Dave Carabetta: My Thoughts - Microsoft

How To Build RIAs...Successfully

Mon, 20 Apr 2009 18:00:00 -0400

As their home page says, Forrester Research is a technology and market research company that provides pragmatic advice to global leaders in business and technology. Anybody who works in our industry has heard of Forrester just like they would have heard of their competitors such as Gartner. They are fiercely independent in their case studies and truly have a hand in boosting -- or busting -- trends. Forrester has been trying to understand the rich Internet applications (RIAs) design and development process. While many firms like Cynergy have been doing this sort of development for so long that it seems like it's old hat, the fact of the matter is that building real applications with technologies like Adobe Flex, Adobe AIR, Microsoft Silverlight, and Microsoft WPF is still pretty new and lots of companies are trying to get their heads around how to set up a successful workflow. After a lot of research, Forrester essentially concluded that Cynergy's approach -- and what we have learned by approaching our projects this way -- is the template from which other firms should be modeling their workflows, and Dave Wolf, Cynergy's vice president has blogged a nice summary with a link to a free copy of the report (which usually goes for $750). Now, I want to be very careful with the messaging here. I still (barely) maintain a separate blog from Cynergy's blogs because I don't want to be a shill for everything we do -- at least, not on my blog. :) That said, one thing I've learned in the time I've been at Cynergy is just how hard it is to set up a repeatable workflow for designing and developing successful RIAs. And by "successful RIAs" I mean real, enterprise-level applications upon which you can build your business. Trust me, if this workflow were that easy, a lot more people would be doing it, and it's one thing to do something once but another thing entirely to continually "rinse and repeat" it successfully. I encourage you to check out the report and compare how we're building RIAs with how you're building them (or would like to). At 7 pages, it won't take more than 15-20 minutes of your time but it could provide insights into a process that will save you hundreds of hours down the line. Oh yeah, and if you'd like to see the output of having a sound process, check out CynergyTV for some examples of real apps built to solve real business needs.

CynergyTV: Flex, Silverlight And Why I've Disappeared

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 16:21:00 -0400

So why have I been so quiet for pretty much the last year outside of some token posts? Well, our re-launched CynergyTV experience holds the reason, and I'm glad I can finally talk about it. So Dave, you mean you've spent the last year re-building CynergyTV? Nope, not quite. That was done by an extremely talented team here at Cynergy that worked extremely hard to not only refresh the user experience but deliver the content in professional audio/video quality supported by lots of hardware and software upgrades in our data center. Incidentally, when I say team, I mean it in the truest sense of the word -- our president, Carson Hager, recognizing that we could and should present our accomplishments better and allowing guys to stop being billable in order to get this done; our Marketing group spending hours in the recording studio choreographing the audio/video; our User Experience group iterating through lots of potential look and feel options until it was nailed; our Rich Interface team implementing the user experience in Adobe Flex; and finally, our Enterprise Services and Network Support teams building out the services tier to support the streaming video content (not a trivial task as I've come to learn), notifying the appropriate people when the Let's Talk form is submitted, and then setting up the appropriate infrastructure to host it all in our data center. If that sounds like a lot of work, that's because it was -- and it was well worth the investment. So back to my opening question as to why I've been so quiet. Well, if you head over to CynergyTV (after reading this post, of course), you'll see that one of the showcases is for an application we built called Quickcomm Enterprise, a telecom expense management (TEM) tool for one of our clients, Quickcomm. It is this application that has basically been most of the last year of my life. As the Technical Lead on the project (which is a combination senior application architect and project manager here at Cynergy), I have spent over 1,600 hours working with my team here at Cynergy and the team at Quickcomm to deliver the most disruptive TEM solution on the market and I'm extraordinarily proud and privileged to have worked with both teams. Since the completion of that project a short while back, I have since made the transition for being a Technical Lead to Business Development -- yes, the dreaded "sales" guy. I was ready for a new challenge beyond coding and the growth opportunities here at Cynergy made this transition both seamless and a no-brainer. So now I get to put on my sales hat: If you're interested in speaking with us about an idea you have or have an existing application you want re-invented to provide a better user experience, drop us a line and we're happy to speak with you further. And of course, if you have any feedback at all about the re-launched CynergyTV, feel free to leave a comment and I'll make sure it reaches the right people immediately. Lastly, if you're a developer who wants to work with a phenomenally talented team that continually delivers cutting edge applications, we'd love to speak with you about career opportunities at Cynergy. It's a great time to be building RIAs and we'd love for you to be a part of it!

Adobe Announces Searchable SWF Collaboration With Google And Yahoo!

