqueries, a developer discovers that MySQL does not support subqueries. Even if MySQL *did* support subqueries, it's usually a better choice to replace subqueries with joins whenever possible. Sample subquery-to-join conversions are included.
Title:	MM Rich Text Editor - WAS: RE: Macromedia Contribute
Date:	12/12/02      30 Posts
Summary:	A question about the DRK2 Rich Text Editor inspires a look at the other options available to those seeking a good HTML or XHTML editor. ActivEdit, soEditor, EditLive!, CF XHTML Editor, and XHTML Editor Pro are discussed and compared for their respective value.

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Best of Talk (12/13/02)

Title:	CFMX Enterprise vs. CFMX for J2EE
Date:	12/13/02      25 Posts
Summary:	Which is best — CFMX Enterprise or CFMX J2EE/JRun? J2EE/JRun provides support for Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB), Java Message Service (JMS), and clustering with multiple application instances and session replication. But the added functionality comes at the expense of complex administration. Note: J2EE is priced per processor while Enterprise is priced per server.
Title:	IIS on WinXP Pro
Date:	12/13/02      33 Posts
Summary:	Although IIS on XP Pro does not support hosting of multiple websites, one can always run Apache. There's also an option to create virtual directories under the webroot to access development sites.
Title:	Session Variables (was Login/Password screen)
Date:	12/13/02      15 Posts
Summary:	Discover what can be done to secure your login process...like designing fail-close behavior to prevent the possibility of brute force password guessing. Unfortunately, counting login attempts does not provide adequate protection...after reaching its quota of unsuccessful logins, a client could refuse cookies and continue attempts to access the system.

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Best of Talk (Weekend, 12/14/02 - 12/15/02)

Title:	Persistent CFC's in the Client Scope
Date:	12/14/02      12 Posts
Summary:	Persisting CFC state can be a problem when using the client scope in anticipation of a clustered environment because the client scope cannot store complex variables. It would be better to store CFCs in the session scope. Beyond that, the ideal solution would be to use CFMX for J2EE on top of JRun 4; it offers support for clustering with J2EE sessions.
Title:	Page is Loading Message...
Date:	12/15/02      5 Posts
Summary:	Here's some code to display a "Please wait..." message for pages that are slow to load. However, for cross browser compatibility, replace document.all.PleaseWaitMessage.style.display='none'; with document.getElementById('PleaseWaitMessage').style.display='none'; in the Javascript code.
Title:	Pass "null" to a Java Object?
Date:	12/15/02      12 Posts
Summary:	In CFMX, you cannot pass a "null" value to the method of a Java object. Currently there is no way to work around this if your server does not allow you to add .class or .jar files. Feature request?

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Best of Talk (12/16/02)

Title:	For the Gurus: Question About State Management with CLIENT Scope
Date:	12/16/02      12 Posts
Summary:	If you're using client scope for long-term user data storage, you can create "session" cookies that expire when the browser closes. It's worth noting that "storing short-term data in memory is much, much cheaper, and perfectly safe if you write your code correctly." Use of the session scope also provides the ability to store complex variables.
Title:	Login/Password Screen
Date:	12/16/02      41 Posts
Summary:	This thread is packed with valuable information about authenticating a user. There is basic coverage of topics like server-level authentication, basic HTTP authentication, Digital Authentication, and non-CF file protection...definitely a "must-read!"
Title:	mySQL & CF
Date:	12/16/02      21 Posts
Summary:	What's the best way to handle checkboxes in mySQL? Use a tinyint data type and set the default to "0" to designate a "false" condition. But avoid using CFINSERT or CFUPDATE with a mySQL database since they tend to be unstable. And to be on the safe side, always use CFQUERYPARAM to bind SQL parameters.
Title:	Return of the SQL Wierdness ERROR Message
Date:	12/16/02      13 Posts
Summary:	A developer is advised to use the CFQUERYPARAM tag to get SQL to accept a direct reference to an array item. Another workaround would be to set a local variable equal to the array item and use that variable in the SQL instead.

