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Looking for CF books? Here's 2,500+ pages for just $50

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
If you're ever in the market for books on CF, did you realize there are 6 books in the ColdFusion documentation set? And now you can get them (in paperback) for just $50 for the entire set from Adobe, for CF8, or CF7?

The docs contain far more than just the 1100+ page CFML reference. Most important is the often-missed 1100+ page "Developers Guide", which explains and introduces both beginner and advanced techniques. Damon Cooper offers still more details on the offer.

I'll have some Scorpio magic to show next week, also

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
I forgot to mention (in my previous entry about speaking next week) that at both cf.Objective() and the Twin Cities CFUG, I'll be sprinkling a little Scorpio spice on top of my talks (with Adobe's blessing).

First, at the Twin Cities CFUG talk, when I discuss caching in CF, I'll be able to show off some new Scorpio enhancements related to this. Don't ask me to say what they are now. I'm still working out details about which of a few features I can discuss. I've got the green light on some. Waiting on the others.

Second, at cf.Objective(), Jared and I will be leading a "birds of a feather" talk on "hidden gems in scorpio". We all know that with each new release, there are lots of "star" new features, but there are also often lots of "small supporting role" new features which are often as important to some as the big ones. We will pow-wow with the powers that be to confirm which ones will be ok to talk about as of that date. We hope to be able to share a few that will surprise some.

So there are two more reasons to get to Minneapolis next week. (I don't know if the Twin Cities CFUG meeting will be recorded, but if not, I plan to make a recording of it on my own eventually, or offer it on the Meetup soon.)

Speaking at cf.Objective() and Twin Cities CFUG next week

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
Just a heads up, for those interested, that I'll be speaking twice next week.

As I first discussed a couple weeks ago, I'm set to speak at the cf.Objective conference on the topic of 'Understanding, Improving and Resolving Issues with Database Procedure Caches, or "What really happens when we use/don't use cfqueryparam?"'. This the first time I'll present the talk, and indeed it's the first time I've seen a talk on this topic offered, at least to the depth I plan to cover, about what really goes on inside the database with this feature.

And while I'm there, Troy Pullis at the Twin Cities CFUG has invited me to return to speak at their user group meeting, which happens to be the night before the conference. I've spoken there a few times in the past and always enjoy that group. I'll be presenting my '"Caching In" on CF Performance' talk, which I've presented previously at the Atlanta CFUG and WebDU. You can find out more about the topic at http://carehart.org/presentations/#caching.

3 ColdFusion Meetups this week: one scheduled, and two surprise cf.Objective() session previews

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
Just want to announce that the Online ColdFusion Meetup which Ray and I run will have three, count 'em three, online presentations this week. Step right up, get your fill of CF presentation goodness.

First, Thursday at 6, see Steve Bryant on "DataMgr Component Set: Easy Data Access without an ORM". Get more info and/or RSVP, as well as get the online meeting URL at http://coldfusion.meetup.com/17/calendar/5667225/. This should last about an hour.

Then on Friday, we'll have two half-hour talks which are previews of the same talks being given by the speakers at next week's cf.Objective() conference in Minneapolis, MN, May 3-6.

At 10:30 on Friday, we'll have Dean Saxe, on "Security and the SDLC: Threat Modeling". Get more info and/or RSVP, as well as get the online meeting URL at http://coldfusion.meetup.com/17/calendar/5708602/. This should last about 30 minutes.

Finally, at 3pm, we'll have Mark Mandel on "Developing Applicatons With Transfer ORM". Again, get more info and/or RSVP, as well as get the online meeting URL at http://coldfusion.meetup.com/17/calendar/5708652/. This should also last about 30 minutes.

Yes, they will also all be recorded. For more on the Online CF Meetup and more about my and Ray's taking it on recently, see the links to previous blog entries below.

Anyone in the CF world looking into Restlets yet? They went 1.0 today.

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
Has anyone in the CF community started looking into the Restlets API yet? I happened upon the concept today for the first time, when I saw news that it went 1.0 today, though it's a little over a year old. I did some digging using my Google CSE to search and see if any other CFers had written about it, but I found none.

Restlets are an implementation of RESTful applications atop the Java framework. If your brain thinks "applets", think instead "servlets". Though even that's not quite right, since it's specifically NOT about implementing REST in servlets, as mentioned in the 'restlet inception' section of the intro page. The goal is "supporting the concepts of REST and facilitating the handling of calls for both client-side and server-side applications". I have to admit, I'm not entirely clear on what it can do and what it may do for CF folks.

Note that there is both a restlet API and a restlet engine (NRE), and it can be embedded within another servlet engine (like Tomcat--or in CF's case, JRun).

To their credit, there's plenty of friendly documentation (well, friendly for a Java project) at the site, including intros, tutorials, faq (general and developer), sample code, and more.