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 09:50:00 -0400

One reason (OK, there are many, I admit) why this blog has gone bare lately is because I try not to post announcements that every other similar blog in the world has already announced. It's a waste of my time and being one of 2,000 posts on the same exact subject doesn't tend to interest me (anymore). However, today's announcement by Adobe that they are working with Google and Yahoo! to enhance the search capabilities of SWF files (Adobe Flash and Adobe Flex applications in case you don't know what a SWF file is) is a long overdue breakthrough for the rich Internet application (RIA) trend, and is yet another validation of technologies such as Adobe Flex and Microsoft Silverlight for delivering public-facing, web-based applications. Let's get one thing right out there though: Not all RIAs should be searchable by search engines. Many (most?) RIAs are not and should not be simple ports of HTML-based web sites over to these newer technologies. That would be a waste of time and money. RIAs really excel for true web-based application development -- think applications like Picnik, an online photo editor. There isn't any real value in Google being able to index the photo editing application itself -- that's sort of like indexing Microsoft Word. However, an Adobe Flex-based RIA that captures the latest new stories and visualizes them -- i.e., displaying the titles in little bubbles and having more popular stories have larger bubbles -- is right in the wheelhouse of the utility of this announcement. The ability for Google and Yahoo! to be able to crawl the SWF itself for the content rather than having to expose the raw RSS feed, XML file, or whatever the source is incredibly valuable. A social network RIA that allows search engines to index public profiles -- think LinkedIn -- is yet another example of where the convergence of the sticky user experience Flex provides and the search engine power of Google and Yahoo! is extremely powerful. Lastly, and this is a lesser point yet one I still wish to make, I've been to trade shows where AJAX-focused companies tout their products. Interestingly, I invariably hear them say as part of their pitch that one of the big distinctions between AJAX applications and Adobe Flex or Microsoft Silverlight applications is that AJAX apps can be searched by the major search engines. Well, the competitive advantage is leveled today. I certainly am one who is curious to see how Adobe's announcement plays out in reality (name the last technical solution you saw that worked flawlessly on the first try), but hopefully the AJAX vs. Flex/Silverlight debate can start to move back to what really matters: the user experience.

Why Silverlight Is A Phenomenally Important Announcement For Adobe Flex

Thu, 19 Apr 2007 12:15:00 -0400

There's been a big discussion over the last few days across mailing lists and blogs about the impact of Microsoft's Silverlight announcement. The loyalists from both the Microsoft and the Adobe developer camps have come out of their respective wood works to debate Silverlight's merit vis-a-vis Flex. What's interesting to me about this debate is that, once again, with the introduction of a new, potentially disruptive technology, it always winds up being an "either/or" discussion rather than an "and" discussion. That is, the debate can usually be distilled down to why one would use technology X rather than technology Y when the discussion should really be how one can use both technology X and technology Y. As a real-world example, simply replace "technology X" with "Adobe Flex" and replace "technology Y" with "AJAX" in the previous example and do a simple internet search. I mean, I thought that we, as developers, were in the business of delivering the best product to our employer/customer/client rather than a product that uses a specific technology simply because that's their personal preference? Did I miss something? Dave Wolf, Vice President of Consulting at my employer, Cynergy Systems, wrote an excellent blog entry this morning entitled Wake up and see the Silverlight, which discusses just how phenomenally important Microsoft's Silverlight announcement is to the Rich Internet Application (RIA) industry. As he notes:

...[T]his week's news that Microsoft has officially named Sparkle - WPF/E as Silverlight and that it is clearly and finally on its way to market truly is the tipping point that establishes that RIA's are real, RIA's are the future and RIA's will shape the way we are going to be developing software for some time to come. Microsoft just justified and legitimized RIA. That is HUGE.

Dave hits the nail on the head in his entry, and I won't try and re-hash it here, as I wouldn't be able to do it justice. However, my point is that this isn't about how Silverlight is going to squash Flex, or vice versa. This is about how the RIA industry just became the focal point for future development, and that's an incredibly important validation of Adobe Flex and, by extension, Apollo. By recognizing that the equivalent of the Adobe Flash Player is the future of delivering engaging web applications, Microsoft validated the Player as that delivery platform. Hence, they built their own. Did Microsoft declare that Adobe is officially in their cross-hairs? Absolutely. Is the first release of Silverlight going to knock the snot out of Adobe Flex? Absolutely not. But let's be honest here -- for anybody that used either Flex 1.0 or Flex 1.5, those initial releases left a lot to be desired themselves, so let's not be so quick to bash Silverlight as a failure waiting to happen. It'll likely have its warts, much the same as Flex 1.x did. But, in true Microsoft form, once they get that second or third release out and their development community on board, the RIA space is going to have at least two major players from which developers will be able to deliver rich, engaging applications. I don't know about you, but I couldn't be more excited! Have a look at Dave's entry to get a more thorough analysis of the impact of the Silverlight announcement. Don't worry Adobe fans, Flex isn't going anywhere. In fact, I think it got just a whole lot stronger!

Important Adobe Flash Player 9 Security Update Released

Tue, 14 Nov 2006 17:20:00 -0400

This Security Bulletin was just posted to the Adobe site regarding a security exploit in the Flash Player. From the bulletin:

Adobe has provided an update to resolve vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player. These vulnerabilities would allow remote attackers to modify HTTP headers of client requests and conduct HTTP Request Splitting attacks. The flexibility of the attack varies depending on the type of web browser being used.