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Best of Talk (12/17/02)

Title:	Incrementing a Variable
Date:	12/17/02      21 Posts
Summary:	How would you increment/decrement a counter based on where you're at in a directory structure? If you are initializing the counter in Application.cfm, use CFPARAM; otherwise, your counter will be reset for each page request. Use the session scope to persist the counter...but don't forget to lock. And, finally, use ListLen() on the directory path with "\" as a delimiter.
Title:	Is ColdFusion the Best Answer
Date:	12/17/02      16 Posts
Summary:	Will a ColdFusion 5.0/SQL Server platform support a highly trafficked site with several hundred multiple simultaneous requests? Yes, of course; just make sure the hardware can adequately support the load by providing 1) plenty of RAM (especially on the SQL box), 2) SCSI hard drives with ample storage, and 3) dual processor servers. Beyond that, you'll want to ensure that the application is well written with consideration for its load.
Title:	Verity vs. SQL Server 2000 Full-Text
Date:	12/17/02      13 Posts
Summary:	Which is best — Verity or SQL Server full text searching? While there seems to be no true "winner" here, it's interesting to note that both are capable of expanded linguistic searches. As for speed, Verity K2 may be faster, but SQL's full text searches can be cached.

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Best of Talk (12/18/02)

Title:	CreateDateTime function??
Date:	12/18/02      18 Posts
Summary:	How would you create a time interval that is based on weeks, days, hours, and minutes? Just convert weeks to days and store the interval in a date/time field. You could then use basic math to work with intervals as needed.
Title:	Generating PDFs in CF
Date:	12/18/02      12 Posts
Summary:	Need a free solution for creating PDFs on-the-fly? List suggestions include FOP and IText, which are both open source, Java-based applications that "read" XML/XSL to produce PDFs and other doc types. Links and code for a custom tag are included.
Title:	Issue: Change Row Color on Mouse Over in Netscape 4.7
Date:	12/18/02      13 Posts
Summary:	Netscape 4.7 provides weak support for DHTML and CSS. And most developers agree that it's hardly worth the effort to bother with eye candy for such a minute fraction of the browsing population. But if you're dead set on changing row colors on mouseover, you'll need to make each table row a layer, "then use document.write [in] an onmouseover event to rewrite the contents of the layer with a different color."
Title:	mySQL Equivalent of MS Access "Money" Fieldtype?
Date:	12/18/02      28 Posts
Summary:	What data type is best for storing money in mySQL? INTEGER can represent money as pennies to avoid rounding errors. Before inserting, convert formatted values to numeric values with Val(), then multiply by 100. Other options? DECIMAL, SMALLINT, and NUMERIC are also exact data types in mySQL. A word of caution: Check the manual; "outcome is often implementation-defined."
Title:	Need Tag for Dropdown and Input
Date:	12/18/02      11 Posts
Summary:	Looking for a "combo box" that lets you add a new value on-the-fly? This thread provides a couple of links along with some code suggestions to help you roll your own.

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Best of Talk (12/19/02)

Title:	CFerror
Date:	12/19/02      29 Posts
Summary:	You can specify a site-wide error handler in CF Admin to CFMAIL error diagnostics to the website administrator. You can also use CFERROR TYPE="exception" in Application.cfm to set the MAILTO attribute and reference it as Error.MailTo in the CFMAIL tag on your error page.
Title:	Is There a Better Way to Do This?
Date:	12/19/02      17 Posts
Summary:	What's an efficient way to match words stored in a dictionary table to a text block stored in another table? Use an inner join similar to this: FROM mytext INNER JOIN dictionary ON mytext.textblock LIKE '% '+dictionary.word+'%'
Title:	MX Support # 44972
Date:	12/19/02      14 Posts
Summary:	CFMX does not start after reboot on some XP Pro boxes. The workaround? "Set the cfmx service to be dependent on another service, so it starts later in the process, [by adding] a string value named 'DependOnService' with the value 'W3SVC' under: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ColdFusion MX Application Server. This will cause CFMX to start after IIS."
Title:	Setting the Focus to Form Select Box Item.
Date:	12/19/02      9 Posts
Summary:	Need to set a select's focus to the first option? Remembering that Javascript arrays start with zero, try: form.mySelect[0].selected = true; form.mySelect.focus();

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Best of Talk (12/20/02)

