Cold Fusion Professional in HTML Creating Commercial Websites

Cold Fusion Professional in HTML Creating Commercial Websites, This is a self-contained Web database tool; about the only other things you need to put your database on the Web are your database and server.

It can be used to create a wide variety of applications that integrate relational databases with the Web on the Internet (or on Intranets).

Source: Allaire Corp.(http://www.allaire.com/); free demo available.

Databases supported:

  • Any ODBC-compliant database
  • Microsoft SQL Server
  • Borland dBase III and dBase IV
  • Microsoft Access 1.0, 2.0 and 7.0
  • Informix with the vendor-supplied ODBC-UNIX drivers
  • Microsoft FoxPro 2.0, 2.5, and 2.6
  • Microsoft Excel 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0
  • Sybase with the vendor-supplied ODBC-UNIX drivers
  • Borland Paradox 3.x and 4.x
  • Watcom SQL 4.0
  • Oracle 7.0 with the vendor-supplied ODBC-UNIX drivers
  • Plain text files

Platforms supported:

  • Windows NT 3.51
  • Windows 95

System Requirements:

  • 80386 or higher microprocessor; Pentium recommended
  • 10MB free hard disk space
  • 24MB RAM for Windows NT or 16MB RAM for Windows 95 (32MB recommended)
  • TCP/IP networking software installed and running
  • A Windows NT or Windows 95 compatible World Wide Web server.

Web Servers Supported:

  • O’Reilly Web site
  • Netscape HTTPD
  • Microsoft Internet Server
  • Process Purveyor
  • EMWAC HTTPS
  • Internet Factory System
  • Spry Web Server
  • CSM Alibaba

If you are using one of these products, you can be assured that your server is fully supported. If, however, you are using another product, your server may still be supported. Your best bet is to check the support area of the Allaire Web site for information on your particular server.

Overview

 

Cold Fusion is a low-cost (under $500) Windows-based program that enables you to edit and enter information, create and read cookies, perform conditional queries, dynamically send mail, create thread-based discussion groups, create order forms, and even create “shopping cart” systems.

Cold Fusion uses a template language called DBML (Database Markup Language) to create queries on your database and structure the results,

so no CGI or C++ coding is required, and getting your database on the Web is fairly easy. (DBML tags are similar to HTML tags, which makes them easy to use and understand.)

With Cold Fusion, developers can build applications by combining standard HTML with high-level database commands stored in templates

(which is theoretically faster and more flexible than first generation, code-intensive techniques). Using Cold Fusion, developers can create dynamic Web sites and full-scale Web applications.

The basic functions of Cold Fusion are

  • submit database queries that can then be used to dynamically generate Web pages. For example, you can use database query results to create menus (for product or other information), populate select boxes, and produce document lists.
  • To intermix the results of queries with HTML tags and text for complete control over how data is displayed and formatted.
  • track users and customize their view of Web pages by using information about their browser, location, or other preferences.
  • insert and update records in database tables with HTML forms.
  • present the results of queries in attractively formatted tables.
  • send e-mail messages (SMTP) that use address and message content from database queries.

A Cold Fusion Web application uses templates instead of static HTML documents. A template is a text file that contains both HTML and Cold Fusion’s Database Markup Language (DBML).

Rather than being sent directly to the user’s browser, templates are first processed by Cold Fusion, which generates a standard HTML page that is then sent to the viewer’s browser.

DBML contains a set of commands that tell Cold Fusion how to interact with the databases, validate form submissions, and process database output. (See Figure 13.1.)

Figure 13.1. How Cold Fusion works when a Web browser invokes a Cold Fusion template, straight from the horse’s mouth.

Here’s how it works:

  1. The viewer clicks the Submit button on a form or a hypertext link on a page; the viewer’s Web browser then sends a request to the Web server.
  2. The server opens a Cold Fusion process, passing it the data submitted by the browser and pointing it to the appropriate template file.
  3. Cold Fusion then reads the data from the client, in turn processing DBML commands used in the template, including the type of request to send to the database and the format that should be used to present information to the results page.
  4. Using ODBC, Cold Fusion interacts with the database.
  5. A dynamically generated HTML page, containing the results of the form submission or query, is returned by Cold Fusion to the Web server. (Cold Fusion can also dynamically generate e-mail messages containing the results of the query.)
  6. The Web server sends the generated HTML page to the viewer’s browser.

This system is very flexible because of the wide range of database interaction and data handling options available through DBML.

Though Cold Fusion isn’t the fastest program on the market, and is limited in the functions that are available, it is worthy of consideration.

Overall,

Cold Fusion is simple to use, inexpensive (for a commercial product such as this), includes pretty good documentation, eliminates the need to learn complex CGI programming in order to provide crucial features

(for example, customizing Web pages, tracking users, integrating databases), and is flexible enough to be used by small companies to create good live database applications.

If you have to put your live database on the Web, but aren’t ready to commit to a product that requires strong programming skills—or a large monetary investment—Cold Fusion could be just the ticket.

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