An introduction to the ColdFusion framework created by Sean Corfield.
Presented by Ben Ellefson


ColdFusion developer for 9 years

Twin Cities CFUG Manager

Framework enthusiast

Experience with Fusebox, Model-Glue,
Mach-ii, ColdBox, ColdSpring, Reactor and now FW/1

Disclaimer: Mach-ii fan


ColdFusion MVC Framework

Lightweight – single CFC file (1700 lines)

Convention based instead of configuration based

Flexible code organization


Dissatisfied with current application frameworks
 Too bloated
 Too complex
 Requires XML
 Dependent on configuration
 Too much overhead for simple apps

 org
 Contains single framework file
 views
 Contains section folders
 View cfm files within each folder

Application.cfc
 Extends org.corfield.framework

Index.cfm
 Blank

 controllers
 Contains cfc for each section
 layouts
 Contains cfm for each layout
 services
 Contains cfc for each service


All links direct to /index.cfm

Pages access using ?action=section.item
 Section = name of folder within views folder
 Item = file within views/section folder

SES URLs available
 /index.cfm/section/item/name/value


?action=section.item looks for the method item() in /controllers/section.cfc
 Passes the request collection “rc” as a single argument. Struct containing url and form variables, plus more.

Automatically calls before(), startItem(),
Item(), endItem(), after()

Controllers are cached, cleared with
?reload=true


Multiple layouts are available
 View Layout: /layouts/section/item.cfm
 Section Layout: /layouts/section.cfm
 Site Layout: /layouts/default.cfm

Layouts cascade from view to section to site

Cancel cascading by setting request.layout = false

#body# contains current rendered view


Services called from controller by fw.service(“cfc.function",“variable")
 Results placed in requet collection “rc” with variable name stated in the call

 Receive the request collection “rc” from the controller to display variables populated by the service.

View file called is automatically determined by the action (i.e. section.item)

View file can be changed by calling setView() or setLayout() to call a new action.

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Hard to find information
 No framework website
 Documentation only found through Corfield’s Blog
 No community around FW/1
 Very little found via Google search

Framework not compatible with CF previous to
9.0.1

Conventions assume small app and do not allow for deep nesting of folders.


Sample and Skeleton apps are poor
 Filled with bugs
 Too simple to understand how a full app would be built with FW/1
 No comments in code

In 6 hours testing for this presentation, I was unable to build one page that had a query in the service passed to the view to display.

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Available for download at http://fw1.riaforge.org/

Free for use under the Apache 2.0 License

Latest version requires ColdFusion 9.0.1

Documentation at https://github.com/seancorfield/fw1/wiki