Apparently, Flash Player 7, 8, and 9 are all affected, but there is only an update available for version 9 at the moment. I should also note that the fix has been marked as "Important," which is one step below their highest severity level of "Critical," so definitely look into upgrading if possible. For any Flash or Flex developers who rely on the Debug version of the player for development, Adobe unfortunately makes it hard to find the updated Players on their site, so here you go.

What's Your Ideal Source Control Setup?

Wed, 06 Sep 2006 13:00:00 -0400

Recently, I've been wrestling with the task of migrating our current source control solution from Microsoft® Visual SourceSafe® over to Subversion. Now, I know there are many of you who are cringing at the mere mention of using VSS. However, until recently, it has been an extremely stable solution for our source control needs. And hey, at least we have a source control solution, right?! Our needs are changing though, and our team is clearly outgrowing the feature set that SourceSafe provides. From directory-level branching to better binary file compression and storage to concurrent editing, Subversion clearly fulfills our needs...and it's free to boot. I keep my personal files in a Subversion repository at home, so I'm familiar with it when working on one machine. However, now I need to set it up for a couple of our departments (we got some non-IT departments into version control!) and I'm trying to figure out the best way to do it. The requirements are fairly straightforward:

All access will be internal. In fact, no public access will be granted to anybody. However, not all users will have an account on the repository's server.
Must be able to fully migrate the existing VSS repository to Subversion.
Must be able to support roughly 15-20 users concurrently accessing the repository. There may be more user than that overall, but that's the targeted number of actual concurrent use.
Must be able to lock down certain projects such that users must authenticate themselves when trying to access the files.

OK, now that the requirements have been stated, I need your help figuring out the best approach. First and foremost, where to physically put the repository. We have a shiny new development box (running Red Hat Linux 4.0) for our team with tons and tons of free space. I was thinking about creating a partition there dedicated to housing the repository. At the same time, I'm hesitant to put the repository on the same box as where most of the development is going to be taking place (we all have our own JRun/ColdFusion instances on this box, so we're separate, but sharing the same overall resources). I just don't trust all the banging that the box will be taking to house our core file repository, even though we'll be taking proper backups on a nightly basis. Should I phsyically separate the repository from the dev box? With regard to the network protocol, from my research, it seems like the best setup is to install Apache on the server and manage the file access and user autentication using the mod_dav_svn module. However, this feels like overkill to an extent. I have the excellent book Pragmatic Version Control using Subversion 2nd Ed. by Mike Mason (and published by Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt of Pragmatic Programmer fame), so I'm aware of the pros and cons of each of the protocol options (svnsserve, svnserve+ssh, and Apache). However, I'm looking for other real-world opinions on each, based on the stated requirements. With regard to migrating the existing VSS repository, this is a biggie. The problem I have with a lot of the current presentations about using Subversion is that they all assume that you're starting with a clean slate. However, we have literally years worth of comments, tags, labels, etc., that are an absolute "must keep." To that end, I have been monitoring the open source project Vss2Svn with the hopes of using their solution for migrating our repository. However, it doesn't look quite ready for prime time just yet. Has anybody succesfully used it by chance? I also found a solution from Polarion called Subversion Pro that looks to be free for at least the migration aspects of the product. Has anybody used this one? Lastly, are there any tips on the best way to set up authorization/authentication? Anything else I'm overlooking? We're currently using the amazing FogBugz project management system from Fog Creek software (it integrates with virtually all source code management systems, which is great), so we don't need things like Trac. Thanks for any insights.

For Tech Job Seekers and Employers, Joel Spolsky's New Site Is A Great Idea

Tue, 05 Sep 2006 17:40:00 -0400

I've mentioned before that I'm a big fan of Joel Spolsky. He just "gets" how to run a technology company and treat his Fog Creek employees. Well, he has just set up a new Jobs site that essentially aims to take the annoying marketing and recruiting out of job hunting, while providing high-quality tech listings. Are you tired of vague job listings that ask if you want to work for a "well established, leading online company," but get no more information than that until you talk with a recruiter? Well, apparently, so is Joel (and me too, for that matter). He's not aiming for it to supplant the gi-normous job boards like Monster or HotJobs. Rather, his goal is to keep it as a niche site where you can get the real job details for a given position without any hassle. Unique features include:

For candidates, the site is entirely free, including not having to register for anything.
Listings expire after 3 weeks. As he notes, most candidates don't apply for jobs that have been posted for longer than that.
All job posts must disclose the company at which the position is located. No "Company Confidential" listings are allowed. Since there are no recruiters involved, you can do all the research you want for a position without being hassled.
For a small $350 fee, an employer can post listings on the site. In comparison to the 15%-20% of base salary that recruiting fees that many recruiters charge employers for placing a candidate, this is chump change.
He offers his standard 90-day money back guarantee. If you don't find anybody to fill the position, hire the wrong candidate, if they quit just after starting, etc., you get your $350 back unquestioned. (Charities and non-profits can get in touch with their customer support reps about reduced fees.)
The job posting form contains checkboxes for answering each of the 12 questions of the Joel Test, which is his measure of the quality of a software team. This is a non-marketing way to really gauge the type of team you might be joining.

