ColdFusion 2025 released, Feb 25 2025: resources and my initial thoughts

I agree 100% on your first point. I am very disappointed: and I can only hope that somehow there is more news to come that somehow slipped between the cracks. We've been waiting a long time for clarity on this, and I thought it would come in this release.

As for what you found in the FAQ, I have always hoped that somehow that might not be as authoritative as we'd take it--though it's all we had before: and note how I mentioned elsewhere above that it is still not covered in the 2025 EULA, nor even in the new NUL or FRL licensing pages. I was hoping somehow that's where we'd find clarity.

Sadly, I don't know that we can expect anyone from Adobe to speak up here. They are notoriously tight-lipped when it comes to public statements about licensing matters (beyond what's offered on the site publicly).

But maybe there will be enough hue and cry about this to engender some response. Otherwise, yes, it seems folks wanting to run many *licensed* containers will seemingly need to consider Lucee or Boxlang's cf compat feature.

(I stress "licensed" because of course one can run CF containers for free as the Developer edition, and for some that may suffice while they are simply exploring the prospects of containerized deployment.)

Christopher, I don't work for Adobe so can't answer that last question. :-) I'm just a messenger, pointing folks to the resources Adobe has offered. And the FAQs they give offer a lot, but I don't think they answer that specific question. You should instead ask Adobe (more in a moment).

You should also ask them your first question, because I'd think the answer is "no, you could pick from any of the 3 license types". But yes, in effect, the subscription price is about 1/4 the previous perpetual price (which logic I elaborated on in a forum post I pointed to above: https://community.ad...).

As for your reaching out to ask Adobe your questions, you could do that on the Adobe forum thread I'd mentioned, "the post announcing CF2025", at https://community.ad... They have been responding to some questions there (though they have not responded to another I asked there regarding licensing: still, give it a shot.) I'm sure you're not the only one with the question. They could and should add it to the FAQ or licensing pages for clarification.

I'm just saying that I can't answer it, and I don't have different connections: I'd ask the same way (as indeed, I just said I did). :-)

And if they don't answer there (or you don't want to ask there), I'd offered also in my post their "install support" email address [email protected]. If they can't answer you, they will get the question to someone who can.

Finally, as I acknowledged in the post, this whole licensing change is a doozy, and it will take months if not years for us all to sort it out--perhaps even for some within Adobe.

Uday, I assume you're speaking in your role as a member of the cf team. Thanks.

But can you clarify that you mean the running cf instance is what does the checking, like it does now for activation? Just want to be clear, since things are confusing about the NUL license being tied to a single user id. Does that user have to somehow be involved in this check-in process? Its just so strange for a server product like cf.

And what if one licenses under the other FRL license type?

No, everyone is not paying 2200% more for cf2025. That would be about $220k for a cf enterprise license, compared to the typical cost of about 9500 for a previous perpetual license. That's about 78k per year, for those 3 years you mention. Is that indeed what you're being quoted? I suppose it's possible.
It may not be your only option, though.

First I'll say it's not new that the EULA is written as it is: it's essentially the same as for the past few releases. (But yes, there are complaints over the years from various folks who said that Adobe asserted they needed to change to some sort of core licensing. It's not been the norm at all, at least that I've heard.) But again you have other options beside leaving ACF.

One is running on the AMIs on either AWS or Azure. Those have their own licensing and cost (per hour). Another is running cf via a host, which again have their own cf licensing agreements and costs. Or as you say you can plead to Adobe that you won't pay that amount, and ask what c
they can do to make it work for you.

I'll say this as well: many people have assigned far more cores to a cf machine than are needed. I've helped many people lower their resource requirements SUBSTANTIALLY, by modest tuning efforts (hours of work, saving tens of thousands in both hardware and OS costs as well as cf licensing costs).

I appreciate that last point may ring hollow, if one presumes they've "done all that can be done" regarding tuning. I'll say this: you won't pay me for time you don't find valuable, so you have nothing to lose but perhaps a couple of hours--with the chance of saving even potentially "2200%" of the cost of my time. :-)

Of course, some people are just looking for a reason to leave cf, if they've always held it in derision, or perhaps it's been a pain point for them (for any of many potential reasons, some which are themselves often more easily resolved than some would think).

I get that you may have just wanted to vent. Perhaps you're not even interested in any help or any apologetics on behalf of Adobe. But you did sound off on my blog, and naturally I'm inclined (indeed expected by most here) to share my opinion. :-) It's just one of many, of course.

But that help I can offer may be a more rare commodity. I hope you or anyone in your situation would consider it before pulling the plug.

Wonderful to hear, both that you were able to work things out with Adobe, and for your kind regards. Glad to have helped even just a little with my words here. And thanks for the "coffee"(s) that you proceeded to buy. Much appreciated!