Our Into the Box 10th edition did not disappoint! We had incredible speakers and attendees who made this conference one of the best yet; thank you to all the new and past speakers for making this a unique and eye-opening experience for all of us.
We hope to have you with us again in the next Into the Box to start a new chapter on how we teach and learn modern CFML and web development; if you miss it, here’s a little recap of what we lived at Into the Box 2023.
What is Into The Box?
For those unfamiliar with this conference, Into the Box is a highly immersive conference that brings together web and mobile app developers, industry experts, and technology enthusiasts.The conference focuses on cutting-edge tools, frameworks, and practices that empower developers to create innovative, high-performance applications. With a diverse range of sessions, workshops, and keynote presentations, Into the Box offers a platform for attendees to expand their knowledge, gain insights from industry leaders, and network with like-minded professionals.
From exploring the latest trends and technologies to diving deep into best practices, this conference provides a valuable opportunity to stay at the forefront of the rapidly evolving development landscape. Whether you're a seasoned developer or just starting your journey, Into the Box offers a unique learning experience that will inspire and equip you to build exceptional software solutions.
Recorded Sessions and Hands-On
Videos will be available online on our training website CFCasts (www.cfcasts.com) in a couple of weeks; we will post an announcement as soon as we get them up.
When can I access ITB 2023 videos as a CFCasts Subscriber?
Thanks to your subscription, we will send an email announcing the release of the videos for you to enjoy at CFCasts for free. If you have any inconveniences or don't seem to get free access to the video recordings, please feel free to reach out to us at: info@ortussolutions.com
Keynote Day 1 Summary
With the introduction out of the way, here is a summary of the major announcements made during our Day 1 Keynote. The keynote was started by our CEO Luis Majano with a look at 10 years of providing the ColdFusion (CFML) community with a conference focused on expanding the language and its tooling.
He then focused on major Ortus announcements, ColdBox 7, Box Ecosystem, and forked ORM Extension for Lucee and TestBox 5.
Ortus Solutions Announcements
- Most productive year at Ortus Solutions with lots of new products, updates, and key achievements
- Expansion to Europe, lots of connections, and evangelization of modern CFML in a new continent based off Malaga, Spain
- New initiatives and products to continue modernizing and improving the CFML language
- We are excited about what’s to come for the future of CFML
ColdBox 7 Released
ColdBox HMVC is a powerful, lightweight, and conventions-based framework that enables developers to build scalable and modular applications using the Hierarchical Model-View-Controller architectural pattern.
Our first product and genesis of the Ortus Solutions Ecosystem has been around for 17 years, a powerful open-source platform built on top of the ColdFusion programming language. This year we have stepped up our game with a new version full of awesome features, tools, and resources for developers to apply to their projects with our ColdBox 7.0.0 version.
- 30+ Bugs Closed and over 75+ Features/Enhancements
- New Engines and Long-Term Support: Adobe 2023 and Lucee 6
- Module injectors and awareness
- Whoops Exception Developer Experience - SQL/JSON Formatting/Highlights and tons of performance improvements
- WireBox Delegates (Traits/Object Delegation for ColdFusion)
- WireBox Transient Caching, producing performance improvements of over 585%!
- WireBox Lazy Properties & Event Observers
- Schedule Task refinements, metadata additions, first & last business days, and next run intervals
- ColdBox CLI with tons of generation and code quality tooling
- Testing and Application Modes
- So much more…
Read more about this release in our What’s new with ColdBox 7 article:
CBDebugger 4 Released
The ColdBox Debugger is a robust, lightweight, and intuitive performance monitor and profiler that aids developers in debugging and troubleshooting their ColdBox applications, providing valuable insights into the application's execution flow, variables, and performance metrics.
The release of ColdBox Debugger v4 introduces enhanced features, improved performance, and an even more user-friendly interface, empowering developers with comprehensive debugging capabilities for their ColdBox applications.
- ColdBox 7, Adobe 2023, Lucee 6 Support
- Timer Delegates for easy addition of timing capabilities anywhere in your applications
- Adobe Full SQL Profiling, we can now profile ANY SQL query done in a specific request
- Timer metadata support for storing extra information useful to developers
- IDE integration: Rendering, handlers, models, etc. You can now open and debug code right from the debugger
- Profile the slowest requests and slowest SQL
- DB time vs. request time percentages
- Lays the foundation internally for our centralized debugger application coming soon.
Ortus ORM Extension
The Ortus ORM Extension is a fork of the Lucee extension that has been customized to meet the needs of many of Ortus Solutions' projects and clients It includes the latest Hibernate features, more community involvement, and offers professional support for those who need it.
We are excited to announce the release of the Ortus ORM Extension for Lucee! This extension is a fork of the Lucee extension and has been highly customized to meet the needs of many of our projects and clients. We depend on this extension for many projects and are excited to push it forward.