Title:	Another Disturbing MX Error
Date:	12/20/02      9 Posts
Summary:	If you are experiencing out-of-memory errors under MX, your problem may be related to the perm memory setting in JVM 1.3.1, especially if you are managing a large number of JARs or classes. Solution? Increase the perm memory setting or install JVM 1.4.1.
Title:	CFMX: Caching files
Date:	12/20/02      16 Posts
Summary:	You can enhance the performance on a production server by enabling "Trusted Cache" in CF Administrator. Just remember, you are telling CF to "trust" that the code has not changed, so it will not bother checking template timestamps for possible updates.
Title:	Macromedia Update on ColdFusion MX Stability Issues
Date:	12/20/02      1 Posts
Summary:	Heads up to Unix, Linux, and Apache users! Follow these step-by-step instructions to ease your MX instability problems: 1) install Updater 2, 2) apply Linux and Solaris connector patches, and 3) change settings in jrun.xml.
Title:	MAIL SERVER
Date:	12/20/02      7 Posts
Summary:	Need a cheap mail server? Here are several suggestions...Argosoft, qmail, Mail Enable, XMail...and a link to archived information on HoF.
Title:	Web Based CD key
Date:	12/20/02      14 Posts
Summary:	How would you limit access to a CD containing a PowerPoint presentation? Developers toss around a few ideas involving encryption, Flash, Director and VB scripts.
Title:	Web Based Collaboration System
Date:	12/20/02      8 Posts
Summary:	Looking for "an online system where members of a project can go and share documents, post calendar events, engage in discussions, [and] track issues...?" This thread provides several links.

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Best of Talk (Weekend, 12/21/02 - 12/22/02)

   WHERE ticketID IN (0<cfqueryparam 
      cfsqltype="CF_SQL_VARCHAR"
      value="#tickList#" list="Yes">)

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Best of Talk (12/23/02)

Title:	Brief Introduction
Date:	12/23/02      8 Posts
Summary:	After announcing his selection as Macromedia's new ColdFusion Community Manager, Christian Cantrell solicits ideas for useful additions to the MX Developer Resource Kit. (See Fusion Authority's profile on Cantrell in Issue 118.)
Title:	Page Breaks for Printing
Date:	12/23/02      9 Posts
Summary:	Looking for a way to generate page breaks for printing? You can use the page break style elements available in CSS2, like this: <p STYLE="page-break-before: always">, or generate PDFs on-the-fly.
Title:	Random SQL Statement
Date:	12/23/02      9 Posts
Summary:	Does SQL have a random function or should CF be used to pull a random record from the query recordset? Here are several suggestions, links to relevant articles, and code for a stored procedure.
Title:	Randomization of a CFQUERY
Date:	12/23/02      9 Posts
Summary:	Here's a UDF that returns a randomized query recordset. There's also a light debate about the extra overhead involved in writing code for modularity and reusability.
Title:	Regular Expression Question
Date:	12/23/02      10 Posts
Summary:	How would you return an email string that REFind matches? Try this: <cfset emailAddress=REReplaceNoCase(BlockOfText, "(|.*[^'\._a-z0-9-]+)(['\._a-z0-9-]+@[a-z0-9-]+ (\.[a-z0-9-]+)*\.(([a-z]{2,3})| (aero|coop|info|museum|name))).*","\2")>

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Best of Talk (Christmas, 12/24/02 - 12/25/02)

Title:	DateFormat in CFMX
Date:	12/24/02      15 Posts
Summary:	JVM 1.4.1 generates a date-related bug. To work around it, convert the date string to a date object, like this: #DateFormat(parseDateTime ('Tuesday, 17 December 2002 05:21:09 PM EST'))#
Title:	How to Do This Without the Subselect?
Date:	12/24/02      21 Posts
Summary:	Here's an example of how to convert a query that uses NOT IN with a subquery to a query that uses LEFT JOIN with a NOT NULL predicate. You will also find helpful strategies for building queries and flattening queries containing subqueries.
Title:	CFMX / JVM
Date:	12/25/02      20 Posts
Summary:	Does Macromedia recommend a specific JVM for best performance? While there is no official recommendation, upgrading the IBM JVM 1.3.1, which ships with the CFMX standalone, will definitely boost performance. List respondents report good luck with JRE 1.4.0_02 and JRocket, but warn that there are date issues with 1.4.1.

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Best of Talk (12/26/02)

Title:	HostMySite.com
Date:	12/26/02      4 Posts
Summary:	HostMySite.com gets a "thumbs up" for CFMX service in dedicated and shared hosting environments.
Title:	Linking CF and Flash
Date:	12/26/02      27 Posts
Summary:	Several developers ask Macromedia to replace ColdFusion tags that use Java applets, like CFGRID and CFTREE, with tags that use Flash components. They also request XHTML2 support and a developer-friendly Flash UI. This thread also provides information about how you might integrate CF and Flash based on their respective strengths.
Title:	New User
Date:	12/26/02      30 Posts
Summary:	Newbie advice: A search query using LIKE '%#searchstring#%' will return *all* rows if the search string is empty. To prevent that, scope all variables and test the search string for a 'no value' condition, using IsDefined() and Len(), before running the query. There is also some discussion about date formats and database default values.

