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Notes from CF Class 1

 (Janet's interpretation of Edlyn's notes--plus some code)

 

What is CF

  An Interface between web and database. Cold Fusion Markup Language

- macro language for HTML – compare to mail mege.

HTML    is not a programming language,

                it has tags,

                it is file based (separate files instead of one big file like Access or VBPPt),

                it is stateless (each page is independent/does not have information from the page before),

Many similarities between HTML and  Cold Fusion--but you can program in CF

HTML code cannot be protected--users can always view it.  They cannot see your CF code. The CF server processes it and sends it to the user as HTML. 

 

ASP:  Active Server Pages--lets you put out web pages--not html based--more like VB.  CF's competition.

 

Apache web server has been installed. 

 

Homesite:  From Allaire the source of CF, this is an editor/code generator for html and cf

 

Path  to class files is Network Neighborhood/Ice/wwwroot/cf-class

 

The following were exercises that Michael set in class and helped us get up and running.

 

First Example:  Hello World HTML

To access your index.html file (using your folder and your index.html file)

http://207.196.87.5/janet/ (the numbers are the IP number address of the machine – instead of machine name such as www.byteback.org) Note: the internet address slashes / go the opposite way from Windows slashes \ in file names and paths.

 

<html>

<head>

<title>

This is Janet's Hello World

</title>

</head>

<body  bgcolor="aqua" text="red">

<h1>Hello World and hello Michael!</h1>

</body>

</html>

 

Second Example: Cold Fusion If,  Set

 

<CFIF   hour ( now( ) )   gt  18>                          gt means greater than (can use > as that is tag delimiter in HTML!)

some code and/or text                        

</CFIF>

The function now() gets the current date/time on the server.

The function hour() gets the hour from the date/time value.                       

If the statement is true, the next line will be processed and the text will be sent to the

If the statement is false, the CF server drops below the close CFIF tag.

 

You can also assign values to variables:  <cfset CurrentHour=hour(now())>

This sets CurrentHour equal to the value obtained by the functions hour and now

Here is a file called  first.cfm file using CurrentHour

 

<html>

<head>

<title>

Using If and Set

</title>

</head>

<body  bgcolor="aqua" text="red">

<h1>Hello World and hello Michael!</h1>

<cfset CurrentHour =hour(now())>

<cfoutput>

#h#

</cfoutput>

<cfif CurrentHour gt 18  >

It is later than 6 PM

<cfelseif CurrentHour gt 2 and CurrentHour lte 6>

It is too early!

<cfelse>

Tea break!

</cfif>

 

</body>

</html>

 

CF is similar to other programming languages.  You can add a CFELSEIF and CFELSE to provide other options.

 

Third Example:  A Simple Form

The Input page puts two text input areas and a button on the page.

<html>

<head>

<title>

Input page

</title>

</head>

<body bgcolor="Lime" text="blue">

<form action="action.cfm" method="post">

 

<input type="text" name="FirstName">

<input type="text" name="LastName">

<input type="submit"  name="submit">

</form>

</body>

</html>

 

The action page

<html>

<head>

                <title>Action Page</title>

</head>

 

<body bgcolor="red" text="white">

<font size=6>Here is the output.

</font>

<cfoutput><h3>First Name

<P>Last Name</h3>

<cfif lastname is "Lathan">

<font size=7 color="yellow">#FirstName#

<P>#UPPER(LastName)#</font>

<cfelse>

<font size=7 color="blue">#FirstName#

<P>#UPPER(LastName)#</font>

</cfif>

</cfoutput>

</body>

</html>

 

 

The is a nice summary of forms at http://junior.apk.net/~jbarta/tutor/forms/quik-index.html

 

We also discussed CFABORT to end process of a page early.

<cfif not isdefined("firstname")>

This is an abort.

<cfabort>

</cfif>

 

and cf comment tags <!--- This is a comment  ---> with one more dash than html.

Note if you use HTML comments with two dashes to comment out CF code then the code will still run and you page will not behave as you expect!

 


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