Comments on: Choosing a Framework http://adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/ Rants on technology, Ruby on Rails, Javascript and UI Design by Adam Fortuna Tue, 20 Apr 2010 08:57:39 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: joel johnston http://adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-49493 joel johnston Mon, 12 Nov 2007 05:56:33 +0000 http://www.adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-49493 I too just came from a company that did not use any framework in particular. There were about 7 years of overlapping mess held together by spaghetti (with marinara...) uggh.. Of course the company-wide perception was that "Cold Fusion Sucks" as a result. Many developers (after trudging through layer after layer of application sludge,) decided that Java was the superior technology. This was mainly because they had the opportunity to start from scratch and alleviate the pain of untangling "bird nests" of cold fusion code to get the simplest things accomplished. What they didn't realize is that by not implementing a unified framework in java, they only furthered the steady march towards chaos in code for future generations of employees. As the release engineer and IT operative that normally ended up "dealing" with the various implementations, I saw very quickly how important putting a globally standard methodology in place truly is. It doesn't just make code pretty, it saves money on many fronts ...... In some cases I think home-grown frameworks are better to have than nothing, but I would agree with Adam, that you're ultimately defeating the purpose. Also, Home-Grown frameworks have a way of creeping (or evolving,) over time, making the original standard obsolete in short time. I too just came from a company that did not use any framework in particular. There were about 7 years of overlapping mess held together by spaghetti (with marinara…) uggh.. Of course the company-wide perception was that “Cold Fusion Sucks” as a result. Many developers (after trudging through layer after layer of application sludge,) decided that Java was the superior technology. This was mainly because they had the opportunity to start from scratch and alleviate the pain of untangling “bird nests” of cold fusion code to get the simplest things accomplished. What they didn’t realize is that by not implementing a unified framework in java, they only furthered the steady march towards chaos in code for future generations of employees.

As the release engineer and IT operative that normally ended up “dealing” with the various implementations, I saw very quickly how important putting a globally standard methodology in place truly is. It doesn’t just make code pretty, it saves money on many fronts ……

In some cases I think home-grown frameworks are better to have than nothing, but I would agree with Adam, that you’re ultimately defeating the purpose. Also, Home-Grown frameworks have a way of creeping (or evolving,) over time, making the original standard obsolete in short time.

]]> By: Adam Fortuna http://adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-748 Adam Fortuna Tue, 27 Feb 2007 04:44:17 +0000 http://www.adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-748 @Derek Very interesting categories. I think we're definitely hitting a point where more people are in that #3 category though. @Nolan I would agree that in CF you can get something small done more quickly than just about anything out there, but it is usually at the cost of maintainability. Funny to think that Ruby was started the same year CFML was started up -- 1995 i think? Very true about how they evolved though, I hadn't even heard of Ruby until about 2 years ago, which gave it a lot of momentum on one single application rather than a language as a whole. It was really a best case scenario in that respect. One thing about home grown frameworks though -- it goes against two reasons for using one. You lose out on community involvement -- whether that means the community contributing it's code, pointing out problems or just in a simple mailing list. And #2, it's not public so you could never look to hire someone with that skillset because it's all internal. It's not that these are bad though, and they are a good step, and I'm sure there are a load of amazing internal frameworks, but their help is limited. @Derek
Very interesting categories. I think we’re definitely hitting a point where more people are in that #3 category though.

@Nolan
I would agree that in CF you can get something small done more quickly than just about anything out there, but it is usually at the cost of maintainability.

Funny to think that Ruby was started the same year CFML was started up — 1995 i think? Very true about how they evolved though, I hadn’t even heard of Ruby until about 2 years ago, which gave it a lot of momentum on one single application rather than a language as a whole. It was really a best case scenario in that respect.

One thing about home grown frameworks though — it goes against two reasons for using one. You lose out on community involvement — whether that means the community contributing it’s code, pointing out problems or just in a simple mailing list. And #2, it’s not public so you could never look to hire someone with that skillset because it’s all internal. It’s not that these are bad though, and they are a good step, and I’m sure there are a load of amazing internal frameworks, but their help is limited.

]]> By: Nolan Erck http://adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-739 Nolan Erck Mon, 26 Feb 2007 18:32:56 +0000 http://www.adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-739 While I find the facts/stats in this post interesting, I think you’re partially comparing apples and oranges. Ruby (and by extension Rails) is marketed to mid-level programmers and above. It has a (basically) proprietary style of syntax, and does things its own way. ColdFusion was initially built using the tag based CFML to make it easier for designers to understand. Two of the long running selling points for CF have been 1) it looks enough like HTML that your graphic designers don’t get scared by dealing with CFML, and 2) you can fire it up and just get something _done_ quickly. Totally different marketing directions. Additionally, CF has been around a lot longer than Ruby, has it not? From my experience, there are a number of in-house frameworks out there among the ColdFusion shops that wouldn’t pop up under a search for “Model Glue”, but it’s still a framework (albeit not always a well constructed one). Whereas Ruby is still “picking up speed”, and it stands to reason that a budding, small, community would support the same framework (Rails), yes? How many CF shops started out using the “basic web framework” in Ben Forta’s WACK books? I know at least one shop that’s running millions of dollars worth of their business through a huge intranet, 100% of which is based on this same sample framework from Ben’s book. 2 cents, pre-coffee, so it should probably be taken with a few grains of salt. :) -nolan While I find the facts/stats in this post interesting, I think you’re partially comparing apples and oranges. Ruby (and by extension Rails) is marketed to mid-level programmers and above. It has a (basically) proprietary style of syntax, and does things its own way.

ColdFusion was initially built using the tag based CFML to make it easier for designers to understand. Two of the long running selling points for CF have been 1) it looks enough like HTML that your graphic designers don’t get scared by dealing with CFML, and 2) you can fire it up and just get something _done_ quickly.

Totally different marketing directions.

Additionally, CF has been around a lot longer than Ruby, has it not? From my experience, there are a number of in-house frameworks out there among the ColdFusion shops that wouldn’t pop up under a search for “Model Glue”, but it’s still a framework (albeit not always a well constructed one). Whereas Ruby is still “picking up speed”, and it stands to reason that a budding, small, community would support the same framework (Rails), yes? How many CF shops started out using the “basic web framework” in Ben Forta’s WACK books? I know at least one shop that’s running millions of dollars worth of their business through a huge intranet, 100% of which is based on this same sample framework from Ben’s book.

2 cents, pre-coffee, so it should probably be taken with a few grains of salt. :)

-nolan

]]> By: Lola LB http://adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-732 Lola LB Mon, 26 Feb 2007 11:51:57 +0000 http://www.adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-732 Yeah, and Number 1 and 2 types tend to not be aware of events such as CFUnited or CFEclipse. It's especially surprising regarding CFUnited because it's held right here in the DC Metro area and I've been interviewing at local companies for jobs. Yeah, and Number 1 and 2 types tend to not be aware of events such as CFUnited or CFEclipse. It’s especially surprising regarding CFUnited because it’s held right here in the DC Metro area and I’ve been interviewing at local companies for jobs.

]]> By: Script-it.blog http://adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-728 Script-it.blog Mon, 26 Feb 2007 09:55:38 +0000 http://www.adamfortuna.com/2007/02/25/choosing-a-framework/#comment-728 [...] - Choosing a framework. 01 [...] [...] – Choosing a framework. 01 [...]

]]>