The extension includes the latest Hibernate features and more community involvement. Additionally, it offers professional support for those who need it.
Key Features
autoGenMap = falsesupport- JavaDocs API published on apidocs.ortussolutions.com
- Initialization performance improvements by over 80%
- Reload time improvements by over 60%
- JUnit test suites
- Automated builds
- Encapsulation of ORM UDFs in the extension
- Code quality updates
- Support for latest Hibernate builds
- Maven dependency resolution
Modern CFML in 100 Minutes Book Updated
The Modern CFML in 100 Minutes book has been completely revamped and updated with new sections and engine updates. It's now available for free online, and a PDF/print version will be available on Amazon soon. We are also working on a CFCasts Series for the entire book.
Please note that this book is completely FREE in order to evangelize and expand the usage of the CFML language. Help us continue to provide it for FREE by supporting us via Patreon
TestBox 5 Released
TestBox BDD is a testing framework that combines Behavior-Driven Development principles with powerful testing capabilities, allowing developers to write expressive and readable tests that focus on the behavior and expectations of their applications.
TestBox 5 delivers significant improvements such as method spies, code coverage batching, enhanced performance, skipping of specs or suites with messages, globbing path patterns for testing bundles, numerous bug fixes, and compatibility with Adobe 2023, Lucee 6, and JDK 17.
- Method Spies: $spy(method)
- Code Coverage Batching
- Performance, Performance, Performance
- skip (message) specs or suites
- Globbing path patterns to test bundle runners
- Tons of bug fixes and small improvements
- Adobe 2023, Lucee 6, JDK 17
TestBox IDE : Project TIDE
Esmeralda Acevedo, Senior Ortus Developer, and Chief Design Officer presents this New initiative by Ortus Solutions to transform your testing experience with TestBox, TestBox IDE. This is a new way to visualize, organize and test your TestBox bundles. From a new dashboard, testing preflight, historical results, import/exporting, quick settings, and much more. Coming soon…
You can review our IDE demo released at Into the Box below!
ForgeBox Updates
ForgeBox is a comprehensive package repository and package manager for the ColdFusion community, offering a vast collection of modules, libraries, frameworks, and tools to streamline and accelerate the development process.
Our very own DJ: Javier Quintero, Senior FORGEBOX developer, presented the state of FORGEBOX from all of the releases done in the last 9 months and the upcoming FORGEBOX eCommerce feature. This upcoming addition will enable developers to monetize their hard work and creativity by selling their modules and packages directly through the ForgeBox platform.
With ForgeBox eCommerce, developers can easily create listings for their modules, set prices, and manage transactions seamlessly. This not only empowers developers to generate revenue from their creations but also provides a centralized marketplace for ColdFusion enthusiasts to discover and acquire high-quality modules. As a result, the FORGEBOX ecosystem will continue to thrive and foster collaboration among developers while promoting innovation and growth in the ColdFusion community. Whether you're a seasoned developer looking to monetize your expertise or a passionate ColdFusion user seeking top-notch modules, ForgeBox eCommerce is poised to revolutionize how modules are bought and sold within the ColdFusion community.
- Community growing faster!
- General availability of business plans
- Elastic Powered Search
- Package notifiers and webooks that will alow anybody to monitor packages and react accordingly
- Improved dependency manager with ability to visualize licensing if you have a PRO or Business accounts
- eCommerce
Please note that Ortus Solutions maintains FORGEBOX for the entire ColdFusion community. It takes time, effort, and money to maintain FORGEBOX. Please be part of this adventure by supporting us either with a PRO/Business account or by becoming an Ortus Patreon.
CommandBox Updates
CommandBox is a versatile and powerful command line interface, package manager, and server for ColdFusion developers, providing streamlined development workflows, easy package management, and a range of productivity-enhancing features.
Brad Wood, Senior Ortus Architect, presents the past, present, and future of CommandBox. CommandBox is now reaching 9 years of life, and it has transformed the ColdFusion landscape not only by providing a native operating system CLI, but also as a package manager and a powerful Web and Java Server.
- CommandBox Servers Power the CF World, targeting over 70,000 downloads a year.
- Support for PFX cert file for server SSL
- Java 17+ Preliminary support
- Bundled System Modules: Gives you more functionality out of the Box, which can still be upgraded independently from the CLI.
- Config & Module Synchronizations via FORGEBOX
- Better Reverse Proxy Support
- Load Balancing!
- Per-Server Browser Settings
- New Server Console Log Layouts
- Clipboard support
However, we did not stop there; we introduced a new professional version: CommandBox PRO, which is available for purchase TODAY!
CommandBox PRO
A professionally Supported version of CommandBox that includes several exclusive features and benefits. It also includes a business SLA that can be customized if needed.
