Momentous Change is Here. But Don't Panic! Deep Down, It's All ColdFusion.

by Judith Dinowitz

I attended the Allaire Developer's Conference in Boston last month and found myself both happy and bewildered. Happy because there are signs that Allaire as a company is not stagnating. It is pushing forward with new products, new tools, and a new business strategy, all based on one platform: Allaire Spectra.

This is very positive. A company that relies on its old tools and doesn't move forward, either in improving them or by taking them in a new direction, is a company that cannot long hold the ground it has gained. By coming out with Spectra, Allaire is showing that as a company, it is still ahead of the curve.

Another great reason to be happy: You folks. The community. Over 1,000 people attended the conference–a mix of developers and business people of varying skill in ColdFusion programming with one thing in common. Everyone there, from the newest ColdFusion developer to the well-known names (people such as Steve Nelson, Charlie Arehart, Gerry Libertelli, Anthony Krinsky, Steve Drucker, and our own Michael Dinowitz) had an interest and a love for ColdFusion the programming language, and the development platform. It was fun to hang out with the CF crowd, to meet people, to attend the workshops, and to hear all the latest things the people from Allaire are planning.

So why the bewilderment? Because, like most developers (and many of the people at the Allaire Conference), I am both excited by Spectra and confused as to how to utilize it. It's got concepts that are new to ColdFusion, such as some of the object-oriented ideas that are common to languages like Java and Javascript. It's also got a funky interface called a "webtop" that's supposed to make creating Spectra objects, handlers and methods easier. But the complexity of the Spectra platform and the interface itself are new and confusing, and I can see a moderate to steep learning curve ahead for developers starting on Spectra (depending on their level of Coldfusion knowledge).

(One way to introduce yourself to Spectra: Allaire is running free Spectra seminars and cyberseminars. Sign up for one and have fun attending–it will at least introduce you to the basic concepts.)

Towards the end of the conference, after attending workshops on Spectra and talking both with people at Allaire and outside developers, I came to a realization that brought this whole ColdFusion/Spectra thing into focus for me. Spectra may look and sound like something new, but it was created from and with ColdFusion code. It's really a set of packets of ColdFusion code in a new GUI environment. The webtop is like the hood of a car that hides the wires and spark plugs of the Spectra engine--a toolset of ColdFusion apps and modules for us CF junkies to fool around with and learn. And make use of.

So where does Fusion Authority fit into all of this? As Editor of Fusion Authority, it's my job to make ColdFusion and Spectra useful and understandable to the ColdFusion community. Fusion Authority is a community center, a sounding board, and the source of (hopefully) valuable, practical articles about ColdFusion in all its ramifications. Some of our coming features: a CF calendar of events and user group meetings, a news section with room for press releases and our Fusion Authority News Watch series, a "Developer's Directory" and, of course, CF articles. We are open to contributions from the ColdFusion community, and it is that community that we aim to serve. So, as editors, Michael, Malkah and I are asking you, the community we consider ourselves a part of, for feedback and advice. Let us know what you like, and what you don't like. We aim to please.

• Subscribe
• RSS

• Editorial
• Specials
• Community
• News
• Tech and Tags
• Views
• Reviews
• Techniques
• Security
• Best of ColdFusion Talk
• Knowledge Base
• Blog Watch

• Tipical Charlie