Sean Corfield is currently CEO of Railo Technologies, Inc. He has worked in IT for over twenty five years, starting out writing database systems and compilers then moving into mobile telecoms and finally into web development in 1997. Along the way, he worked on the ISO and ANSI C++ Standards committees for eight years and is a staunch advocate of software standards and best practice. Sean has championed and contributed to a number of CFML frameworks and was lead developer on Fusebox for two years. He released his own framework (FW/1) in 2009.

CFUnited sessions: ColdFusion and the Open Source Landscape
FW/1 - The Invisible Framework

1. Have you spoken at CFUnited in the past?

Every year since 2004 so this will be my seventh consecutive year as a speaker.

2. Why should people attend your sessions?

I'm an advocate for several things that I think help developers improve themselves and build better applications. Two of those things are frameworks and open source software - the topics of my talks this year. My framework talk showcases FW/1 (Framework One) which is a very small, lightweight framework that should appeal to people who "don't like frameworks", whether they think frameworks are overkill for small projects or simply too much complicated third party code to learn or rely on in their applications. I call FW/1 the "invisible framework". My other talk is intended to expand developers' awareness of open source software in general, showing how the popularity of certain other technologies has arisen because of their open source communities. I also hope to answer questions such as "Why give away the source to my application?" and "Why should I contribute to someone else's free software project?".

3. Do you have any projects in the works that you will be revealing at CFUnited?

I'm currently planning the next release of FW/1 and expect that to be released around CFUnited. I'm also thinking about creating a ColdFusion Builder Extension for FW/1.

4. Besides your topic, what other sessions are you looking forward to?

When I looked through the list of topics the other day, there were about 30 that I'm interested in attending! Three that really caught my eye are Christian Ready's HTML5 talk and the two talks by Elliott Sprehn - because he always has some fascinating insights!

5. What are some of the hot topics you'd like to see at RoundTable discussions?

Cloud computing is one - since I've worked on systems deployed entirely on the cloud for a couple of years now - and Agile Software Development is the other. A lot of the ideas from the agile community are very interesting and a refreshing approach to many of the common problems we tend to encounter with projects.

6. Where can people find you at CFUnited?

When I'm not in sessions, I'll be at the Railo Consulting sponsor booth during the day. In the evening? Most likely the bar...

7. What's the latest news with you? Has anything changed since last CFUnited?

Apart from 2009 being a horrible year for me personally and 2010 being a great improvement so far, not much has changed. That's quite a contrast to the last few years where I'd had a new employer each year! (Adobe in 2006, self-employed in 2007, Broadchoice in 2008, Railo in 2009 and Railo in 2010)

8. What is unique about CFUnited?

CFUnited is the biggest event of the year for CF developers - it offers the best networking, the broadest selection of topics, and access to more of our peers than any other event. I really enjoy the opportunity to connect with so many CF developers in one place!

9. What do you like to do in your free time?

Last year I would have said dancing but since my wife broke her ankle we haven't done much of that. To be honest, what I mostly do in my free time is work on open source software projects - and I really enjoy that!

This entry was posted on April 28, 2010 at 5:33 PM and has received 2671 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

Hello everyone,

We feel so lucky to have such great sponsors supporting CFUnited 2010. Allow us to introduce the ones who are on board so far.

Diamond Sponsor

Adobe

Gold Sponsors

Intergral

Silver Sponsors

CONTENS
Mura

Railo

Emerging Sponsors

Epicenter Consulting

Contributors

CF Tips Plus

EasyCFM

Learn about sponsorships and be a part of CFUnited 2010! If your company is interested in sponsoring, contact info (at) stellr.com

Thanks!

This entry was posted on April 27, 2010 at 9:31 AM and has received 2367 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

Hello everyone!

As soon as we posted up the guest packages, we realized we were going to have some problems.

Long story short, the system was not going to work as we hoped. So we have a new system.

We are going to offer a guest package for $220, which will cover Wednesday through Saturday guest amenities, including lunch and evening events.

Of course, we know not all guests will want the whole week's worth of goodies, so we have discounts available for the guest packages.

Guest1 - $160 off - Use only if you want to use the guest package for either Wednesday or Thursday (1 day only).

Guest2 - $100 off - Use only if you want to use the guest package for Wednesday AND Thursday (2 days).

Guest3 - $50 off - Use only if you want to remove the Saturday from the guest package, and therefore would be applicable for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday (3 days).

ALSO!

We have had some people asking about the golf and spa specials that the resort had offered last year. This year, the Lansdowne Resort will be able to offer 10% off all spa treatments.

Though not many people had taken advantage of the free golf that was offered last year, the Lansdowne Resort was kind enough to let us raffle off (1) free tee time! Stay tuned for more info about that!

Purchase your guest passes here!

Thanks everyone!

This entry was posted on April 26, 2010 at 4:03 PM and has received 3065 views. There are currently 1 comments. Print this entry.

Be our Guest!

Many of our attendees are curious about the options for bringing their spouses, and maybe even kids. Is it ok to have guests during CFUnited?

Heck yeah! We created a "guest pass" for all these people in our lives so they can join in the fun! Now you can register yourself for your specific package, and also purchase a "guest pass" based on the day it will be utilized.

The guest passes are $60/day for Wednesday and Thursday. This includes the all-day amenities and lunch, as well as the evening events. Friday and Saturday guest passes $50/day as there is no evening event that requires ticketed entry.

These prices are based on our cost per person at the venue, so guests will have access to everything minus the sessions. Kids under 16 are free. During the resorts Health Club classes, Resort Rascal Day Care is available for our guests, but pre-registration is required! Please visit the Health Club while you are on property for advanced registration and further details.