Since this is an experiment on his part, you'll note that there is no search functionality or saved profiles or anything beyond the basic listings. (This might expand if the site proves to be successful.) However, from Google to Six Apart to BEA to MySQL, there are a number of big-name company jobs currently listed, along with a lot of other smaller companies who I have seen are doing some great work. I'm not sure how the site will hold up, if only because recruiters will always find a way to post seemingly legitimate job listings, and there doesn't seem to be a screening process for who is posting the job. That being said, I love the idea of side-stepping recruiters with no tech background who are seemingly the gatekeepers to a lot of great jobs. Here's Joel's official announcement.

A New Week, A New ColdFusion 8 Wishlist

Mon, 31 Jul 2006 00:10:00 -0400

OK, so at Damon's request, I'm going to submit my ColdFusion 8, aka Scorpio, wishlist for feedback. Contrary to Jared's sentiments, I think this is the best time for the ColdFusion community to air its multitude of bug/enhancement/feature requests. Sure, some (lots, even) of the suggestions might be off-base and out of ColdFusion'sy intended scope, but I believe it's more important that we have people passionate enough to think and contribute their thoughts rather than be chastised for their efforts. And you know what? You never know what seemingly crazy idea could evolve into something useful. Also, as ColdFusion matures, it not only competes with other technologies, but it competes with its own previous version (much like Windows XP adoption has been slower than anticipated due to existing satisfaction with Windows 2000). Therefore, it's increasingly important to hit more "home runs" with each new major release. I've broken my list down into three major areas: Enterprise (Platform-level), Developer-level, and Language-level. Further, not every wish below are ones that I'd personally like to see, but I believe they're all worth discussing at some level. Lastly, they are in no particular order. I know it's a really long list, but a major release shouldn't just be about fixes; it needs to innovate and that's what I think certain items below allow the user to do. Hence the long, detailed list with lot of explanatory text for each point. Enterprise (Platform-level)

Serializable CFCs: Come on, it's time to leap that last technical hurdle (I think it was either WebSphere or WebLogic that was the obstacle to getting this in CF 7) and make my cluster life easier. I'm sick of my workaround for a basic enterprise feature.
Allow logging to be done to one location rather than forcing to cfusion/logs: This one's important to me as a developer who works in a clustered environment. Being forced to write to the cfusion/logs directory is annoying because I then have to guess which server just served a request by looking at the timestamps. As you add more instances to the cluster, the more of a hassle this becomes.
Better integration with Word and Excel file formats: Regardless of how you feel about Microsoft, their format is the de facto standard in virtually all enterprise organizations. Writing Word and Excel documents (including charts, etc.) would be immensely helpful. We use a product called e.Spreadsheet by Actuate for our XLS reporting needs, and it's a pure Java solution that supports all but 2 extremely obscure Excels features. It has matrices, charting, pivot tables, in addition to formulas. So this is definitely technically possible to accomplish and could be a very compelling feature for an enterprise.
Better management of whitespace: I've never understood why ColdFusion stinks with whitespace suppression. On the one hand I recognize the argument that it can be tricky to determine what is and is not intended whitespace, but other languages don't have this problem, so clearly this must be solvable. We use (sort of) Empirix's e-Test Suite for our functional and load testing needs. However, cleaning up whitespace technically causes regression test failures. Now, I'm not saying this should be solved because one product has problems with it, but I just don't see any need to keep whitespace around in the generate HTML source.
Upgrade Web Services Engine to Axis2: Of all the wishlists I've seen, I have to say I'm a bit surprised I didn't see more in the way of web services enhancements. Axis2 supports REST, which I personally prefer to SOAP, as it's unbelievably easier to work with. Also, it has better support for true web services security, which is a solution I desperately need. Appending a user name and password to the WSDL URL doesn't cut it. Introduce formal features for both of those and I'm a much happier person.
LiveCycle Integration: I'm still getting a feel for what exactly LiveCycle does and doesn't do, but I would wager that most organizations have some sort of document flow process that could stand to be better managed. LiveCycle, from what I can tell, does this. I'd love to be able to integrate an enterprise-level document flow system into my company's practices, and the ease with which CF could potentially offer that is intriguing. I'm still thinking through this one a bit though.
Better search capabilities for clustered environments: OK, I know that Tom Jordahl and others worked their tails off on upgrading the Verity engine for the CF 7 release, and the new features look incredible. But I can't use them because I'm in a clustered environment and there are no provisions for properly managing the collections across the servers (I think it's licensing or something). I like searching. I need searching. I can't use what's currently there, and I'd prefer to stay away from a database-centric solution or pay $100,000+ for a modest solution.
Essentially, Fusion Reactor or SeeFusion: This one I know is being worked on because Adobe's been pretty open about it, but it really needs to be a home run. Lack of metrics and insight into CF instances are the bane of many developers' lives. I hope that Adobe follows Integral's lead by providing incredibly helpful visual indications and graphs so that I can get a feel for what's going on by literally glancing at my monitor.
Plug-in based architecture to turn off Verity, Flash Forms, etc. OK, let's face it -- lots of deployments don't use certain "add-ons" to ColdFusion, such as Verity, Flash Forms, and Reporting. Whether it be the inadequacy of the existing feature set or the reliance on a previously-existing infrastructure, the aforementioned features are loaded on each and every re-boot of the server instance, taking up valuable resources. I'd like the ability to turn on and off (via the CF Administrator or Admin API) pieces of the CF runtime. The floodgates were opened when Event Gateways were allowed to be turned on and off, so it should be technically possible to achieve. I'd like to see this extended to the other plug-gable features so that I can reduce the memory footprint. I think hosting providers in particular would use this feature.
Full admin API hooks to everything CF Administrator offers: The CF Admin API that shipped with CF 7 was great, but I'd like to see a one-for-one match in the offered features. This would be immensely convenient for vendors who want to package up an application but provide their own interface to the configuration settings.
Role-based CF Administrator: I think this one is long overdue. Your security is only as strong as its weakest link. If one were to get the password to a CF Administrator, there's way too much that can be done by default. A basic roles-based login enhancement so that certain areas (i.e., datasources) can be locked down while other less-hurtful settings (i.e., debugging settings) can be accessed by anybody would be incredibly useful.
Enhance the report engine: It's too easy to point out the various bugs that people have reported with regard to the Reporting engine in CF 7. It was a first attempt, and it was to be expected that there would be problems. However, the "intro period" is over. I'd like to see a robust reporting engine implemented that will allow me to include complex charts and graphs and page breaks.
64-bit and JDK 1.5 support: Damon already posted in one of my previous entries that Scorpio has JDK 1.5 support, but it's not out yet so I'm listing it! ;) As for 64-bit support, I'd like to see a pure 64-bit kit available so that I can take advantage of the larger per-instance memory spaces that 64-bit platforms allow.
.NET Runtime: This one is sure to draw the ire of many, and still others will make the point that "New Atlanta does this with BlueDragon already, so why waste our time." Here's the thing though. It has been reported recently that .NET has surpassed Java as the development platform of choice. I personally don't think that's accurate at all, but there's no denying that .NET has made significant inroads. Why not offer the ability to deploy on both of the major enterprise platforms? It can only increase ColdFusion's exposure while opening up new sales channels for the product.

