A quick call to any users of my cfcFlexplorer application (if there are any out there). What would you like to see enhanced/improved/added/fixed with the application? What do you like? What don't you like?

If you're not a user, why not? Honestly this tool is very helpful (IMO). I use it quite a bit when I'm developing components at home. It is a very cool way to easily test methods without hacking up a test.cfm to create the component and invoke a method.

I have a few enhancements planned and in the works now that I have a workable Flex environment hacked together at home but I'd welcome any suggestions from anyone who has used it.

I just uploaded cfcFlexplorer 0.3 to the project page over at RIAForge. This version is mostly clean up, but there are a few cool additions as well. Here is a quick summary of the changes:

Component Tree Enhancements:

You can now specify multiple applications in the settings.xml file to keep them seperate in the component tree. The component tree is now cached to increase performance. If you would like to keep the cache current, just create a scheduled task to recreate the external xml file at whatever frequency you'd like (see readme.doc).

Print Support:

Added print support. To print component documentation, select a component in the component tree and click the Flashpaper or PDF icon in the upper right corner.

Method Searching:

Also added filtering for the method grid. To search for a particular method, choose the attribute that you would like to search by and type your search term in the text box.

General Organization:

Removed unnecessary Flex project files. To run cfcFlexplorer, simply unzip, modify the settings.xml file and hit http://yourhost/cfcFlexplorer.

Thats about it for now. I'll blog about an undocumented feature later tonight at the cfcFlexplorer Blog.

If anyone has any feedback or suggestions, as always please let me know.

I just checked RIAForge and noticed that cfcFlexplorer has cracked the top 10 projects (currently #10). That is probably the coolest thing I've seen in a long time! I've been hard at work since it released on some upgrades. I would normally blog about those over at my project blog, but I haven't blogged much over here lately, so I thought I'd post a quick update.

Recent local changes:

• Added search functionality to method grid.
• Added output to pdf/flashpaper.
• Modified tree generation to create and use external XML file rather than generate tree on the fly. (Thanks to Tariq Ahmed!)
• Working on intelligent complex object support (may not make next release).
• Massively cleaned up and organized files.

I'll try to get a zip out next week some time.

I'm considering a future addition that would support creating proxy components. Basically the feature would take an existing component and generate a skeleton proxy that would work with your existing component. I've just picked up on this technique (Hey, I'm still learning!) thanks to the great feedback in this post and I think it would be nice to have my app do some of the heavy lifting for the creation of the proxy component. I've never been real big on code generators, but much of the work of creating the proxy seems redundant. Post some feedback in the comments if you have an opinion on this one.

I also hope to work on adding some style to the application. The stock Flex style ain't bad, but I'd like to mess around a bit with some custom styles - if nothing else but just to learn more.

As I said last week I intend on writing a post or two about my experiences in building cfcFlexplorer. There are definitely some things I'd like to share with other ColdFusionites who may be new to Flex. I'm totally swamped at work and this weekend is the biggest game in recent Ohio State history so I may not get to those posts until next week.

Seriously. What an awesome idea. Not only is it sweet to have a single source for Adobe based projects, but as a user of the site I can say that it is truly great to have a single source for project info, forums, issue tracking and even a project blog. I have posted an entry for to the cfcFlexplorer blog, and will try to keep it updated with the project's progress as I make updates. I'll also update this blog, but for the most part I think I will be using that blog for updates, etc. If anyone has ideas, questions or suggestions make sure to check out the project page for cfcFlexplorer.

I'm very happy to announce the release of my latest project, cfcFlexplorer. This project was inspired by Ray Camden's friday puzzler from September in which he proposed that someone take on the challenge of creating a cfc tester. cfcFlexplorer is a Flex based tool which does that, and a little more.

With cfcFlexplorer you simply modify an xml file which contains two variables: the server root directory and the directory from which to begin crawling for CFCs. Once the application recurses the directories, it returns all CFCs (except application.cfc's and anything under cfide) into a navigation tree. From there you can navigate through the tree, selecting any component that you would like to see further information on. When a component is selected, the 'methods' grid is populated with all of the methods within that component. When a method is selected, all of the associated parameters for that method are populated into the 'parameters' grid. The parameters grid contains an addional editable column called 'value' which allows you to populate test values and invoke the component. When invoked, the application opens a new window which will dump the results of the call (if applicable). If your component has an init constructor, a checkbox is automatically populated and the init() function is called prior to invoking your component so that any necessary instance data is available to your call. (Note: If your constructor requires parameters, populate those in the param grid prior to calling your function). You can either download cfcFlexplorer below, or check it out at RIAForge. There are definitely some enhancements/changes I'd like to make in the future, but I really wanted to get this out there since I think it's a tool that many will find helpful. Currently cfcFlexplorer does not handle passing complex objects (structs, arrays, queries, etc) as parameters so if your method requires these you will not be able to test them. If anyone would like to help out with the project, drop me a line and let me know. I plan on doing a more detailed write up later this week summarizing my first experiences with Flex. Overall, the project took me about 12 hours so far. That may sound a little high for a simple project, but I did get tripped up here and there a bit on the syntax, etc with Flex. I honestly do feel incredibly comfortable with the MXML and AS3 so far. Perhaps a year of hacking Flash Forms to bits taught me more than I thought it did! View cfcFlexplorer Demo