P.S. To all the kids of our attendees: There is a pool... and it has a WATER SLIDE!

Purchase guest passes today!

This entry was posted on April 26, 2010 at 12:01 PM and has received 2993 views. There are currently 1 comments. Print this entry.

Below are the partial results to date for the CF Server Hosting survey survey. If you missed the survey you can take it here. See how you compare with other CF developers.
 

We will announce the final survey results and raffle winners the first week of May.

Note that the results are batched processed so they may not include your votes immediately. Check back in a few hours if you want to be sure.

This entry was posted on April 22, 2010 at 1:06 PM and has received 4254 views. There are currently 4 comments. Print this entry.

Hello everyone!

We are very excited to announce the Schedule for CFUnited 2010.

You will notice there are still some TBA topics, and some events are still not identified, such as the BOFs and Special Events. The main thing to focus on are the presentations!

Also, for those attendees who have registered, you can now use the scheduler (when you log in). So start scheduling your sessions!!

For Saturday-only attendees, once we choose the most popular sessions, we will announce them so that you all can create your Saturday schedule!

Happy Hump Day!

This entry was posted on April 21, 2010 at 1:28 PM and has received 2474 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

I saw this awesome Wordle for NCDevCon on Jim Priest's blog and wanted one for CFUnited! So, of course, I made one! (I know, I'm a copy cat)

You can make your own here.

This entry was posted on April 21, 2010 at 11:04 AM and has received 2182 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

After the successful State of the CF Union survey, we wanted to find out more details about the state of CF hosting in 2010. Help us find out what ColdFusion hosting issues people have with this survey . We will share the summary results with everyone so that you can see how you compare with other CF developers. Additionally, everyone who completes the survey will get a copy of a 25-page report on Advanced Application and Server Troubleshooting Techniques by hosting expert Edgeweb CEO, Vlad Friedman. Thanks for your time completing this survey!

Plus we will raffle off one ticket to CFUnited (a $1049 value), two 8 Gb iPod Touches and one copy of Fusion Reactor picked at random from everyone who completes the survey. You have four chances to win something awesome!

The raffle closes on Friday April 30th. We will announce the winners and final results the following week.

This entry was posted on April 19, 2010 at 12:28 PM and has received 2975 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

Brian Rinaldi is an Applications Developer at Pongo Resume where he does Adobe ColdFusion and Adobe Flex development. Brian is an Adobe Community Expert and runs the Boston ColdFusion User Group. He also organizes the RIA Unleashed conference in Boston. Brian blogs regularly about ColdFusion, Flex and Ajax on his blog at remotesynthesis.com.

CFUnited session: Beginning Flex for ColdFusion Developers
Building Self-Updating ColdFusion Builder Extensions

1. Have you spoken at CFUnited in the past?

Yes, I spoke at both of the past two years - two years ago on RIA security and last year on the Mate Flex framework. This year I will be speaking on ColdFusion Builder extensions, which are, in my opinion, the most exciting feature in ColdFusion Builder.

2. Why should people attend your sessions?

Like I said, ColdFusion Builder extensions are the most exciting feature of ColdFusion Builder, allowing you to extend the Eclipse IDE using the CFML programming skills you already have. This opens up a world of possibilities in creating tools and customizing your IDE to meet your specific needs and/or the needs of your organization. This session will cover all the basics of building your own extensions and will add in the ability to auto-update those extensions using my Acme Boomerang project.

3. Do you have any projects in the works that you will be revealing at CFUnited?

Well, the Acme Boomerang for ColdFusion Builder project is already out but considering it plays a significant part in my presentation, I would expect some updates along the way.

4. Besides your topic, what other sessions are you looking forward to?

Well, I am hoping that we can keep the Flex track as top-notch as it was last year (especially considering I am track chair on that).

5. What are some of the hot topics you'd like to see at RoundTable discussions?

Hmmm...Well, we never seem short on items to debate. I thought last years CFML committee discussion was enlightening. I'd like to see a discussion on open source in CFML - like, for instance, get the leads of many of the open-source frameworks or professional open-source projects to discuss the challenges and benefits of open-source.

6. Where can people find you at CFUnited?

The first night, I will probably be at the bar until midnight - convincing myself that this time I will get some sleep rather than staying out far too late. Each night after that, you'll likely find me out at the bar progressively later.

7. What's the latest news with you? Has anything changed since last CFUnited?

Not much...thanks for asking! :)

8. What is unique about CFUnited?

It's still the single best opportunity to network within the ColdFusion developer community. I've been attending conferences for years but I never fail to meet many new people every time I go to this conference. The venue was outstanding with plenty of amenities and good food. The alcohol flowed well into the night - often out by bonfire. Oh yeah, and the sessions are great - last year was by far the best sessions I attended at a CFUnited.

9. What do you like to do in your free time?

Well, I own a lot of video games (with every system available on the market). Notice I said own and not play. I don't get to play them too much - between kids and work. I also listen to a lot of music.

This entry was posted on April 19, 2010 at 10:48 AM and has received 2712 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.

Hello everyone

We know you have all been waiting on pins and needles for the schedule to come out! It is currently going through its rounds of approval. I'm doing my best to make sure it comes out soon!

In the meantime, feel free to look at the topics and speakers to get an idea of what will be offered at CFUnited this year!

And as usual, we will have Birds of a Feather sessions and Roundtable Discussions, as well!

As soon as the schedule is official and ready to go, I will be sure to blog about it!

This entry was posted on April 14, 2010 at 2:26 PM and has received 2058 views. There are currently 0 comments. Print this entry.