Today I ran across some old code that reminded me why being "clever" can get you into trouble. The code basically collects a bunch (over 30) data fields that are submitted via a web form. At the time the client was continually adding new data points. In an effort to make adding new data points easier we began to place a delimited list of key/value pairs into a single text field in the database. What a great idea! Now we don't have to add a new field to the table every time we add one to the form......Wrong! Today the client asked for the ability to sort/search on one of those data points. Something that should have been as easy as adding an ORDER BY clause to my query has turned into a refactoring job.

I came across this set of CF utilities. It's not free, but it's cheap for what you get:

http://foundeo.com/fusionkit

Over the last few years my development environment has evolved and changed as newer and better tools were released. I've had my current setup running for a few months now and I'm really pleased with how it's working.

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Ben Forta confirmed the ability to set set per application mappings in Scorpio. This will be great for distributing code and encapsulating applications. Too bad it only works with Application.cfc.

Rey Bango has put together a neat list of sites that are powered by Coldfusion.

http://www.gotcfm.com

I just downloaded and installed FusionDebug 2.0 this evening. I haven't really gotten a chance to review it completely. My initial impression is that it's a much enhanced and mature program. I've been using version 1.0 for about 4 months and I think it's a great tool, but sometimes a bit error prone. I was happy to put up with the bugs and quirks, because it was so handy. I'm pleased to say a lot of those problems are now fixed.

The initial install was pretty painless. I downloaded the plugin only. They are now offering a complete install package (Eclipse, CFEclipse, and FusionDebug). I'm anxious to hear if this solves some of the initial setup woes that plagued me in the beginning. Additionally they've included a Server Configuration Wizard. No more editing JVM config files by hand! This made setting up my server for debugging a snap. The entire process took about 10 minutes! I'll continue posting my impressions as I use it.

In the meantime, I recommend all Coldfusion developers download the free trial. It WILL change the way you work.

I stumbled onto an odd problem yesterday. I decided to test this site using Safari. I don't use my Mac very often, but I like to write my code so that it's as cross-browser as possible. In Safari there were several graphical issues that I couldn't abide. So I set down and adjusted my style sheets and HTML until the site looked good in Safari too. I tested the site in Safari using my local development machine (i.e. http://192.168.1.101). I uploaded my changes to the production server. However, my style sheet changes did not take effect on the remote server. After a lot of cache clearing, DNS flushing, and code checking I was stumped. I began to suspect that there was a MIME type issue on the remote server. After more investigating with no luck I was about to give up. Then I noticed that I had two tags with a media attributes of "screen". I removed one and immediately the site worked in Safari. I still don't know why it only affected Safari. It also doesn't explain why it worked when browsing my local development machine.