Adobe ColdFusion is a commercial rapid web application development platform created by JJ Allaire in 1995. ColdFusion ColdFusion was originally designed to make it easier. connect simple HTML pages to a database. By version 2 (1996), it became a full platform that included an IDE in addition to a full scripting language.
One of the distinguishing features of ColdFusion is its associated scripting language, ColdFusion Markup Language (CFML). CFML compares to the scripting components of ASP, JSP, and PHP, but its tag syntax more closely matches HTML, while its script syntax resumes JavaScript. ColdFusion is often used with CFML, but there are additional CFML application servers besides ColdFusion, and ColdFusion supports programming languages other than CFML, such as server-side Actionscript and embedded scripts that can be written in a JavaScript-like language known as CFScript. Originally a product of Allaire and released on July 2, 1995, ColdFusion was developed by Joseph J. Allaire and Jeremy Allaire. In 2001 Allaire was acquired by Macromedia, which in turn was acquired by Adobe Systems Inc in 2005. ColdFusion is most often used for data-driven websites or intranets, but can also be used to generate services such as REST services, websockets, SOAP web services, or Flash remoting. It is especially well-suited to the server-side technology to the client-side ajax. ColdFusion can also handle asynchronous events such as SMS and instant messaging via its gateway interface, available in ColdFusion MX 7 Enterprise Edition.
ColdFusion provides additional features out of the box. Main features include: The engine was written in C and featured, a built-in scripting language (CFScript), a plugin module written in Java, and a syntax very similar to HTML. The equivalent to an HTML element, a ColdFusion tag begins with the letters “CF” followed by a name that is indicative of what is the tag, in HTML. Eg <cfoutput> & gt; to begin the output of variables or other content. In addition to CFScript and plugins (as described), CFStudio provided a design platform with a WYSIWYG display. In addition to ColdFusion, CFStudio also supports syntax in other languages for backend programming, such as Perl. In addition to making a backend.
All versions of ColdFusion Prior to 6.0 were written using Microsoft Visual C ++. This meant that ColdFusion was largely limited to running on Microsoft Windows, but did not boot ColdFusion to Sun Solaris starting with version 3.1. The Allaire company was sold to Macromedia, then Macromedia was sold to Adobe. Earlier versions were not as robust as the versions available from version 4.0 forward. With the release of ColdFusion MX 6.0, the engine had been re-written in Java and supported by its own runtime environment, which was easily replaced by its configuration options with the runtime environment from Sun. Version 6.1 included the ability to code and debug Shockwave Flash.
Version 3.1 brought to the Sun Solaris operating system. Cold Fusion studio has a live preview page and HTML syntax checker.
“Cold Fusion” moniker renamed simply as “ColdFusion” – possibly to distinguish it from Cold fusion theory.
Version 4.5 brought the ability to natively invoke Java objects, execute system commands, and talk directly to a Java EE server.
First release from Macromedia after the Allaire Corporation acquisition. The last to be legacy coded for a specific platform. On January 16, 2001, Allaire announced a pending merger with Macromedia. Macromedia continued its development and released the product under the name ColdFusion 5.0. It retained the name “ColdFusion” through the remainder of version 5 releases.
Prior to 2000, Edwin Smith, Allaire Architect on JRun and later the Flash Player, initiated a project codenamed “Neo”. This project was later revealed to ColdFusion Server re-written completely using Java. This makes it easier to provide a layer of security on the server, because it ran inside a Java Runtime Environment. In June 2002 Macromedia released the version 6.0 product under a slightly different name, ColdFusion MX, allowing the product to be associated with Macromedia brand and its original branding. ColdFusion MX was completely rebuilt from the ground up and was based on the Java EE platform. ColdFusion MX was designed with Macromedia Flash using Flash Remoting. With the release of ColdFusion MX, the CFML language API was released with an OOP interface.
With the release of ColdFusion 7.0 on February 7, 2005, the naming convention was amended, rendering the product name “Macromedia ColdFusion MX 7” (the codename for CFMX7 was “Blackstone”). CFMX 7 added Flash-based and XForms-based web forms, and a report builder that provides Adobe FlashPaper, RTF, and Excel. The Adobe PDF output is also available as a wrapper to any HTML page, converting that page to a printable document. The enterprise edition also added Gateways. These services, SMS, Directory Watchers, and an asynchronous execution. XML support has been boosted in this version to include native schema checking. ColdFusion MX 7.0.1 (codename “Merrimack”) added support for Mac OS X, improvements to Flash forms, RTF support for CFReport, the new CFCPRoxy feature for Java / CFC integration, and more. ColdFusion MX 7.0.2 (codenamed “Mystic”) included in the CF Report Builder.
