MACROMEDIA COLDFUSION 4.5 Use Manual

Allaire Corporation

Using

ColdFusion Studio

ColdFusion Studio 4.5

for Windows

®

95/98/NT4/2000

Copyright Notice

This manual, as well as the software described in it, is furnished under license and may

be used or copied only in accordance with the terms of such license. The content of

this manual is furnished for informational use only, is subject to change without

notice, and should not be construed as a commitment by Allaire Corporation. Allaire

Corporation assumes no responsibility or liability for any errors or inaccuracies that

may appear in this book.

Except as permitted by such license, no part of this publication may be reproduced,

stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,

mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of Allaire

Corporation.

ColdFusion and HomeSite are federally registered trademarks of Allaire Corporation.

HomeSite, the ColdFusion logo and the Allaire logo are trademarks of Allaire

Corporation in the USA and other countries. All other products or name brands are

the trademarks of their respective holders.

Part number: AA-45STU-RK

Contents

Welcome to ColdFusion Studio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

Intended Audience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xii

Introduction to the ColdFusion 4.5 Web Application Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xii

Development Features in ColdFusion Studio 4.5. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

About ColdFusion Documentation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv

Documentation updates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv

ColdFusion manuals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv

ColdFusion Server online documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv

ColdFusion Studio online documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv

Developer Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvi

Allaire ColdFusion Developer Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvi

ColdFusion Web Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvi

Making Web sites accessible to visually impaired visitors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvi

Contacting Allaire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii

Chapter 1 Exploring the Workspace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

The Workspace Areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Setting workspace options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Working in the Resource Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Resource tabs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Creating and Browsing Files in the Document Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Edit tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Browse tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Design tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Tracking Your Work in the Results Window. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Getting the Most from the Help System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Opening dialog box Help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Accessing Help References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Bookmarking Help topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Searching Help References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Extending the Help system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Adding Help References to the booktree structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Adding media content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

iv Contents

Chapter 2 Managing Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

About the Files Tab. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Working with Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Setting startup options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Opening files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Opening recently used files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Adding a link to an open file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Saving files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Changing the File List Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Dragging Files from Windows Explorer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Building a Favorite Folders List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Working with Files on Remote Servers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Downloading Web Pages. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Chapter 3 Configuring Web Browsers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Configuring the Internal Browser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Setting the internal browser options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Configuring External Browsers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Selecting a save option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Using the external browser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Chapter 4 Connecting to Servers via FTP and HTTP . . . . . . 41

Required Server Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Connecting to an FTP Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Overview of Remote Development Services. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Managing ColdFusion security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Configuring an RDS Server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Managing Servers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Chapter 5 Adding Server Mappings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Understanding Development Mappings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Mapping for page processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Mapping for debugging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Understanding RDS Mappings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

File mapping examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Defining a Server Mapping. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Chapter v

Chapter 6 Writing Code and Web Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Inserting Code. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

Inserting tags from the QuickBar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

Selecting tags from the Tag Chooser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Selecting a Color Coding Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Setting the supported file types for a scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Setting the tag display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Using Inline Tools to Enter Code. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Tag Insight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Function Insight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Tag Completion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Auto Completion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Code Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Extended characters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Using Code Generating Tools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Adding Document Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Using Keyboard Shortcuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Saving Code Blocks as Snippets. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Sharing snippets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Adding snippet shortcut keys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Chapter 7 Accessing Data Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Introduction to Database Tools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Registering Data Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Accessing Allaire Spectra data sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Connecting to Data Sources. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Viewing Data Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Using SQL Builder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

The SQL Builder interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Writing SQL statements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Building a SELECT Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

Testing a Query . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Editing a Query . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Inserting SQL into a Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

Chapter 8 Exchanging Data via XML . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

An Overview of Distributed Data for the Web . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

WDDX Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Working with Application-Level Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

vi Contents

Data Exchange Across Application Servers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Time Zone Processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

How WDDX Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

Converting CFML Data to a JavaScript Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

Transferring Data from Browser to Server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