Developer-level

CFDoc: This is my second biggest enhancement request for CFCs (serializing them being my biggest). Documentation is so critical to any project. But this documentation doesn't always have to be a Word document with use cases and "business-speak." Just as important is the API documentation, and let's face it, the hint attribute just doesn't cut it. I'd like to see a proper Javadoc/ASDoc implementation for ColdFusion so that I'm not confined to just a phrase or two. If you provide a more robust solution for documentation, I'd wager you'll see more robust developer documentation.
IDE overhaul: This one's a biggie and is likely a whole separate development cycle, but I had to throw this one in here. Mark Drew has done a phenomenal job of taking over the CFEclipse effort. But the reality is that his efforts and the efforts of many others who have contributed to the project all come in their spare time. That is neither fair to them nor to the CF development community who are essentially at their mercy when it comes to bug fixes (and yes, there are bugs). It's been over a year since the last official, stable release. ColdFusion needs a professional IDE. I have been working with Flex 2 lately, and it's downright appalling to see the level of professional polish on the Flex Builder IDE versus the CFEclipse IDE. That's not to be taken as a shot at Mark et al. Rather, it's just a recognition that I am immensely more productive in the Flex Builder IDE than I am in the CFEclipse IDE. Flex is about 2 years old and ColdFusion is 11 years old, and Flex development productivity blows away ColdFusion development productivity. That's a shame and I hope that Adobe finds the resources to dedicate a team of developers who can polish up CFEclipse by providing me more than RDS support, for which I have zero need. Things like CFC introspection and recognition that I didn't properly var scope a variable are much more useful.