On July 30, 2007, Adobe Systems released ColdFusion 8, dropping “MX” from its name. During beta testing the codename used was “Scorpio” (the eighth sign of the zodiac and the eighth of ColdFusion as a commercial product). More than 14,000 developers worldwide were active in the beta process – many more testers than the 5,000 Adobe Systems originally expected. The ColdFusion development team based on Newton / Boston, Massachusetts and offshore in Bangalore, India. Some of the new features are the CFPDFFORM tag, which enables integration with Adobe Acrobat forms, some image manipulation functions, Microsoft .NET integration, and the CFPRESENTATION tag, which allows the creation of dynamic presentations using Adobe Acrobat Connect, the Web-based collaboration solution formerly known as Macromedia Breeze. In addition, the ColdFusion Administrator for the Enterprise version ships with built-in server monitoring. ColdFusion 8 is available on several operating systems including Linux, Mac OS X and Windows Server 2003. Other additions to ColdFusion 8 are built-in Ajax widgets, file handling archive (CFZIP), Microsoft Exchange server integration (CFEXCHANGE), image manipulation including automatic CAPTCHA generation (CFIMAGE), multi-threading, per-application settings, Atom and RSS feeds, enhanced enhancements, enhanced encryption libraries, improved network and structure improvements debugging, embedded database support with Apache Derby, and a more ECMAScript compliant CFSCRIPT. For development of ColdFusion applications, several tools are available: mainly Adobe Dreamweaver CS4, Macromedia HomeSite 5.x, CFEclipse, Eclipse and others. “Tag updaters” are available for these applications to update their support for the new ColdFusion 8 features.
ColdFusion 9 (Codenamed: Centaur) was released on October 5, 2009. New features for CF9 include:
ColdFusion 10 (Codenamed: Zeus) was released on May 15, 2012. New and improved features (Standard, Enterprise, and Developer) include (but are not limited to): CF10 was originally referred to by the codename Zeus, After first being confirmed by Adobe at MAX 2010, and during much of its prerelease period. It was also commonly referred to as “ColdFusion next” and “ColdFusion X” in blogs, on Twitter, etc., before Adobe finally confirmed it would be “ColdFusion 10”. For much of 2010, Adam Lehman’s ColdFusion Product Manager toured the US setting up countless meetings with customers, developers, and user groups to formulate a master blueprint for the next feature set. In September 2010, he presented the plans to Adobe where they were given full support and approval by upper management. The first public beta of ColdFusion 10 was released via Adobe Labs on 17 February 2012.
ColdFusion 11 (Codenamed: Splendor) was released on April 29, 2014. Includes:
Adobe ColdFusion (2016 release), Codenamed: Raijin (and also knownly generically as ColdFusion) 2016) was released on February 16, 2016. Includes:
ColdFusion 13 is codenamed Aether. Aether is the Greek god of the upper atmosphere.
On August 13, 2012 Adobe announced the new Roadmap for ColdFusion including the code names, “Splendor”, “Thunder” and “Dazzle”, for the next two release versions. Adobe announced new features for ColdFusion including (but not limited to); Mobile – Streamlined Mobile Application Development, Revamped and new PDF functionalities, Enabling Enterprise to easily integrate with Social Media Streams, Enterprise mobility, Multi-content support for responsive, Digital Marketing-Web, Mobile & Social Analytics and Customizable Enterprise Video Portal. Adobe also announced in the same Roadmap upcoming cloud enhancements. The Roadmap ColdFusion projects development out to the year 2021.
ColdFusion can generate PDF documents using standard HTML (ie, no additional coding is needed to generate documents for print). CFML authors place HTML and CSS within a pair of cfdocument tags (or new in ColdFusion 11, cfhtmltopdf tags). The generated document can be saved to the client’s browser. ColdFusion 8 also introduces the PDF document. These tags, but do not use Adobe’s PDF engine, but do not use it. JPedal Java PDF library and the open source Java library iText, and cfhtmltopdf uses an embedded WebKit implementation.
ColdFusion was originally designed for PHP version 3 and below. ColdFusion falls into the category of OO languages that do not support multiple inheritance (along with Java, Smalltalk, etc.). With the MX release (6+), ColdFusion introduces basic OO functionalities with the component language that builds classes in OO languages. Each component may contain any number of properties and methods. One component may also extend another (Inheritance). Components only support single inheritance. Object handling feature set and performance enhancing has occurred with subsequent releases. With the release of ColdFusion 8, Java-style interfaces are supported. ColdFusion components use the file extension cfc to differentiate them from ColdFusion templates (.cfm).