Chapter 9 Editing Pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Setting Options on the Editor Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Selecting Code and Text Blocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Saving Text to the Multiple-Entry Clipboard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Setting the clip entry limit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Using Collapsing Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

Setting options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

Using Tag Editors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Using the Tag Tree and Tag Inspector. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Navigating a document structure in the Tag Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Editing code in the Tag Inspector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

Creating and editing event handler script blocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Preserving Code Formats with CodeSweepers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Selecting a CodeSweeper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Running a CodeSweeper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Managing CodeSweepers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

Allaire CodeSweeper settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

HTML Tidy settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Formatting Pages with Cascading Style Sheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

About the Style Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Chapter 10 Debugging Application Code

from ColdFusion Studio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Interactive Debugger Overview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

Configuring RDS from the Debugger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

Specifying Server Mappings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

Running the Interactive Debugger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

The Debugger toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Debug windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

Debugging across multiple pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Stepping through code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Evaluating expressions and setting watches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Debugger Shortcut Keys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

Chapter vii

Chapter 11 Using Projects for Site Management . . . . . . . 101

What is a Project? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102

Creating a Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102

Working in the Project Resources Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Configuring project options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Accessing project properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

About Project Folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Manual-inclusive and auto-inclusive physical folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

The project file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Folder types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

Managing Project Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

Working with folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

Working with files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Working with Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Additional Project Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Working in a Source Control System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Why use source control? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Supported source control systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Setting up a project in source control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Chapter 12 Deploying Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

Setting Project Level Deployment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Setting Folder Level Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Relative to the Parent Folder Deployment Location option . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Specific Deployment Location option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Do Not Upload option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Adding Deployment Servers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Running the Deployment Wizard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116

Deploying directly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116

Using deployment scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Managing deployment scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

Saving deployment results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

Chapter 13 Customizing the Development Environment 119

The Visual Tools Markup Language (VTML) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Customizing Tag Chooser and Expression Builder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Dialog Definition Files. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

Creating Tag Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

Creating a tag definition file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124

Defining attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

Defining attribute categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

viii Contents

Building Tag Editors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Defining controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Populating dialog boxes with tag data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

Generating a tag . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Variables passed to the layout template . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Special variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Adding Tag Help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

Providing Help from an external file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

VTML Container/Control Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Building Custom Wizards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

Saving wizard files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

Creating Wizard Definition Pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

VTML for Wizards tag summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

VTML for Wizards tag reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

Dynamic expressions in tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

Bound controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

Creating Wizard Output Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Expressions and functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

WIZ Tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162

WIZML reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

Wizard Definition Page Library . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165

Chapter 14 Scripting the Visual Tools Object Model . . . . 171

Writing and Executing Scripts in Allaire Visual Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

Application Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

Table of CommandID Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186

Table of SettingID Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

DocumentCache Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197

ActiveDocument Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

DeploymentManager Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

Special notes about project folder names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

HTTPProvider Object. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208

ZIPProvider Object. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

ActiveScripting examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220

JScript . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220

VBScript . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222

Third-Party Add-Ins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224

Welcome to ColdFusion Studio

ColdFusion Studio is a powerful and flexible tool for building, testing, and deploying

dynamic Web applications.

It is also an easy to use tool to create and edit Web content, with support for a variety

of scripting languages.

Contents

• Intended Audience...................................................................................................... x

• Introduction to the ColdFusion 4.5 Web Application Server................................... x

• Development Features in ColdFusion Studio 4.5 .................................................... xi

• About ColdFusion Documentation ......................................................................... xii

• Developer Resources................................................................................................ xiv

• Contacting Allaire...................................................................................................... xv

x Intended Audience

Intended Audience

The principal audience for this user guide is professional Web developers who have a

working knowledge of HTML and Web server environments. The focus is on

introducing you to Studio’s interface and development tools.

Introduction to the ColdFusion 4.5 Web Application Server

The ColdFusion 4.5 release focuses on fundamentals — the fundamentals of delivering

your e-business: faster development, better reliability, enhanced scalability, expanded

integration, and stronger security.