The project clearly has a java feel and focus, so if it can be useful to CFers, it will be up to someone to either show how it will be useful, or perhaps even implement some demo atop or in conjunction with it, for most CFers to "get it" I think.

I'm not sure I do, myself, so I'm more just throwing this out there to see if anyone gets interested. (Didn't do much good with my reference to the Ibatis framework. :-) But you never know.) If it helps you or looks interesting, share a comment or link to your blog in the comments here.

WebDU animations for 2007 now online (part 2)

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
I mentioned previously that the first day of the funny WebDU animations had been posted online. I can report that tonight the 2nd day animations have been posted as well: http://animation.nectarine.com.au/, and they're just as funny.

Thanks to one of the animators, Steve Piscopo, who dropped me a note to tell me about these.

First Online ColdFusion Meetup (Virtual User Group) set for Thursday, 6pm Easter, with Jacob Munson

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
Folks, the first online Coldfusion Meetup (virtual user group meeting) will be held tomorrow night, at 6pm Eastern, with Jake Munson speaking on "Attack of the Spam Bots". You can learn more, including the URL for attending, at http://coldfusion.meetup.com/17/. We'd appreciate your RSVPing.

I mentioned in an entry a couple weeks ago that Ray Camden and I are reviving the Meetup which Steven Erat had started and had to step down from due to time constraints.

It's an online ColdFusion user group, where you can watch and participate via Acrobat Connect. The meeting will also be recorded and the URL for that will be posted to meetup members as well as in my UGTV repository of recorded presentations, which now has over 100 from over 80 speakers.

New (free) Performance Dashboard for SQL Server 2005 SP2

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
Those using SQL Server 2005 may want to take note of a new "Dashboard Report" option for SP2, to help monitor and resolve performance problems, including capturing diagnostic info when a problem is detected.

Common performance problems that the dashboard reports may help to resolve include:

  • CPU bottlenecks (and what queries are consuming the most CPU)
  • IO bottlenecks (and what queries are performing the most IO).
  • Index recommendations generated by the query optimizer (missing indexes)
  • Blocking
  • Latch contention

The report is an extension of the Custom Reports feature introduced in the SQL Server 2005 SP2 release of SQL Server Management Studio. Note that Reporting Services does not need to be installed.

The reports retrieve info from dynamic management views. They don't poll performance counters or require tracing be enabled. They also do not store a history of performance over time. So it's a lightweight (yet powerful) monitoring option.

You can get the extension itself at:

Performance Dashboard Reports

There's also a complete article about how to install it from Black Belt Administration: Performance Dashboard for Microsoft SQL Server, Part I , at Database Journal (and from which I obtained the image above).

Come see me speak at CF.Objective, on a topic that I think's unique and valuable

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
I was delighted to learn in February that I'd been accepted to speak at CF.Objective this year. I couldn't make last year's event. With it being the premiere "enterprise engineering conference for ColdFusion programmers", I knew I had to come up with something special to please my fellow propeller-heads, so I've created a new, never-before seen presentation--which is now listed on the sessions page along with the many other great talks. I'm not aware of anyone in the CF world having covered the topic as I plan to (please do correct me if I'm wrong).

Understanding, Improving and Resolving Issues with Database Procedure Caches, or "What really happens when we use/don't use cfqueryparam?"

Following is the description as the conference guys worded it (just a little different than my own, but tighter and jazzier):

Community favorite Charlie Arehart will help you come to grips with how cfqueryparam affects the performance of your database as well as your application. Follow him thru the process of understanding, diagnosing, and fixing issues related to database query plan caching and its effect on performance, and how to choke more performance out of the two systems than you knew was possible.

The point is that we often are told "use CFQUERYParam" for the "performance benefit" (separate from the security benefit), but rarely do you get insight into the real technical underpinnings of the impacted database operation: query plan caching.

In this talk, I'll share some little-known yet powerful information to help really understand what goes on under the covers in the database. I'll focus on SQL Server 2000 and 2005 but also cover MySQL and perhaps other databases as well. If I don't cover yours, the general concepts will still apply and help you investigate more on your own.

More about the Conference

The conference is May 3-6, 2007, at the Sofitel in Bloomington, MN.

Also, if you missed news of it on the blogwire last week, the folks at CFObjective have created a 2-page "manager's guide" to why you should attend the conference. (I was actually surprised to see that my talk was one two highlighted, along with Jeff Houser's. Besides there being so many great speakers, mine doesn't quite fit the "object-oriented approach" that's been the hall-mark of the conference. But maybe )

Perhaps the biggest reason is the value: $475 for 3 days of content. "What a bah-gin!" (even after the passing April 1 of the early-bird discount at $395.) With the added value of great networking, as at most conferences, and special new Scorpio sneaks hinted it by Adobe (see the conference site registration page), it's a great conference to consider for yourself and team members.

Hope to see you there (and/or at CFUnited in June, which I'll also be speaking about and will write about soon).

[Update: Here's a link to the talk itself.]

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