Programming Coldfusion

Rating:
Summary: Superb book! My new daily reference!
Review: About six months ago the company I work for recently moved to Coldfusion 5 server (holding off on CFMX until all the bugs are worked out) and since that time, application programming duties have been dumped on me. As a web designer and not a programmer, this was a more than a little worrisome. After trying to wade through Forta's Construction Kit, Hewitt's Core Coldfusion 5, as well as "Mastering Coldfusion 5" it was as if the light was turned on by Rob Brooks-Bilson's Programming Coldfusion.

By the by, those books mentioned are all great books. I own all of them. But when it came down to what I really needed to know and understand Bilson came through like no other. Great job Rob! Keep up the good work.

Rating:
Summary: My NEW ColdFusion bible
Review: I received my copy of Programming ColdFusion about a week ago. I didn't even know O'Reilly had a ColdFusion book until I saw a ColdFusion article featured on their web site.

Anyhow, I just finished reading it from cover to cover today and have to say that it is absolutely hands down THE BEST ColdFusion book on the market. I have all of the Forta books. I have the Wrox book, and while they are all great in their own respects, the O'Reilly book completely rocks!

Every chapter is well written and the book flows nicely from one chapter to the next - the result of having a single author as opposed to 5-10 like most of the other ColdFusion books. Rob gives indepth coverage to several topics usually skimmed over by the other ColdFusion authors such as LDAP, Verity, and regular expressions. His coverage of user defined funcitons is excellent as is the cflib.org site he hosts. The tag reference and function reference are awesome. Much more convenient than the online docs and the examples actually work!

Programming ColdFusion has become my NEW ColdFusion bible!

Rating:
Summary: Programming ColdFusion, My First-Reach ColdFusion Text
Review: Programming ColdFusion flows well. Rob Brooks-Bilson has created a great tutorial and reference text for ColdFusion. The best part is, it is very readable. This book is going to stay on my shelf for a long time.

The text speaks to multiple audiences:
1.Web programmers will find this an excellent tool for learning ColdFusion.
2.Seasoned ColdFusion programmers upgrading to ColdFusion 5.0 will find it a great review and resource for the new features of CF 5.
3.More advanced users will find timely topics such as XML/WDDX; Verity Collections; CF Server Administration; Calling external objects through COM, CORBA and Java; and the graphing features of ColdFusion 5.0.

On my shelf, Programming ColdFusion is the first-reach ColdFusion text. I recommend it to any ColdFusion programmer, or those with serious interest in programming ColdFusion.

Rating:
Summary: This book sets the standard for ColdFusion.
Review: Reading this book after the Forta book, I was struck by how much more smoothly it flows from chapter to chapter. It covers a number of topics like LDAP, Verity, and great query techniques that were lacking in other books. It also has a lot more space devoted to programming and code instead of Studio screen shots on every page. The writing style is clear, with enough examples to illustrate without cluttering the book. All in all, it delivers a book that is excellant to learn from, and functions as a well thumbed through desk reference as you move on.

Rating:
Summary: Hats-off to Mr. Brooks-Bilson
Review: When I first started programming ColdFusion, the only book on the market was the well-known Forta book. When CF 5 came out, I didn't buy the ColdFusion 5 Web Application Construction Kit, even though it is a great book to have. The main reason is b/c most of the chapters would be close to identical, with a couple of new chapters to address a couple of new features. For anything new in CF, I knew I could also reference the documentation. But I still needed a CF 5 book on my desk. I decided to go with someone else's point of view. Even though I have not read it from cover to cover, and probably never will, it is still a great book to have. I actually used it to help prep me for the certification exam and appreciated its in-depth explanations.