Adobe ColdFusion- A tool for Web Application Deployment

Hi friends

In my last interaction I talked about Adobe flex. Today I am discussing ColdFusion one very important tool from Adobe which is useful for Web Application Deployment and because of its certain features is becoming very famous.

ColdFusion is an application server and software development framework used for the development of computer software in general, and dynamic web sites in particular. In this regard, ColdFusion is a similar product to Microsoft ASP.NET, JavaServer Pages or PHP. ColdFusion was the first amongst these technologies to provide the developer the capability of creating dynamic websites that were attached to a backend database. This technology is gaining a lot of popularity these days.

The primary distinguishing feature of ColdFusion is its associated scripting language, ColdFusion Markup Language (CFML), which compares to JSP, ASP.NET, or PHP and resembles HTML in syntax. ColdFusion is most often used for data-driven web sites or intranets, but can also be used to generate remote services such as SOAP web services or Flash remoting. It is especially well-suited as the server-side technology to the client-side Flex.

One important feature is ColdFusion can also handle asynchronous events such as SMS and instant messaging via its gateway interface, available in ColdFusion MX 7 Enterprise Edition.

Some of the main features of ColdFusion are:

- Client and server cache management
- Client-side code generation used especially for form validation
- Conversion from HTML to PDF and FlashPaper
- Data retrieval from common enterprise systems such as Active Directory, LDAP, POP, HTTP, FTP, Microsoft Exchange Server
- File indexing and searching service
- Platform-independent database querying via ODBC or JDBC
- Session, client, and application management
- XML parsing, querying, and validation
- Server clustering
- Task scheduling

Some important new features in ColdFusion includes Microsoft .Net integration, Microsoft Exchange Server integration, multi threadingand more ECMAScript (scripting language, standardized by European Computer Manufacturers Association) compliant CFSCRIPT. For development of ColdFusion applications, several tools are available like Adobe Dreamweaver CS3, Eclipse etc.

You might be thinking what makes ColdFusion so important?

Because ColdFusion is a Java EE application, ColdFusion code can be mixed with Java classes to create a variety of applications and utilize existing Java libraries. ColdFusion 8 supports .NET within the CFML syntax. ColdFusion developers can simply call any .NET assembly without needing to recompile or alter the assemblies in any way.

A unique feature for a J2EE vendor, ColdFusion 8 offers the ability to access .NET assemblies remotely through proxy (without the use of .NET Remoting). This allows ColdFusion users to leverage .NET without having to be installed on a Windows operating system.

ColdFusion can not only bring together disparate technologies within the enterprise, but can make these technologies available to a number of clients beyond the web browser including, but not limited to, the Flash Player, Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR), Mobile devices (SMS), Acrobat Reader (PDF) and IM gateways. This opens a lot of opportunities for innovations in application development.

NIIT has strategic alliance with Adobe through which NIIT offers Web 2.0 training programs on Adobe technologies like Flash, Dreamweaver, Flex, ColdFusion.

To know more about Web 2.0 training programs visit your nearest NIIT centre or visit http://www.edgeineers.in/program_web2.asp

To avail BJS scholarships on Web 2.0 based programs plz visit http://www.netvarsity.com/BJS08/Scholarship_Details.aspx

Happy Learning!!...

Cheers

Madhu S