Let’s explore some of the key features of this commercial edition of CommandBox:
- Professional Support Plan
- Custom builds and patches for customers
- Service Manager Module included: https://www.ortussolutions.com/products/commandbox-service-manager
- Multi-Site Capabilities; deploy 1 or 10000 web applications on a single managed context
- Automatic JDK Management
- ForgeBox Pro Account
- 1 server license of ANY of our Lucee commercial extensions: Redis, Couchbase or MongoDB, Ortus PDF
However, the multi-site functionality is a truly groundbreaking feature that sets CommandBox apart as a robust and competitive web and Java server, capable of rivaling industry giants like Nginx, Apache, IIS, Tomcat, Redis, Jetty, and more. With CommandBox, you can consolidate your technology stack into a single, comprehensive solution, eliminating the need for multiple servers and benefiting from professional support and even faster performance than many of the aforementioned options.
- Fully-featured and high-performance Web Server
- Host as many separate websites as you like
- No need for any front-end web server or ModCFML
- Supports separately configurable rewrites, lockdowns, virtual directories, and other settings on a per-site basis
- Supports unlimited HTTP?SSL/AJP bindings, SSL cert, and host headers
- Extremely fast and low memory footprint
- Allows your CFML servers to be simplified down to a single moving part
- Server and website configuration synchronization via FORGEBOX (coming soon)
- Stats and operational dashboard (coming soon)
- One CLI command server setup via FORGEBOX sync (coming soon)
Big Shoutout to our Sponsors!
We want to highlight all the tech-leading companies encouraging software innovation and collaboration with their support for Into the Box 2023! We couldn't have done this without you; thank you for trusting our project and helping us spread the word on modern CFML tools!
- Platinum Sponsors
- Adobe Creativity is in our DNA. Our game-changing innovations are redefining the possibilities of digital experiences. We connect content and data and introduce new technologies that democratize creativity, shape the next generation of storytelling, and inspire entirely new business categories.
- Ortus Solutions Is a multinational company based in the US, Europe, and LATAM. As a leading provider of open-source products, tooling, and training, we are passionate about training, mentoring, modernizing the CFML language, and growing our community of excellent developers.
- Silver Sponsors
- Foundeo Software consulting and products company focused on ColdFusion and Lucee security. Our products include Fixinator (https://fixinator.app), a source code security scanner; FuseGuard (https://fuseguard.com/), a web application firewall for CF; and Fixinator, an automated server security scanner for ColdFusion and Lucee. Our consulting services include code reviews, server reviews, and custom development...
- WRIS Web Services is a Remote web design and development company founded in 1996. Providing services countrywide and internationally. Since our inception, our primary objective has been to develop robust, custom websites and web apps that help our clients operate more efficiently. We also offer top-notch digital marketing services and hosting solutions to ensure our clients maximize their online presence. Learn more about the services they have to offer to develop your projects effectively.
- Amazon Web Services is the World’s most comprehensive and broadly adopted cloud, offering over 200 fully featured services from data centers globally. Millions of customers—including the fastest-growing startups, largest enterprises, and leading government agencies—use AWS to lower costs, become more agile, and innovate faster.
- Lucid Outsourcing Solutions We are a team of expert developers dedicated to providing our clients with top-quality web and mobile app development services. Our team comprises skilled developers, project managers, and designers passionate about delivering innovative solutions that exceed our client's expectations.
- TeraTech helps CIOs at medium-sized US companies with expert ColdFusion software development. Our CF wizards will keep you safe from the nine Dark Riders of Mordor (CF maintenance headaches), Orcs (CF security), and Goblins (CF crashes) that roam Middleware-earth. We have a podcast, and a book, and our CEO, Michaela Light, speaks at CF conferences (which are, BTW, fantastic, and you should come to them!)
- Bronze Sponsors
- Computer Know How We understand that technology is changing faster than most of us can keep up with. That is why we have assembled a team of system analysts, programmers, network engineers, and web architects ready to assist you with handling your technical projects on time and within budget. We will find creative solutions to your needs regardless of your business or project size.
Patreons
We want to give a special thank you note to all of our Patreons for making not only Into the Box possible but also supporting all of our Ortus products and podcast to keep us alive and running with new tools, features, and resources for the modern CFML community, we couldn't have gone this far without your support and trust in our Team; we appreciate your help and are working hard to give you more benefits to get back to you!
We hope to have you with us in our upcoming Into the Box 2024!
Become a Patreon and help us maintain and built new tools to modernize CFML and improve your projects!
Attendees Review!
Giancarlo Gomez | Senior Developer & Musician
Big shoutout to our amazing partner and friend **Giancarlo Gomez for his great recap and review of our Into the Box 10th edition! **Go check it out, and don't miss the upcoming era of ITB 2024!
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