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Best of Talk (12/27/02)

Title:	Best Way to Handle Checkboxes with Insert Query?
Date:	12/27/02      14 Posts
Summary:	The simplest way to work around the possibility of a nonexistent checkbox form variable is to add <CFPARAM NAME="form.your_checkbox_var" TYPE="boolean" DEFAULT="false"> to the top of the action page. You could also test for a 'no value' condition within your query by using IsDefined(). As always, remember to protect your SQL by referencing parameters within the CFQUERYPARAM tag.
Title:	Can I Put LIKE '%#form.SearchText#%' into a CFQUERYPARAM?
Date:	12/27/02      7 Posts
Summary:	Need to use LIKE with CFQUERYPARAM to accommodate different database platforms? Try this: WHERE table.fieldname LIKE <CFQUERYPARAM CFSQLTYPE="CF_SQL_VARCHAR" VALUE="%#form.searchtext#%">
Title:	Padding Zeros
Date:	12/27/02      13 Posts
Summary:	Use NumberFormat(), like this: NumberFormat(mynumber,"0000000"), to create a standard length by left-padding zeros.

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Best of Talk (Weekend, 12/28/02 - 12/29/02)

Title:	Displaying *.swf Files
Date:	12/28/02      8 Posts
Summary:	If you're looking for a way to display a SWF file in CFCHART, you will find a helpful code block here that uses both CFOBJECT and EMBED tags for cross-browser compatibility. Tips for reducing file size are included.
Title:	Dynamically Created Form Input Names
Date:	12/29/02      6 Posts
Summary:	Try this on your action page to get the names of dynamic form fields: <cfloop index="f" list="#form.fieldnames#"> #f# = #form[f]#<br> </cfloop> To concatenate two form fields, do this: #FORM[FORM.field1& FORM.field2]#.
Title:	Excel as a Vehicle to Collect and Write Back Data to a CF-App
Date:	12/29/02      4 Posts
Summary:	Here are a handful of suggestions for sending the user a populated Excel form to be edited then updated in Access. Some of the technologies you might use to do this are: XML, HTML/CSV, VBA, and WDDX. A sample block of code is included.

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Best of Talk (12/30/02)

Title:	ColdFusion forum (OPEN SOURCE?)
Date:	12/30/02      23 Posts
Summary:	Can't find the perfect online forum application? Hop on over to SourceForge to contribute your skills and ideas to a multi-developer project (smb)...set up with just that goal in mind. Simple Message Board (SMB), an open source BBS written in CF, provides the foundation.
Title:	Couple of Somewhat OT Learning Questions
Date:	12/30/02      15 Posts
Summary:	Would your system perform better with an upgrade to CPU or RAM? To find out, first analyze the performance monitor metrics to see how your system performs under load. Read error logs and look for bottlenecks generated by bad code. Note that while you cannot co-mingle CF and PHP on a page, you can run CF and PHP on the same server. PHP API is recommended.
Title:	Root Template Directory Has Not Been Specified
Date:	12/30/02      4 Posts
Summary:	If the template path in your CFINCLUDE is set up like this: template = "/somesubdirectory/somefile.cfm," CF won't be able to find the base path. Solution? Drop the leading "/" or add ".." instead.
Title:	War Againest Loneliness
Date:	12/30/02      14 Posts
Summary:	Did CF-Talk just get hit with the Yaha email virus? Not really. Attachments are not accepted by CF-Talk for an obviously good reason, so code has been written to turn attached data into inline text. This should serve as a wake-up call to install and maintain a good virus protection system!

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Best of Talk (12/31/02)

Title:	Caller Problem
Date:	12/31/02      Posts
Summary:	Looking for a way to make a custom tag's query recordset available within other custom tags? This thread contains a solid discussion about how custom tags should be used and provides several code snippets for you to try out.
Title:	INPUT = FILE
Date:	12/31/02      9 Posts
Summary:	Need to autofill a text box with the complete filepath of a "browsed" file selection? Try this IE-only solution: <input type="file" name="nameFile" style="display:none;" onchange="this.form.nameText.value=this.value"> <input type="button" name="nameButton" value="Browse" onclick="this.form.nameFile.click()"> <input type="text" size="70" name="nameText">
Title:	Verify that Updater 2 Has Been Applied
Date:	12/31/02      6 Posts
Summary:	To verify whether or not you've installed CFMX Updater 2, open CF Administrator and click on "Version Information" at the top. If the version number is 6,0,0,55693, you *have* indeed installed Updater 2!