At the center of the ColdFusion 4.5 release is an application server platform that's been

highly optimized with new functionality and native support for UNIX. As a result, your

e-business systems will run better and do more. With this release we're launching a

new edition of ColdFusion Server for Linux so you can take advantage of the reliability

and performance of the hottest new Internet server operating system.

While optimizing the core server, we also enhanced fundamental features including

email integration, server-side FTP and HTTP, advanced security, scheduling, and

database connectivity — again giving you more reliability and new functionality.

The focus on fundamentals extends to new features. As part of a broad new

commitment to Java, ColdFusion 4.5 has a range of new Java integration options from

Java CFXs to Java Servlet support to Java object and EJB connectivity. In ColdFusion

Studio 4.5, we added new tools to make you more productive including a flexible new

project architecture that makes managing and deploying complex Web applications a

snap. On the server, we focused on reliability, performance and security with features

such as service-level fail-over, Cisco Local Director integration, and OS security

integration.

Whether you're revolutionizing your company's HR operations, building the next

generation of your firm's global intranet, or launching the next killer .COM company,

you'll find the speed, scalability, connectivity, and security you need in ColdFusion 4.5.

Welcome to ColdFusion Studio xi

Development Features in ColdFusion Studio 4.5

A wide range of features are available in ColdFusion 4.5 for application development

and for creating Web content.

Allaire FTP & RDS — Manage all your files from a single interface that integrates access

to the Windows file system, ColdFusion server via Remote Development Servers (RDS),

and FTP servers.

Advanced Project Management — Manage complex Web application development

projects using physical, virtual, and auto-inclusive folders, resource browsing, and

direct access to version source control applications.

Scriptable Project Deployment — Write in VBScript or JScript to script application

deployment, with granular control over file uploads, to multiple server configurations

with FTP or RDS.

Editing — Easy tag selection, customizable language color coding, collaspe code

blocks, edit code in the Tag Inspector property sheet interface, navigate code hierarchy

in Tag Tree.

Function Insight — Insert function syntax as you type.

Code validation — Configurable for multiple versions of HTML, CFML, SMIL, and

browser-specific tags.

Image Map Editor — Create image maps right in ColdFusion Studio with a new

easy-to-use visual tool.

TopStyle Lite CSS Editor — Create and edit standards-compliant cascading style sheets

to easily control the look and feel of your web applications.

Wireless Support — Build wireless Web applications quickly and easily with the

complete set of Wireless Markup Language (WML) and Handhelp Markup Language

(HDML) visual tools.

CodeSweeper — Enforce code formatting with customizable rules.

Browsers — Preview pages in multiple browsers, with automatic detection of installed

browsers.

Proofing and Testing tools — Maintain site content with search and replace, spell

checking, code validation, and link verification.

Code templates — Quickly insert common text blocks and expand abbreviations.

Snippets — Save code blocks and content for reuse.

Templates and Wizards — Quickly create basic pages, tables, frames, JavaScript and

DHTML elements, and synchronized RealAudio content.

Image preview — View Web images and their properties.

User macros — Automate tasks by scripting the Visual Tools Object Model (VTOM).

xii About ColdFusion Documentation

About ColdFusion Documentation

ColdFusion documentation is designed to provide support for all components of the

ColdFusion development system. Both the print and online versions are organized to

allow you to quickly locate the information you need.

In addition to the book set, the documentation is provided in two other formats:

• HTML — Browser-based Help references.

• Adobe Acrobat (PDF) — Available from the root level on the product CD-ROM

and from the Developer area of Allaire’s Web site at http://www.allaire.com/

developer

.

Documentation updates

Late additions and corrections to ColdFusion printed documentation are listed in the

Documentation Updates page. To reach this page, open the Welcome to ColdFusion

page installed with ColdFusion, where you’ll find links to the update page as well as

links to other pages containing useful information about ColdFusion, Allaire support

options, and Allaire products and services.

For ColdFusion Studio users, you can access the Documentation Update page in the

Allaire Support folder in Help References.

