Rating: 
Summary: Not what I was looking for
Review: This book is more about process than it is about code.
Rating: 
Summary: Good book, if you want to know about Fusebox
Review: This is a well written and easy to read book, with a somewhat evangelical tone about Fusebox methodology for writing Web applications in ColdFusion. For those who don't know about Fusebox, or want to find in detail about what it is, it is excellent. For those who have used Fusebox in the past, it is a good reference for Version 3 of Fusebox, with all of the major concepts explained in clear, English prose, with not too much techno-jargon. Whether the book succeeds in convincing everyone that Fusebox is the way to go is, however, questionable. Evangelism usually succeeds when the message is simple, or the results easily obtainable. Fusebox methodology is not the panacea that its proponents would have us believe. Its learning curve is steep, its benefits limited to certain types of applications and to sizable teams of developers. This book seems to address itself mostly to them, and it will have a hard time converting those developers who toil alone or in small teams. It is to be commended though for trying.
Rating:
Summary: The missing link to an awesome way to code in Coldfusion
Review: This method of writing web application, once you get get the idea of how it works, will blow you away. This book will get you over the learning curve, and is a great tool to help your team, if you work in a team environment, get producing Coldfusion dynamic applications quickly. This book helps you explain over and over what you already know but need to put into clear concise words to others developers showing "WHY" fusebox in Coldfusion. Plus this book provides real working applications us on his site showing this technique which you can download and use as a beginning collection of provable code. Like someone else said in these reviews, "I wish this was available when I started". It wasn't and over a year afterwords I'm finally understanding clearly what I've been using and why and have the reference I need to explain it to others. Important book is your doing coldfusion development.
Rating:
Summary: The missing link to an awesome way to code in Coldfusion
Review: This method of writing web application, once you get get the idea of how it works, will blow you away. This book will get you over the learning curve, and is a great tool to help your team, if you work in a team environment, get producing Coldfusion dynamic applications quickly. This book helps you explain over and over what you already know but need to put into clear concise words to others developers showing "WHY" fusebox in Coldfusion. Plus this book provides real working applications us on his site showing this technique which you can download and use as a beginning collection of provable code. Like someone else said in these reviews, "I wish this was available when I started". It wasn't and over a year afterwords I'm finally understanding clearly what I've been using and why and have the reference I need to explain it to others. Important book is your doing coldfusion development.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent. A must read for anyone interested in Fusebox
Review: Whether you want to learn about the intricacies of the Fusebox core files; or you want to understand how Fusebox can help you become a better ColdFusion® developer, the book Fusebox: Developing ColdFusion® Applications by Jeff Peters and Nat Papovich is well worth the read. This book covers the basics of the Fusebox framework and FLiP (Fusebox Lifecycle Process) methodology to the more advanced features of Fusebox such as nested circuits and layouts. Beginners will appreciate the authors' abilities to convey complex ideas through examples that relate to real-world development experiences. Through their examples, it is easy to see how using FLiP and Fusebox can ease and even eliminate the common pitfalls that developers go through when coding their applications. The book starts out by explaining why a framework and methodology are beneficial to creating successful applications, and will give the reader some insight into the relationship between the developer and the client. This is a recommended read for all managers. The expertise of the authors really shows in chapters 3 and 4 as they delve into the complexities of the Fusebox core files. This section may be overly complex for the Fusebox beginner, but is an insightful read for those who already have experience creating Fusebox applications. If you were ever curious about the functionality of the code that makes up the Fusebox core files, this section will give you greater understanding of how Fusebox works. Chapters 5-10 walk the reader through all of the parts that a developer is responsible for when creating a Fusebox application. The basics such as the fuses (ColdFusion templates) and XFA's (eXit FuseActions's or Triggers) are covered in chapters 5 and 6. Chapter 7 covers Fusedocs, a documentation standard developed by Hal Helms. Even if you are not going to adopt the Fusebox framework for application development, learning Fusedoc's is time well spent. The Fusedocs chapter is a great reference tool that should be kept near your keyboard as you learn the names and attributes of the elements that make up the documentation. Appendix