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Best of Talk (1/1/03)

Title:	Call to the Regex Ninja Clan
Date:	01/01/03      5 Posts
Summary:	Use rereplacenocase(text, '</?(p|font|textformat)[^>]*>', 'all') to remove FONT, P, and TEXTFORMAT tags from your text.
Title:	CFC Question
Date:	01/01/03      5 Posts
Summary:	How would you output a structure returned by a CFC? <cfscript> for(key in yourStruct) WriteOutput(key & ":" & yourStruct[key]); </cfscript>
Title:	Happy New Year
Date:	01/01/03      16 Posts
Summary:	Amid a flood of "Happy New Year" wishes, the developer of www.firstnight.org shares his code for setting a stylesheet based on user preference.
Title:	User Name/Password Concepts
Date:	01/01/03      11 Posts
Summary:	Need some pointers on website security? Here's a good discussion about several precautionary measures you can take to protect your site...like setting up strong password requirements, using CFQUERYPARAM and CFPROCPARAM, disabling multiple logins for the same user, and using Digital Authentication.

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Best of Talk (1/2/03)

Title:	CFScript Help
Date:	01/02/03      8 Posts
Summary:	Why does this script timeout? <cfscript> while (len(#ref# LT 5)) { insert('0','#ref#',0); } </cfscript> Although parentheses are incorrectly placed and pound signs are unnecessary, the real problem stems from the fact that ref is not set equal to the string returned by insert(), so this code generates an endless loop. Try this instead: <cfscript> while (len(ref) LT 5) { ref = insert('0',ref,0); } </cfscript>
Title:	Page Context
Date:	01/02/03      5 Posts
Summary:	Developers brainstorm about storing page variables that are loaded once, but used often.
Title:	Tutorials
Date:	01/02/03      8 Posts
Summary:	Here are several links to ColdFusion tutorials for beginning developers.

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Best of Talk (1/3/03)

Title:	IsAuthenticated() and IsAuthorized()
Date:	01/03/03      12 Posts
Summary:	Good news! CFMX has done away with advanced security and replaced it with roles-based security, touted as "a lot more flexible, easier to work with and more reliable than the [a]dvanced security model." Resources provided.
Title:	Newbie School of Hard Knocks (More Ignorant Questions)
Date:	01/03/03      8 Posts
Summary:	Although you can always check your database for duplicates before inserting a record, it would be better to design your database to *prevent* duplicates by creating an index on unique fields.
Title:	Outputing Part of Memo Field
Date:	01/03/03      13 Posts
Summary:	Need to pull leading memo text to use as a teaser? Try #REReplace(Left(String,150),"^(.* ).*","\1")# or the UDF included in this thread.
Title:	Pre-Populating a "file" Form Field
Date:	01/03/03      16 Posts
Summary:	Is there any way to prefill a form field of INPUT TYPE="file" when the form is redisplayed for validation reasons? No, this is not possible. In fact, it was designed that way for security reasons.

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Best of Talk (Weekend, 1/4/03 - 1/5/03)

Title:	CFMXJ2ee advantages over CFMX Standalone
Date:	01/04/03      6 Posts
Summary:	If you are using CFMX for J2EE on a multi-processor system, you can set up multiple server instances (JRun processes or JVMs) to safely isolate multiple CFMX sites. This technical overview makes an excellent comparison between CFMX for J2EE and the CFMX Standalone ...a definite "must read."
Title:	How Do I Get the Domain Name Extracted from the URL of a Request...
Date:	01/04/03      2 Posts
Summary:	You can extract the domain name from a url by accessing CGI.SERVER_NAME or CGI.HTTP_HOST. The following function also works: <cfscript> function getDomainName() { return getPageContext().getRequest().getServerName(); } </cfscript>
Related:	How Do I Get the Domain Name Extracted from the URL of a Requeste...
Title:	CFLOGIN Problems
Date:	01/05/03      5 Posts
Summary:	Use CFLOGIN in Application.cfm to associate login credentials with each page request. If a user's login credentials have been cached, the login is bypassed. Otherwise, it executes.

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