Just my two cents.

- JS

“Longtime Adobe Developer Gives Insider’s View of Flex & AJAX
The newest addition to the Flex Framework family is the Flex AJAX Bridge (FAB)”
http://br.sys-con.com/read/192086.htm

What has me excited is the coupling of CF with incremental client side improvements via browser-native AJAX technologies. This post regarding the bridge to Flash and Flex opens the door wider to all of our imaginations. It’s exciting in whatever server-side product you choose to develop in.

Fusebox as a means to implementing MVC w/in CF has also been around since 1997. For those who want to check it out: http://www.fusebox.org (Last I heard a week ago or so, Version 5 is approaching release.)

One more item to add to the good points by Brian G, for any interested. When using a framework like Fusebox, it’s straightforward to unit test your server side ColdFusion code, if you’re developing in an enterprise enviroment. http://cfunit.sourceforge.net/

Thx guys-

But that’s not the issue here. Flex is a whole new ball game, and I think that the loose coupling with the server makes it a very attractive platform, particularly for enterprise development and component based development. If only we can break down some of the psychological barriers that exist in the enterprise for flash.

Maybe. You can access/use Java (and JSP taglibs) directly inside CFMX. Mix and match as your skillset (or your teams!) allows.

> Are you creating distinct application
> layers, separating markup from server “script�, Data access
> from Business Logic?

Yes.

Many people who bag on CFMX are not familiar with the latest releases. Things have changed. If it was really about purity of a language, would there be an Ajax revolution right now centered on Javascript? No. It’s about productivity and user experience and ColdFusion MX can provide both of those things in a substantially shorter amount of time than .Net and Java assuming all other things are equal (skilled developer, etc). Users don’t care what it’s written in; they care that they have it and that it helps them.

Adobe’s toolset is getting better and better and I think it’s great that the product is adopting more deployment options and integration points.

I’ve just been biting my tongue for a long time now with all this proliferation of languages that encourage practices like mixing server code with markup. You got the brunt of my finally “lashing out”. So did anyone reading these comments hoping to find relevant conversation on Adobe’s Flex/Ajax bridge.

I apologize.

Are you using Java? Are you creating distinct application layers, separating markup from server “script”, Data access from Business Logic?

> which enable rapid development of object-oriented-like applications

?huh? object-oriented-like? What is that?

> Ruby on Rails, although I haven’t developed in it yet, is one language I find intriguing…

Of course it is, it’s another scripting language that encourages people to put their markup in the same file as (and interspersed within) their server code. It’s easy to learn how to make a web page or a couple pages in these scripting languages and string them together with spaghetti code and call it an application. That’s easy, and that’s why it’s so popular.

I’m sorry if I offended anyone personally. I was surprised to hear Coldfusion being used seriously (still).

Adobe rocks… The Flex/Ajax bridge will enable a lot of very cool stuff on the client. Coldfusion, not so much. But, it’s easy, so you know… mor power to you.

For those who don’t know, ColdFusion MX is built on underlying J2EE technology. All CF apps can be run on any J2EE compatible servers. All applications scripted in ColdFusion compile to java byte code. So the statement supporting java but not Coldfusion doesn’t make a great deal of sense. (However, coupled with the “y’all” and the .net support statement, it somewhat does though :) )

There are 3 popular, and somewhat mature CF frameworks (Fusebox, Mach-II, and ColdSpring) which enable rapid development of object-oriented-like applications using the (optionally, but preferred) Model-View-Controller paradigm.

Ruby on Rails, although I haven’t developed in it yet, is one language I find intriguing, given some of the examples I’ve seen developed with it, and what I have been able to read and listen to on Podcasts regarding its integration with AJAX.

I won’t respond to any more comments here, but thanks again for the info on the Flex/Ajax bridge.

cheers-

Adobe is doing some neat stuff in the client side arena, but ya’ll need to start developing real layered / scalable architectures (i.e. learn a real language) on the server. :-) Rails, Coldfusion, PHP… come on.

Sorry, I am mister cynacism.