Other than dying, it is also pretty painful to learn.

If you want to learn a web language, I'd say PHP is the easiest.

posted August 4, 2009

Yes, CF is dying off. PHP is a much better investment.

posted August 4, 2009

There are several user groups that would disagree. The new versions of CF are based on Java, which will be around for a long time.

As for PHP, maybe...there are certainly fans here, but there are fans of other languages on this site as well, and everyone has an opinion.

As someone who's been working in web development since the early 90's, and has used CF with multiple employers, I actually would suggest that he study CF, but that he not rely on it being around forever. It probably will be, but it's not as widely used any more.

Studying CF will give him more than a little introduction in SGML, as well as an introduction to SQL (how much depends on the DB). Understanding DB issues and learning the front-end languages associated with web development (X/HTML, ECMA Script, and CSS) are much more important.

posted August 4, 2009

Both PHP , ASP, are the two he should focus on. PHP is for linux Servers and ASP is generally for Microsoft based Servers. javaScript (not java) is also something he should have some background in.

posted August 4, 2009

Everyone else has already hit the reasons why CF is probably toast, but no one recommended Ruby or Ruby On Rails to go along with PHP for web programming. Also learning Objective C and working on iPhone development if he's looking for commercial jobs in the near future.

posted August 4, 2009

Whether it's true or not, when I think of ColdFusion, I think of a dying platform.

posted August 4, 2009

A dear family friend and the smartest physicist studied it for years with his son after retirement from Naval Research Lab in DC and said it was not what they though but is a real unique event occurring with long term possibilities. Probably like sticky notes glue was a failure as a new strong adhesive but we got the darn notes everywhere now.

posted August 4, 2009

Many years ago a great mentor told me “…languages are easy; it’s the concepts that are hard…”

If you master the concepts of software development you can easily switch between multiple languages and if you’re in it for the long run you will switch languages multiple times.

posted August 4, 2009

I'll add my voice to the chorus saying don't bother with ColdFusion. The few places I know that still use it would like to move away from it, but haven't only for reasons of momentum.

PHP is a good choice because it's ubiquitous and simple to learn. If your kid is planning to do web development for dollars, it's a necessary tool for the tool belt.

Given the choice, though, I would recommend learning Python within the context of a framework such as Django. Python is a great learning language. It's terse, elegant, and powerful.

Links:

• http://python.org
• http://djangoproject.com

posted August 4, 2009

Dear Jim,
Your kid wishes to follow through Cold Fusion. To me that's all what is important.! Anyone who follow through his own dream, will put his gut and the rest to it...

I have known Cold Fusion around for many years. A computer product which stay around so long cannot be a bad thing. Furthermore I am convinced that once your kid will finally discover that this language is over, he will have a genuine asset to help him switch to a new technology.

posted August 4, 2009

Just what I wanted to start my morning off reading...another post asking about ColdFusion being dead.

First, majority of you have chosen to respond to a topic you have no clue about. How is ColdFusion dying when Adobe just released CF9 Beta, which is the most comprehensive and complete CF package to date.

Second, ColdFusion costs less than PHP or .NET to setup as an enterprise solution.

Third, did someone really suggest ASP??? ASP is more of a dying language than CF. HELLO...ever heard of .NET???

Fourth, CF is an awesome language to start learning. While Ruby is all the rage, and PHP is probably the most widely used, CF is a great language to start learning.

Fifth, just because we are the oldest web language does not mean we need to be in a nursing home.

Sith...guess what is next week? CF United, a HUGE ColdFusion user group gathering of CF developers from around the world. Ya, I guess for a dying language to put on a huge conference is pretty ridiculous, huh. What is Adobe thinking putting on the largest CF conference to date if the language is dying off?

COLDFUSION IS NOT DYING PEOPLE. I am tired of constantly reading forum posts and tech blog articles about similar. Get a clue and stop responding to questions that you have no business answering. 800,000+ CF developers world wide ARE NOT WRONG. We are not the autoworkers of the web industry.

And @conrey...et tu, Brute?!?

Links:

• http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/coldfusion9/

posted August 5, 2009

OK, I do Coldfusion, and I do Perl, and PHP, ... Every Software Developer has to start somewhere. Age has nothing to do with anything with respect to programming languages.

If you want to do web development - Coldfusion is as good as any. Its easy to develop in (easier than PHP), its pretty robust and its extensibility comes from sitting on top of J2EE. Coldfusion in the Enterprise is a serious competitor and Railo/JBoss combination is formidable also.

