Error in precompile.bat printed in my CFDJ article

Gads! Somehow the version of the precompile.bat file that was printed in my October CFDJ article (http://www.sys-con.com/coldfusion/article.cfm?id=519) is missing some important code! :-(

It should be:

set MX_INSTALL=d:\cfusionMX
%MX_INSTALL%\runtime\jre\bin\java -classpath
    %MX_INSTALL%\lib\cfusion.jar
    coldfusion.tools.Compiler -webroot %1
    -webinf %MX_INSTALL%\wwwroot\WEB-INF %1

As the article indicates, it's just 2 lines, the first being the SET and the second starting with %MX_INSTALL%.

But the printed version was somehow missing the beginning of the second line:

%MX_INSTALL%\runtime\jre\bin\java -classpath

So sorry for that printing mistake!

One other thing I've learned since writing the article is that it seems to fail to work if a directory name or file name being precompiled has spaces in the name.

Update: I've since found another issue with the version offered in the CFDJ. In certain instances it may fail to work, and it turns out that it was the setting the second line above to:

%MX_INSTALL%\runtime\jre\bin\java -classpath

as was shown in the article. It should instead be what I've set it to above:

%MX_INSTALL%\runtime\bin\java -classpath

Turns out that the runtime\jre\bin calls a 1.3 version of the java interpreter, and as of the updater 1 of CFMX, parts of this compile process (when using the -f directive) need the 1.4 interpreter. The corrected line calls the correct one. See my entry of 12/6/02 for more info.

/charlie

Speeding Up Dreamweaver MX: Disable Auto Refresh

Some have noticed that Dreamweaver can perform sluggishly.

One reason is that, by default, it's checking all files in a site (and all subdirectories) to determine if they have changed--and it does this every time you leave and return to DWMX, such as to go read email, edit a word processing document, etc. The thinking is that you may have created or edited a file while outside DWMX. Unfortunately, that "lookup" can cause a painful delay if you leave and return to DWMX often, especially if the site has many files (and subdirectories).

The option is controlled by the feature "refresh local files list automatically", a checkbox in Edit Site>Advanced>Local Info. Turn it off and see if that helps.

You can use the "refresh" button in the site tab to refresh the list. Also, if you expand a directory for he first time since opening the site, that will also obtain a refreshed list of what's in the directory. Once it's opened, though, the file list is cached and only using the "refresh" or restarting DWMX will obtain an updated list (with the "refresh automatically" option disabled).

It's worth clarifying that this is a site-specific feature. You can leave it enabled on one site and disable it on another.

One other comment about poor performance in DWMX in general: I mentioned in my entry of 9/27 ("Getting into Dreamweaver for Studio users") that your machine's performance may have an impact, and in an entry on 8/10 ("Time for developers to consider a hardware upgrade?") I suggested other benefits of considering a machine upgrade.

Running the updater

Well, I've waited a few weeks to install the updater and while I've heard of some problems none seem so grave so I've installed the updater (http://dynamic.macromedia.com/bin/MM/software/trial/hwswrec.jsp?product=cfmx_updater.

It went well, though while it reminds you to stop the CFMX service and the release notes tell you to also stop the CFMX ODBC Services as well as restart all of them after the updater is done, it's easy to forget to start those ODBC Services which could lead you to think something went wrong with the install (I did, and none of the datasources were working correctly until I figured that out).

I was disappointed to see that the udpater did not fix the problem I raised in my June 2002 article on the new server-side redirect, with the getpagecontext().forward() method. It still does not work if a forward is attempted from a form action page. Grr.

/charlie

Looking for Some Verity Docs?

Are you looking for more info to understand how CF's underlying Verity Search engine works? Whether for creating or searching them, there's lots more to it than is discussed in the CFML Reference or Developing CF Apps books in the CF docs.

I've come across some sites with interesting extended documentation. If you've not seen these they may be useful.

Before that, though, some may have noticed that in CFMX there is a new manual "Working With Verity Tools". That's certainly worth a look, particularly for the coverage of using Verity Spider searching. See it at livedocs.macromedia.com.

But beyond that, there is also a complete set of HTM-based Verity docs at http://support.exln.com/doc/full/dm/vdk/doc/. This is just the docs at a particular site that's posted them. There are other places that have posted them, in case these every disappear. Do a google search for "Collection Building Guide" to find such links. This particular link offers several docs related to Verity processing.