Language-level

Concept of null: First and foremost, I'm not necessarily talking about being able to type null itself. I recognize that the underlying engine would need a serious overhaul to be able to support it. However, I need to be able to declare a cfargument as a type of numeric, yet still have the option of not passing a value in without having to default to 0. In a lot of the work that I do, zero has a very real meaning and it can't be used as a conditional check to see if a numeric value is valid. Further, I shouldn't have to switch the datatype and use a string instead because that's not the correct self-documentation of what that argument is.
Re-do Flash Forms: One thing that I noticed at CFUNITED was how even the Adobe employees were making fun of Flex 1.5 because of how hard it was to do things relative to Flex 2. Flash Forms, in their current incarnation, just don't cut it. It's a "cute" feature without any real-world possibility of implementing. I vote that it be entirely overhauled and that the Flex 2 engine is embedded. Then you can wheel and deal with some incredible user interfaces while providing the ease of use that we have come to know with ColdFusion. For backwards compatibility, if it can't just be upgraded without touching anything, I would suggest that there be a toggle switch between 1.5 and 2 to maintain backwards compatibility (i.e., a version attribute) so that existing implementations won't break.
Spry integration: Spry isn't quite ready for production just yet (nor is it presented that way), but it's a compelling alternative to Flash-based interfaces. The current ability to create an accordion interface is just a small part of its potential as not only an interactive data bus but a viable UI alternative to both "conventional" HTML and Flash.
Interfaces: Yep, I'm saying it. I'd like to see interfaces. Does ColdFusion need them? Nope. Did ColdFusion need CFCs? Nope. I both built and saw some pretty complex applications pre-MX, and I could have continued to develop in that paradigm if I wanted to. But CFCs became compelling because they allowed to me to do my work in a more efficient, cleaner way. In my opinion, interfaces offer me this potential as well, as they allow a system architect to "stub" a domain model and leave it to the developers to implement the details. Now, don't misunderstand, I'm not meaning to suggest that introducing interfaces will be as significant as introducing CFCs. And I'm sorry, I just don't buy the argument that somehow introducing interfaces makes ColdFusion harder to develop with. First off, it's optional and second, it's truly gives you the power to "develop to an interface, not an implementation." Perhaps a new file type of .cfi could be introduced to allow an application architect to specify the method signatures, while also introducing an attribute to cfcomponent called implements, which allows users to specify multiple .cfi classes.
Deprecate cfscript: Don't remove it, just formally acknowledge that the engineers are not going to be doing anything more with it. I was a big cfscript fan for a long time, but I was sick of having to have a hybrid codebase of script-based logic wrapped by tag-based features such as cflock or some such because they can't (natively) be called within a cfscript block.
Add stream-based file read/write functions to support large files: The "read the whole file into memory before being able to do anything with it" is antiquated. I don't know what the old underlying C options were (the language that pre-CFMX was written in), but Java offers some robust options for reading and writing large files by streaming. This is a must-have, and I think the increased traffic recently on the mailing lists is indicative of this.
IMAP support: Let me see... there's POP, FTP, HTTP, SMS, and XMPP support, but no IMAP support? Come on, let's get this done.
Add a function to distinguish between createObject() and createCFC(): FUD or not, shared hosts are a pain with this. My host (HostMySite) is not, but there are many who lock down createObject and cfobject from being used (thereby preventing CFC usage) because it provides access to the underlying Java API, which could theoretically allow malicious activities and/or suck up system resources. I'm not sure how much I buy that (it's possible to do it in other ways too that aren't locked down), but the ability to distinguish between calling Java objects vs. non-Java objects at the tag-level would be valuable and helpful.
For the CF tags that generate markup, support the ability to validate generated markup using a specified doctype: A long-time pet peeve of mine. If I'm going to spend the time to make my markup compliant to a certain validation level, don't hamstring me by outputting non-compliant code. Add an attribute to each affected tag called markup that takes values like "xhmtl" or "html4" (i.e., cfchart markup="xhtml").
Ability to throw objects rather than strings: I've come across this particular obstacle recently and I often find myself wishing that I could throw an object using cfthrow rather than just a string. This would allow communication between the calling and target code to be a bit smoother rather than having to write workarounds for getting the appropriate information back.
Add a trace() function that allows you to dump an object during execution: This one's straight out of the ModelGlue framework, but there's a super handy function in there called trace() that allows you to dump out any object during page execution and have it displayed in the debugging info at the bottom of the page. This allows you to see the evolution of a variable throughout the whole page rather than having to do a cfdump/cfabort in broken steps.
Take the most popular cflib UDFs and make them native: This is just a convenience. I would think that Ray and Rob have stats on the "most downloaded UDFs" or "most popular UDFs." Just make our lives easier and make the top 20 or so native.
Syndication: I know that there are those who are calling for a RSS tag, and quite frankly, I don't think the end-user cares if the feed is RSS or Atom as long as they get the right content. However, an interesting blog entry I read recently got me thinking that maybe Atom is the better selection. That being said, some sort of RSS/Atom feature needs to be added to account for the major browsers offering the consumption of these feeds natively.
Full i18n features to please Paul Hastings, and the non-English speaking world: This is so crucial in today's world that I'll just point to Paul's recent posting to outline what needs to be fixed.
CFImage: Eleven years in and ColdFusion doesn't have anything built-in to it to really work with images on any sort of useful level. I know that some will point out that Java can do this natively, but the point of ColdFusion is to "Make Hard Stuff Easy," and I don't think developers should be forced to use the Java API just to get some basic functionality.

I'm sure there are some features that I've left out, but, quite frankly, they don't come to mind, so how important can they really be! Go ahead, fire back!

My Flex Ad Campaign Suggestions

Thu, 20 Jul 2006 23:15:00 -0400

So Ryan Stewart rightly flamed Adobe for a poor execution of an ad campaign they were running on some of the Federated Media sites. In one of the comments, Jeff Whatcott, Senior Director of Product Marketing for the Enterprise and Developer Business Unit at Adobe (I'm not sure his title can get any longer), not only acknowledged the execution gaffe, but further comments that the campaign has been pulled altogether. He then went on to challenge the readers as to what we think a better online advertising campaign should be:

So here's the invitation: please jump on this thread with your specific suggestions for what the Flex online advertising should say and what is should look like. What should the tone be (sophisticated, edgy, friendly, in your face, or what have you)? What should the catchy tag line be? What should the short product description be? What benefits, if any, should we mention right in the ad and what should be on the jump page? Should we bang directly on the competition (think Oracle ads) or should we focus on our own strengths? What creative concepts should we consider (code puzzles that convey a message, movies of Flex coding/results, what else)?

