Isaac Dealey

I must admit to having been excited at the prospect of the Pet Market frameworks project when Simon proposed it to us at the Fusebox & Frameworks Conference in September. I once tried to do something similar by creating a small blog application using the three popular frameworks that I was aware of at the time (Fusebox 3-4 and Mach-II) and the onTap framework. Unfortunately I did all the work myself and didn't have a great venue like the ColdFusion Developer's Journal to publish the results. In the end I think my efforts at a useful comparison of frameworks fell short of what I'd ... (more)

Leveraging JDBC or Just Fetching Coffee?

Using JDBC metadata, it is now possible to analyze databases and automate database tasks with ColdFusion MX in ways that were problematic or at best difficult in the past. Although Java can be rather intimidating, you don't need to be a Java expert (or a database expert) to use these tools. "Metadata" is all the information about how your data is stored (such as table names, column names,... (more)

Playing With(in) the Rules

In a book entitled Finite and Infinite Games in 1986, James P. Carse wrote "Finite players play within the rules, infinite players play with the rules." We play finite games every day, from checkers and chess to Yatzee and Monopoly. Finite games have a familiar pattern: a beginning, a middle, and an end; a winner and a loser. A finite game is easy to play because it has a limited set of f... (more)

CFDJ Feature — Strip Tease

I don't like browser-based WYSIWYG editors. There are a reasonably large number of them and several of the recent versions are even cross-browser-compatible with Mozilla and even some less popular browsers (although Safari continues to be problematic). The technical issues surrounding the implementation of WYSIWYG editors aren't the reason I don't like them, in spite of continuing problem... (more)