ColdFusion manuals

The core ColdFusion documentation set consists of the following titles.

Administering ColdFusion Server

Includes instructions for installing ColdFusion Server. Describes configuration options

for maximizing performance, managing data sources, setting security levels, and a

range of development and site management tasks. If you are administering a

ColdFusion site, you’ll need this book to help plan and implement ColdFusion

security, load balancing, and for details about tuning the ColdFusion application

server.

Developing Web Applications with ColdFusion

Presents the fundamentals of ColdFusion application development and deployment.

Also includes detailed information about ColdFusion data sources, user interfaces,

and Web technologies.

CFML Language Reference

Provides the complete syntax, with example code, of all CFML tags and functions.

Welcome to ColdFusion Studio xiii

Using ColdFusion Studio

Documents everything you need to know about using ColdFusion Studio, including

features like projects, source control integration, as well as the Studio workspace and

interface.

Quick Reference to CFML

A valuable quick reference to CFML tags, functions, and variables.

ColdFusion Server online documentation

To view the HTML documentation, open the following URL: http://127.0.0.1/

cfdocs/dochome.htm

.

Note that because the Verity search libraries are not available on Linux for this release,

the online documentation search facility is not functional on Linux. If you try to open

the search page, a message box opens to explain why the facility is not available.

Acrobat versions of all ColdFusion documentation are available from the root level on

the product CD. If you don’t have a product CD, you can download ColdFusion

documentation from the Allaire web site by visiting

http://www.allaire.com/

developer

and clicking the Documentation link.

ColdFusion Studio online documentation

Click the Help resource tab in ColdFusion Studio to view online Help pages. The help

tree contains ColdFusion documentation and a number of additional developer

resources. Studio online documentation is searchable and individual pages can be

bookmarked.

As you code your work, you can use the online HTML Reference to check syntax and

usage. You can open it from the Help References or press place the cursor in an HTML

and press F1. F1 help is available for all the supported languages. Open the Tag

Chooser (Ctrl+E) to view the list.

To learn about creating and modifying editor dialogs for tags, see Customizing the

Development Environment.

Power users and application developers can take advantage of the Visual Tools Object

Model to automate tasks and to call HomeSite functionality from other programs.

xiv Developer Resources

Developer Resources

This section is a brief listing of CFML resources.

Allaire ColdFusion Developer Center

The Developer Center at http://www.allaire.com/developer/referenceDesk/index.cfm

contains all the latest information on ColdFusion and offers tutorials, technical

articles, and links to other resources.

ColdFusion Web Resources

Following are just a few of many site dedicated to CFML development.

• CF Advisor Online at http://www.cfadvisor.com/api-shl/engine.cfm.

• Haznet’s Fallout shelter, a CF portal, at http://www.hudziak.com/haznet/

cfml.html.

• ColdFusion Developer’s Journal, online version of the popular print journal, at

http://www.sys-con.com/coldfusion/index2.cfm.

Making Web sites accessible to visually impaired visitors

The W3C Web Accessibility Initiative at http://www.w3.org/WAI/ provides a great deal

of practical information about designing applications and interfaces for the broadest

range of users. Allaire supports user accessibility in its product interfaces and is

striving to fully implement the WAI recommendations.

Simple steps, such as providing a text alternative for images, graphics, and animations,

and using clear descriptive text for page elements and navigation, can make a world of

difference to a visually impaired user’s experience of your site. Validation tools are

available on the site to check compliance with established standards.

Welcome to ColdFusion Studio xv

Contacting Allaire

Please contact Allaire for sales and support information.

Corporate headquarters

Allaire Corporation

275 Grove Street

Newton, MA 02446

Telephone: 617.219.2000

Fax: 617.219.2001

http://www.allaire.com

Customer Service

Contact Allaire customer service to inquire about product orders and to obtain

corporate and product information and an Allaire username and password.

Hours: 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM Eastern time.