Here's the thing though... I'm a developer by trade, so actually designing something more than a stick figure (which is a challenge in and of itself) is pretty comical. Seriously, Photoshop/Fireworks and I just aren't friends. So I'm going to leave the "looks" part of his request to the pros. But that doesn't mean I can't put in my two cents on a couple of his questions. Specifically:

What should the catchy tag line be? What should the short product description be?

I spent a bit of time tonight just throwing down ideas. Here's what I've come up with so far... Catchy Tag Line Ideas

Adobe Flex 2: Why Wait For What's Here Already?
Adobe Flex 2: Flash Reborn
Adobe Flex 2: Rich Internet Applications Redefined
Adobe Flex 2: The Web Like You've Never Seen It
Adobe Flex 2: Free Has Never Been This Easy
Adobe Flex 2: Set Your Data Free
Adobe Flex 2: Unleash Your Data
Adobe Flex 2 and You: Perfect Together

OK, the last one's awful, but I had to give a shout out to my New Jersey roots by paying homage to its successful 1980s ad campaign: New Jersey and You, Perfect Together. Feel free to ignore that one. Anyway, I think the other ones walk the advertising balance between piquing one's interest, conveying (albeit at a very high level) what the technology does, and taking a light jab at Microsoft (yes, I had Sparkle in mind in the first bullet.) I also had one that said "Adobe Flex 2: The Power Of Your Desktop On The Web," but that's really more Apollo-esque, so I left it out. Short Product Description This one's pretty tough too because you have several audiences that will potentially see the text, and you need to cater to all of them at some level. From hard-core C++/Java/.NET developers to designers to managers, the text needs to have something that will at least make them click into a more descriptive landing page. This is what I came up with:

Adobe Flex 2 delivers on the promise of Rich Internet Applications by fusing the power of the web with the familiar feel of your desktop. And because it runs in the Adobe Flash Player, the most pervasive plugin in the history of the Internet, it runs exactly the same on Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. Leverage your existing Service Oriented Architecture by putting the interactivity of traditional desktop applications at your customers' fingertips. Oh, and it can be done in about 10 lines of code!

My thought process was to come up with something that describes what the product does, while promoting its competitive advantage in that it's cross-platform, runs in a familiar plugin, and doesn't require a complete rewrite of existing code. I'm still not that totally content with it, but I thought I'd throw it out there for feedback to see what others are thinking. I stayed away from a couple of other people's suggestions and some of Jeff's questions intentionally.

I didn't put any code as a complement to the overview statement. One developer pool that I know Adobe is trying to pull from is the hard core C++/Java/.NET camp. As a long-time ColdFusion developer, there's still a stigma that tag-based languages, such as ColdFusion and MXML, are inferior because their abstraction takes away the developer's power and degrades overall performance. I would submit that the landing page should have the links to the code samples along with plenty of videos that point out how quickly you really can develop some pretty advanced behaviors. Also, the code examples shouldn't rely on third-party tools, such as Flickr. It's cool that you can do that, but I don't think you're going to see people rusing out to get their own Flickr API key just to run a sample. I actually think the samples are a big strength for Adobe, and they've done a good job of getting examples for all levels of expertise online.
I don't think Adobe should go the "Oracle route" and single out competitors. First off, it gives the competitors free press. Let them pay for their own airtime. Second, I think it's class-less and evokes a feeling of fear that their own product is inferior and they're just covering those shortcomings up.

What do you think? How would you improve on the current Flex 2 online marketing campaign? How'd I do? Remember, I'm a developer, so my thoughts are really just raw brain dumps...nothing polished.

Leak? June 28th Release For Adobe Flex 2

Thu, 15 Jun 2006 13:04:00 -0400

Scott Langeberg just posted on the flexcoders list that he learned in a Breeze webinar that Adobe Flex 2 is slated to be released on June 28th! Here is the contents of the post, which includes the long-awaited pricing breakdown:

According to Sydney Sloan (Marketing - Adobe) in a Breeze webinar @ 11AM (c): Official release date: June 28, 2006 Pricing as follows: Flex 2 SDK - FREE Flex Builder 2 - $499, $749 w/charting FDS - $6,000 (100 concurrent users), $20,000 (enterprise) Interestingly: FDS Express - FREE (one app per cpu). Charting components - $299

I want to stress that the above information came from one non-Adobe employee, and may not be entirely accurate, if at all. That disclaimer aside, AWESOME!!! That positions the release to be on Day 1 of the CFUNITED conference, which also means that Mystic (aka, ColdFusion 7.0.2) will be released that day as well (it was noted in a Developer Week presentation that the CF bits would be released simultaneously). The release date does seem to make sense, as Adobe will be giving the keynote address at the conference that day, which makes it the perfect platform to make a major announcement such as this (among other channels, of course). Further, it follows the "first half of 2006" official line on release dates to this point, yet maximizes the time they have to get it out the door. I have to say, the pricing is extremely aggressive, and I think is a further testament to how much Adobe has riding on this release. If you haven't been checking out the online presentations this week surrounding Flex during Adobe Developer Week, then you're missing out on a ton of great information. P.E. -- (Post Entry) I hope Sydney Sloan doesn't get in too much trouble!!