C details the Fusedoc dtd for those interested in the nitty-gritty of how Fusedocs are structured. Chapters 8-10 detail the advanced features of Fusebox that make it such a powerful and useful framework. The chapter on nested circuits discusses how to set up an application to take advantage of the way in which circuits communicate with each other. With nesting comes inheritance, and nested layout which is the subject of Chapter 9. Nested layouts are one of the more difficult concepts for new Fusebox developers to grasp. The book walks step-by-step though the concept of nested layouts and shows code examples of how nested layouts could be applied to an application. Because nesting of both circuits and layouts can be difficult to put into practice, Chapter 10 looks at some of the issues that developers may encounter when utilizing these advanced features. Part 3 of this book goes into the details of the Fusebox Lifecycle Process (FLiP). Developers who are responsible for the initial requirements gathering and architecture of an application will find Part 3 a useful read. For project managers who have struggled with bringing an application from concept to completion, chapters 11-16 are an important read. The remaining chapters in Part 3 (17-19) describe some Fusebox best practices, and sum up why Fusebox is useful in a dialog between two of the characters introduced at the beginning of the book Fusebox: Developing ColdFusion® Applications is very well written, and a must read for anyone interested in using Fusebox to develop ColdFusion based applications.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent. A must read for anyone interested in Fusebox
Review: Whether you want to learn about the intricacies of the Fusebox core files; or you want to understand how Fusebox can help you become a better ColdFusion® developer, the book Fusebox: Developing ColdFusion® Applications by Jeff Peters and Nat Papovich is well worth the read. This book covers the basics of the Fusebox framework and FLiP (Fusebox Lifecycle Process) methodology to the more advanced features of Fusebox such as nested circuits and layouts. Beginners will appreciate the authors' abilities to convey complex ideas through examples that relate to real-world development experiences. Through their examples, it is easy to see how using FLiP and Fusebox can ease and even eliminate the common pitfalls that developers go through when coding their applications. The book starts out by explaining why a framework and methodology are beneficial to creating successful applications, and will give the reader some insight into the relationship between the developer and the client. This is a recommended read for all managers. The expertise of the authors really shows in chapters 3 and 4 as they delve into the complexities of the Fusebox core files. This section may be overly complex for the Fusebox beginner, but is an insightful read for those who already have experience creating Fusebox applications. If you were ever curious about the functionality of the code that makes up the Fusebox core files, this section will give you greater understanding of how Fusebox works. Chapters 5-10 walk the reader through all of the parts that a developer is responsible for when creating a Fusebox application. The basics such as the fuses (ColdFusion templates) and XFA's (eXit FuseActions's or Triggers) are covered in chapters 5 and 6. Chapter 7 covers Fusedocs, a documentation standard developed by Hal Helms. Even if you are not going to adopt the Fusebox framework for application development, learning Fusedoc's is time well spent. The Fusedocs chapter is a great reference tool that should be kept near your keyboard as you learn the names and attributes of the elements that make up the documentation. Appendix C details the Fusedoc dtd for those interested in the nitty-gritty of how Fusedocs are structured. Chapters 8-10 detail the advanced features of Fusebox that make it such a powerful and useful framework. The chapter on nested circuits discusses how to set up an application to take advantage of the way in which circuits communicate with each other. With nesting comes inheritance, and nested layout which is the subject of Chapter 9. Nested layouts are one of the more difficult concepts for new Fusebox developers to grasp. The book walks step-by-step though the concept of nested layouts and shows code examples of how nested layouts could be applied to an application. Because nesting of both circuits and layouts can be difficult to put into practice, Chapter 10 looks at some of the issues that developers may encounter when utilizing these advanced features. Part 3 of this book goes into the details of the Fusebox Lifecycle Process (FLiP). Developers who are responsible for the initial requirements gathering and architecture of an application will find Part 3 a useful read. For project managers who have struggled with bringing an application from concept to completion, chapters 11-16 are an important read. The remaining chapters in Part 3 (17-19) describe some Fusebox best practices, and sum up why Fusebox is useful in a dialog between two of the characters introduced at the beginning of the book Fusebox: Developing ColdFusion® Applications is very well written, and a must read for anyone interested in using Fusebox to develop ColdFusion based applications.
| 
