Steve Nelson

Fusebox Organization Writing applications within a multi person team can be difficult. Sharing applications between two teams can become even more difficult. Effectively sharing applications with 30,000 other developers such as with the ColdFusion® community is almost impossible... unless everyone adheres to standards for writing these shared applications. The Fusebox Organization has been assembled to create these standards. This paper will give specification recommendations to the FuseBox organization for determining how FuseBox applications and databases should be designed. The paper is split up into three recommendations: File structures Code design Database design. Example Web Application Before looking at what the recommendations are, it is important to examine how a web application works. Let's look at a quick case of a User named: 'Steve Nelson' logging into... (more)

Personas Can Improve User Interface

For a long time I've been stuck in the mindset that creating a fabulous user interface requires a top-notch artist. I thought someone who is a master of colors and graphics is bound to make the ideal user interface. Trial and error has proved this incorrect. I've done projects with and without fabulous artists. A good artist can improve the details of the interface to make it easier on the eye, but rarely does he or she make suggestions that dramatically improve how the software works. That's okay; that's not their job. But if they're not changing how the software works, then ma... (more)

The Problem of Complexity: Part 1

As a reader of CFDJ, you're probably an experienced programmer. But what exactly is it that you do? What is programming? Bruce Eckel, in his excellent book Thinking in Java, offers this answer: "At one level, all of programming is about managing complexity." For many of us this answer resonates deeply. Arguments about which language is "best" miss the point - that programmers write programs, not benchmarks. And in the real world, the greatest challenge isn't to shave a few machine cycles off accomplishing a discrete task, but to build software that empowers users to do their wor... (more)

FuseBox Standards

Introduction Writing applications within a multi person team can be difficult. Sharing applications between two teams can become even more difficult. Effectively sharing applications with 30,000 other developers such as with the ColdFusion community is almost impossible... unless everyone adheres to standards for writing these shared applications. The Fusebox Organization has been assembled to create these standards. The Fusebox Organization consists of ColdFusion developers from around the world and at this time it does not cost anything to join. The Organization holds occasion... (more)