This morning I sent this out to the Nashville CFUG mailing list and thought it important to copy it to drop in here as well. --C-- --------- By the way, didn't get the chance to mention this last night so I thought I'd bring it up here. Before I begin let me just say that I am not trying to start a flame war on a low traffic local cfug list, please read through the entire message and think about it's text before blindly responding.
For some reason there appears to be a growing need, within the CF community, to defend the validity of programming within CF. The uninformed/unitiated either a) don't know that ColdFusion exists, or b) think of it as a low-level tag-based scripting language with no power and a high price tag. Now, I don't know about ya'll, but I'd like to beat these people with their own arms for being dumber than a stump. But, since that's not an option and we all have to work to feed our families, many in the community are working towards giving CF 'validity'. Now, not all of these people look at their contributions like this. Some of this are 'just trying to help out.' But the bottom line is (in the many discussions that are out there) that there aren't a ton of high level, enterprise marketable, applications out there written in CF. There are hundreds of little snippet programs for doing this and that. There are thousands of SOHO "business" applications written in CF 2/3/4/5 un-modifiable, non-configurable spaghetti code. There ARE NOT many high end Open Source enterprise level applications written in ColdFusion. So? That's the response I get a lot. But what are we, as CF developers, competing with? How about the hundreds of thousands of open source applications written in C++, PHP, or Python, or even ASP (shudder). Applications that companies download, install, and work with every day. With such a great development community, why don't we have more/better to offer for ColdFusion? Don't get me wrong, I love and applaud the efforts of all of the framework developers we have (Hal, Ben, S. Isaac, Rob, et. al.) and appreciate those who crank it out just for our benefit, learning and enjoyment (thanks Ray), but CF needs some well-designed, well-coded, well-documented Open Source programs to offer to the world. Something that tells people "We're serious about what we do. We're good at it, and only work with the best tools available. That's ColdFusion." So, having said all of that, and having stated my opinion for all to poke, prod, and plunder, I finally come down to my point and request. Not long ago a few people spoke out on the CF-Talk (houseoffusion.com) list for developing an Open Source E-Commerce application. For anyone who's really looked out there for a good CF cart, you may have seen that a) none are free, b) there aren't really that many, and c) few are worth a damn. Some of the higher priced ones are rather nice, but that doesn't mean that they are very configurable (by John Doe, shop owner and all around nice, non-programming guy), nor does that mean they are stable and well written (some haven't had their core business logic updated since FB 3). So, now there is an Open Source project on SourceForge.net for openSource Business Services (keyword openbizservices). The project started just before the holidays, so there hasn't been a lot of activity yet. I've only seen posts from three people in the forums so far (one of 'em being me). The overall scope of the project is 'in process' and is quickly taking shape. This morning I received an initial Design Document from Andy and it is fantastic for a first draft. This project, though still being scoped, is to be very full featured, well formed and documented, as well as extensible. Part of the core process is to design component objects that can be easily extensible for platform and db independence, that can be used in almost any framework or within a basic format we include. But, we need help. There are very few of us in this right now, giving only a few hours a week. The project will be broken down into many small sub-projects that will complete/compliment the overall design, so the more help the faster and more full-featured it will be. So, anyone interested in helping out (even just an hour or two a week) should please go over to SourceForge.net and sign up for the lists. We, and eventually the community at large, will greatly appreciate it. Steve 'Cutter' Blades ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:4:230588 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/4 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:4 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.4 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