ColdFusion Needs A Roadmap

Fri, 19 May 2006 10:48:00 -0400

I've thought about this off and on for some time, but a recent post by Steven Erat got me thinking again: ColdFusion really needs a roadmap. I've been actively using ColdFusion since early 1997 (side note: I almost had a coronary as I just thought about that). In all that time, though, there has never (publicly) been any sort of development roadmap for the product. All we've been able to do is cross our fingers and hope that Allaire/Macromedia/Adobe finds it in their heart to add or support a particular feature. Sure, Ben has made the CFUG rounds before each ColdFusion release to generate some buzz and gather feedback, but that's not really what I'm looking for. As a developer who also has a significant hand in my company's IT procurement processes, there are certain things I need to know about any product before I'll move ahead with them. Our larger purchases are not "spur of the moment." (In this context, "larger purchases" means anything over a couple thousand dollars.) However, the lack of a roadmap really makes it hard for me to properly plan our infrastructure and development timelines. Don't misunderstand, I'm not looking for Adobe to announce every new/enhanced/fixed feature of the product in advance of its release. As a developer, I certainly know that planned features are always constrained by time and resources and are subject to falling out (see replicating session-based CFCs in CFMX 7 as an example ;). However, here are a few concrete areas where the lack of a roadmap in a hindrance:

64-bit support
Java 1.5 support
Support for the latest Sun 1.4 JDK (1.4.2_11 is currently the latest JDK release, but 1.4.2_09 is the latest officially supported by Adobe)
Tentative Scorpio (aka ColdFusion 8) product cycle

Why do I need answers on the above? For starters, we're imminently purchasing a couple of new servers for our web site. In working with my sys admin, he's asking basic questions that I simply need to know the answers to in order to formulate an accurate spec. He's asking why we wouldn't go with 64-bit servers. The only answer I can give right now is that it's because Adobe doesn't seem to have plans to get ColdFusion working on 64-bit platforms (yes, I know it'll run in 32-bit compatibility mode, but that's not the same), so why spend the extra money? Do I necessarily believe Adobe hase no internal plans for this support? Not at all. However, in the absence of any other publicly available information, that's the only conclusion I can draw at this point. It could come tomorrow, it could come next year for all I know. Regarding the Scorpio product cycle, it would be nice to have some sort of feel for the timeline. Is an alpha/beta imminent? Since Mystic is apparently going to be ColdFusion MX 7.02, does that push out the Scorpio cycle? With the new servers we're buying, I am also planning to upgrade our site to CFMX 7. However, if Scorpio is on its way in the short-term, maybe I'll hold off and take advantage of its new features. There's nothing on my company's web site that's screaming for a specific CFMX 7 feature. However, with Scorpio's rumored new resource monitoring features, that's something I could use and maybe I'll hold off on a purchase of FusionReactor or SeeFusion. There's been frequent mention in the blogosphere lately about how Adobe and Microsoft are seemingly on their way for a competitive showdown. I don't know if I necessarily believe that. However, if it's true, one area that I believe Microsoft has a significant leg up is with their roadmaps. Sure, you can insert the latest Vista delay joke here, but the reality is that I know where their products are going. From Vista to Visual Studio to SQL Server, I know when I can roughly expect service packs, upgrades, etc. I can't say that about any product at Adobe other than Flex 2. I hope that Adobe learns from the (in my opinion) success of the Flex 2 public beta. Since I knew that some time in June is the expected release, I have been able to schedule development cycles with it accordingly. I just wish I could do the same with ColdFusion...

Microsoft's "Eolas Patch" Affects Flash, Adobe Reader and More

Fri, 03 Mar 2006 15:01:00 -0400

Microsoft made available an update to Internet Explorer on 2/28 that brings them into compliance with the Eolas patent ruling, which forces them to change the way they display ActiveX content. The update is available only for Windows XP with Service Pack 2 and Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1. After installing the update, you cannot interact with ActiveX controls until they are specifically enabled. While a lot of the focus in the former-Macromedia community has been on its impact on Flash, it's important to keep in mind that the Adobe Reader is affected as well and, as such, code for displaying PDFs should be tested as well. Yesterday, Adobe released a hotfix that will allow Flex 1.5 applications to work, as they will flat-out break without re-writing the wrapper page the compiler generates. For more information about the IE update's impact, a good resource is the Active Content Developer Center on Adobe's web site. I haven't been able to determine (because I've yet to install the update) whether ColdFusion features such as Flash Forms, cfchart with format="flash", and cfdocument are now broken or somehow affected as well.