Toll Free US & Canada: 888.939.2545

Local & International: 617.219.2100

Email: info@allaire.com

Sales

Toll Free: 888.939.2545

Telephone: 617.219.2100

Fax: 617.219.2101

Email: sales@allaire.com

http://www.allaire.com/store

Technical support

Allaire offers a range of telephone and Web-based support options. See the Allaire

Support folder in the online Help References or go to http://www.allaire.com/support/

for a complete description of technical support services.

xvi Contacting Allaire

C HAPTER 1

Exploring the Workspace

This chapter acquaints you with the main areas of the interface. It will also give you

some pointers on customizing the workspace to make all your development work as

productive as possible.

Contents

• The Workspace Areas................................................................................................ 18

• Working in the Resource Windows .......................................................................... 19

• Creating and Browsing Files in the Document Window ........................................ 20

• Tracking Your Work in the Results Window ............................................................ 21

• Getting the Most from the Help System .................................................................. 21

18

The Workspace Areas

The term Workspace describes the user interface that you see when you first load the

program. The workspace has four principal areas:

• Command area — At the top of the workspace is the title bar, which displays

the file path of the current document. Below that is the menu bar, which

contains standard Windows commands plus development menus. Below the

menus are toolbars that provide one-click access to commands and application

tools. To the right is the QuickBar, a tabbed toolbar for inserting JSP, HTML, and

other language elements.

• Resources window — Tabs for file management, data sources, Projects, code

snippets, online Help, and the Tag Inspector.

• Document window — Tabs for writing and browsing pages.

• Results window — Tabs to track search and replace operations, code validation,

link verification, images, project deployment, and compilation. The Console

tab gives you built-in access to the command prompt.

The following illustration shows the main workspace areas.

Exploring the Workspace 19

Setting workspace options

Selecting Options > Settings (F8) opens the control center for user preferences. By

navigating the feature tree in the left pane, you can view and change options for file

management, coding, and testing applications and Web content.

Working in the Resource Windows

The Resource window is a multipanel interface that lets you switch easily among

development resources as you build site content. Several of the panels contain their

own toolbars.

Resource tabs

Following is a summary of each of the Resource tabs:

• The Files tab lets you manage files on local and network drives and on remote

servers. The drop-down list at the top allows you to pick a drive or server, the

bottom two panes display directories and files for the selected drive or server.

• The Database tab is the access point for working with ColdFusion data sources.

• The Projects tab helps you manage site content by organizing pages and

supporting files. You have the option of adding projects to your version source

control system. The drop-down list at the top displays recent projects. The

bottom two panes display the folders and files for the selected project.

• The Site View tab gives you a visual rendering of the links in the current

document. Right-click in the pane to select a view type and display options.

Right-click on a link to expand the view.

• The Snippets tab gives you a convenient place to store code blocks and content

for reuse. Snippets can also be shared with other users.

• The Help tab contains product documentation and other online resources.

• The Tag Inspector tab lets you edit in an interactive property sheet interface.

The top pane is the Tag Tree, a customizable view of the document hierarchy.

The bottom pane is the Tag Inspector, where you can edit code without having

to work in the Document window directly.

20

Creating and Browsing Files in the Document Window

The Document window is where code and other content are entered and edited.

Edit tab

The Editor has many productivity features for creating and editing code, content, and

navigation structures. You can easily insert tags, generate code, and add content from

text files, Microsoft Office applications, or directly from the Web. You can easily create

templates to insert common content.

The Editor toolbar extends vertically to the left and below the Edit tab in the Document

window.

Browse tab

Click the Browse tab or press F12 to process the current document in the internal

browser.

The Browse toolbar displays at the top of the Document window when you select the

Browse tab. You can use it to browse open documents, refresh the display, and access

browser tools. The document URL displays based on the current server mapping. See

“Adding Server Mappings” on page 45 for details.

Press F11 to view the document in the external browser. See “Configuring External

Browsers” on page 38 for details.

Design tab

This mode allows WYSIWYG creation and editing of HTML page elements. You can set

display and CodeSweeper formatting options in the Options > Settings > Design pane.

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