I can't speak to your experience with [A] or [C], but I will try to do a parallel to [B].
In Los Angeles, we have had what amounts to a 'dead' CF user group. I think 2 meetings in the last year since it was resurrected, after being shelved for many many years. However, the job market for CF developers in the Los Angeles area has never been better. We do have a 'general' Adobe users group that meets, but they don't really care much for CF programmers, and focus mainly on the products you had mentioned. If I went to one of those meetings as a litmus test for CF strength in the area, I would write LA off. But because I work in the market, I know better. If you are having issues finding projects that are starting to use CF, keep in mind that most new companies trend toward the free server-side programming languages simply because.... it's free. In contract work, I have taken a few of the contracts and changed their minds about CF by citing and proving some of the basic tenets of CF development. Fast to market, advanced developers tend to be actually advanced (not 'I worked with PHP for a year, I must be a 'senior'), etc. If I were you, instead of looking for 'jobs' that are using CF, try looking for 'startups' that are looking for a solution, and then sell them on you and CF. Just my 2 deenah, William -----Original Message----- From: Mike Kear [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, January 20, 2010 9:52 PM To: cf-talk Subject: Why i fear ColdFusion is on its last legs I know that's a 'Chicken Little" kind of subject line. I hope my impressions are wrong. Might be - i have been wrong before. I remember i was wrong once when i thought i was incorrect, but i wasnt. Anyway, these are the reasons i think the trends tell me ColdFusion is either a dead duck of soon to be a dead duck at least in Sydney anyway. I dont know about other places. ... [A] there is almost no new development going on in ColdFusion In the last 12 months there has been just a handful of coldfusion jobs advertised. And most of those have been advertised by time-wasters who didnt end up appointing anyone. "I'm sorry Mike, they've put that project on hold for now ... yada yada yada " (or so they said maybe they were just too gutless to tell me i didnt get the assignment) In the last 12 months i have had NOT ONE assignment as a result of any advertisements for CF developers. If I hadnt dug up business on my own I'd have starved. Contrast this with a few years ago when freelancers like me had jobs lined up one behind the other. Maybe its just me, maybe everyone else has lots of jobs lined up. But somehow i doubt it. [B] There is next-to no apparent activity in the Usergroups on coldfusion, at least as far as I've seen. Everyone's fussing about Flex and Flash and Railo and Ruby on Rails and no one's talking about ColdFusion. I'd have made the 4 hour trek into the user group meeting if there'd been anything to do with coldfusion on. Apparently developers think there is nothing to talk about with ColdFusion. How newer developers are getting on learning the product I have no idea. [C] Adobe dont seem to be doing anything to promote ColdFusion here. I might be wrong on that, and its just that they dont tell us what they're doing, but I havent seen any evidence that they're putting much effort into marketing ColdFusion. I dont consider sending speakers to a COLDFUSION conference like WebDU or CfObjective to be promoting new ColdFusion installations because they're preaching to the choir there. Those folks are already sold on CF. Yes it's important to keep those lines open with the developer community but I dont see much use for gaining new users that way. ( I said something similar a few years ago, and Mark Blair got highly indignant about it - called me and told me all the things he was doing to promote ColdFusion. But after that, nothing) I would like to know that Adobe care enough about their server product to put some money behind it and promote it a bit here. It would make me feel more comfortable about building my business around it. -- Cheers Mike Kear ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:329884 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.4