I wont argue for or against Python, and Ruby, I've heard there good. They are more Object Oriented than either PHP or Coldfusion. (not that you cant do OO-style in CF or PHP). They also have weaknesses, again, not massive ones.


I would recommend that your kid learnt one language, then another, then another, and whilst he's doing it learn one DBMS then another, and another, and another ...

Tech changes so often, that the programming-principles, data-structures, design-patterns and algorithms are all we get to keep from job to job. Learn those and the world is your oyster.

Links:

• http://www.adobe.com/enterprise/pdfs/Adobe3112.pdf
• http://www.webbschofield.com/enclosures/Adobe%20ColdFusion%20Evangelism%20K...

posted August 5, 2009

i can recall that ColdFusion (CF) has "died" several times over the last decade or so. yet it's still around, still being used by fortune 500 companies & governments worldwide, still one of the most profitable product adobe sells.

it's a very good intro to web development so your son should get off the ground quickly but it also has features that more advanced users enjoy & have enjoyed for years. as bret has pointed out, the CF community's alive & kicking and Adobe's *still* investing in it (CF9 and a new IDE ColdFusion Builder). i should mention that it's free for developers (there are even two OS CF projects around).

since no one seems to have mentioned this, i will. the current "rage" is RIA & the clear leader there is adobe's flex. so guess which back end goes best with flex?

so yeah let your son learn CF & maybe get him onto flex as well. it will not be wasted time.

posted August 5, 2009

No . . . ColdFusion is far from dead, especially since Adobe is pouring millions of dollars into ColdFusion 9 that is just around the corner, with enhancements such as being able to create spreadsheets from query results, convert Word docs to pdfs, add a google map, with Just One Line. And Adobe is planning to run their site with CF9.

Lots of government agencies use ColdFusion, such as NASA and Dept. of State.

Yup . . . ColdFusion is surviving death by a thousand cuts being inflicted by others who believe flogging a dead horse produces great results.

Links:

• http://samfarmer.instantspot.com/blog/2009/07/23/Ten-ColdFusion-9-OneLiners

posted August 5, 2009

If he wants to do enterprise level web application development there is no other tool that is as strongly integrated with the current and future platforms for application deployment.

*Support for multiple databases on the back-end.
*Integration with .NET and Java going horizontally
*Deployment to the browser, the desktop and mobile on the front-end (with html/AJAX/Flex, AIR, and Flash)

ColdFusion has only improved over time and has a growing user base of developers and growing base of installed customers.

Additionally, there are several Open Source engines now available for running ColdFusion based appplications.

posted August 5, 2009

Oh please I heard Apple/Macintosh was dieing and years ago and it's around. I have been quite busy programming in CF and very happy.

Still learn PHP and other languages as a backup when things slow down but there is more money in CF.

posted August 5, 2009

I started web programming with PHP and migrated to ColdFusion; I can honestly recommend either one for your son.

There was a dark period where it looked like CF might be dying off but it has since been bought by Adobe, which has shown great commitment to it in the past couple years and have been making it easier to use by integration with their other products. Now that there are open source engines available to run CF applications I only see it getting more popular as one of the major strikes against it in the past was the hosting cost.

posted August 5, 2009

It's not really that hard to learn both, or one first and then the other. Especially if you're a young kid.
ColdFusion is based on and can extend Java. It is a J2EE application. The open-source version can run on Google's cloud. It has a vibrant development base and has been updated and improved in most every of its 13+ year existence.
PHP is a robust language that tons of developers know. It's free and fast. Many open source projects are built on PHP, which makes for fast deployment and customization of many products.
From an economic point of view, ColdFusion gigs have paid me more (including brand new CF projects I've been doing recently BTW), because there are less of us than PHP developers. But if I knew COBOL (dead or not... anyone?), boy! I could make almost twice as much!

posted August 5, 2009

If Cold fusion is all that great how come I see more asp .net on the job boards than when I look at than Cold fusion? 153 "coldfusion" hits on Careerbuilder as of this moment. 1694 for "asp .net" and "cold fusion" got 102.

Never the less, you have to start someplace. And you pretty much have to learn some xHtml, CSS and JavaScript in there sometime.

It maybe better for him to start on ColdFusion (as long as your not spending money on an expensive IDE for it) as in anything.

Tom

Links:

• http://www.w3schools.com

posted August 5, 2009