Component methods can be made available with no additional coding and configuration. All that is required is for a method ‘s access to be declared’ remote ‘. ColdFusion automatically generates a WSDL at the URL for this component: This will invoke the component’s search function, passing “your query” and “strict” as arguments. This type of invocation is well-suited for Ajax-enabled applications. ColdFusion 8 introduced the ability to serialize ColdFusion data structures to JSON for consumption on the client. The ColdFusion server will automatically generate documentation for you. This is an application of component introspection, available to developers of ColdFusion components. Access to a component’s documentation requires a password. ColdFusion server by browsing the ColdFusion URL. This interface resembles the Javadoc HTML documentation for Java classes.
ColdFusion provides several ways to implement custom tags, ie those not included ColdFusion language. These are especially useful for providing a familiar interface for web designers and content authors with HTML but not imperative programming. The traditional and most common way is using CFML. A standard CFML page can be interpreted as a tag, with the tag corresponding to the file name prefixed to “cf_”. For example, the IMAP.cfm file can be used as the “cf_imap” tag. Attributes used within the ATTRIBUTES scope of the tag implementation page. CFML pages are accessible in the same directory as the calling page, via a special directory in the ColdFusion web application, or via a CFIMPORT tag in the calling page. The latter method does not require the “cf_” prefix for the tag name. A second way is the development of CFX tags using Java or C ++. CFX tags are prefixed with “cfx_”, for example “cfx_imap”. Tags are added to the ColdFusion runtime environment using the ColdFusion administrator, where JAR or DLL files are registered as custom tags. Finally, ColdFusion supports JSP tag libraries from the JSP 2.0 language specification. JSP tags are included in CFML pages using the CFIMPORT tag. Finally, ColdFusion supports JSP tag libraries from the JSP 2.0 language specification. JSP tags are included in CFML pages using the CFIMPORT tag. Finally, ColdFusion supports JSP tag libraries from the JSP 2.0 language specification. JSP tags are included in CFML pages using the CFIMPORT tag.
The ColdFusion standard installs the deployment of ColdFusion as a file, or as Macromedia JRun, and IBM WebSphere. Apache Tomcat and Mortbay Jetty, but because these platforms do not officially support ColdFusion, they leave many of its features inaccessible. As of ColdFusion 10 Macromedia JRun was replaced by Apache Tomcat. Because ColdFusion is a Java EE application, ColdFusion code can be mixed with Java classes to create a variety of applications and use existing Java libraries. ColdFusion has access to all of the Java classes, JSP custom tags, and can access JSP context contexts (GetPageContext). Prior to ColdFusion 7.0.1, ColdFusion components could only be used by Java or .NET by declaring them as web services. However, beginning in ColdFusion MX 7.0.1, ColdFusion components can be used directly within Java classes using the CFCProxy class. Jython, Groovy and JRuby. ColdFusion was one of the first scripting platforms to allow this style of Java development.
ColdFusion 8 natively supports .NET within the CFML syntax. ColdFusion developers can simply call any .NET assembly without needing to recompile or alter the assemblies in any way. Data types are automatically translated between ColdFusion and .NET (example: .NET DataTable → ColdFusion Query). A unique feature for a Java EE vendor, ColdFusion 8 offers the ability to access .NET Remotely Assemblies through Proxy (without the use of .NET Remoting). This allows ColdFusion users to leverage .NET without Windows operating system.
The acronym for the ColdFusion Markup Language is CFML. When ColdFusion templates are saved to disk, they are traditionally given the extension .cfm or .cfml. The .cfc extension is used for ColdFusion Components. The original extension was DBM or DBML, which stood for Database Markup Language. When talking about ColdFusion, most users use the acronym CF and this is used for numerous ColdFusion resources such as user groups (CFUGs) and sites. CFMX is the common abbreviation for ColdFusion versions 6 and 7 (aka ColdFusion MX).
ColdFusion originated as proprietary technology based on Web technology industry standards. However, it is becoming a closed technology through the availability of competing products. Such alternative products include (in alphabetical order):
In March 2013, ColdFusion 8, 9 and 10 left the National Vulnerability Database open to attack. The vulnerability had been identified and released by Adobe for CF9 and CF10 in January. In April 2013, ColdFusion vulnerability was blamed by Linode for an intrusion into the Linotype Manager control panel website. A security bulletin and hotfix for this had been issued by Adobe a week earlier. In May 2013, the latest version of ColdFusion on any servers, which has not been locked. The vulnerability allows unauthorized users to upload malicious scripts and possibly gain full control over the server. A security bulletin and hotfix for this issue 6 days later. This vulnerability is currently unknown for ColdFusion 9 and ColdFusion 10 (currently supported versions). In April 2015 there was reported a cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in Adobe ColdFusion 10 before Update 16, and in ColdFusion 11 before Update 5, which allows remote arbitrary arbitrary web script or HTML; however, it’s exploitable only by users who have authenticated through the administration panel.