Macromedia Coldfusion MX 7 Web Application Construction Kit [With CDROM]

I looked up and down for the best cold fusion book for my specfic need...to build an enterprise quality content management system. I am a registered pharmacist and self taught HTML-based web developer who wanted to take a crack at cold fusion because of I heard it was the easiest to language to learn when developing dynamic web sites. Because I only knew HTML, I found myself using PHP code snippets from open source web sites to create some dynamic attributes to my pharmacy network's website (6 pharmacies). I originally wanted to have a simple "news publisher" so I could provide updates to the other staff. I grew frustrated because I didn't "really" know PHP and debugging was near impossible since I didn't know the code. Then along came this book, recommended by my sister who is a windows application programmer. She said Ben Forte writes the most comprehensive books/tutorials on cold fusion. She was exactly correct! Without getting into the details, I worked through this book from cover to cover and completed the tutorials on the included CD. 7 months later I have created a dynamic content management system for our pharmacy network that tracks transferred medications, provides news updates, online refills to customers, a daily revenue DB application for my director (which he can search by date range), an online store with customer history available, searchable policy/procedures online, etc. All this after only 7 months!! My advise for people is to learn HTML well before delving into Cold Fusion, but if you know HTML well, you will find this book to be your web design bible rather quickly. If I can do it anyone can...The hosptital I work for is even wanting to purchase the app from me now because it's such a valuable asset to the network's infrastructure. GO BUY THIS BOOK if you want to do something like I did with whatever business/site you want. With some dedication you can achieve it and not have to look further than this book.

I received this book at 11 a.m. yesterday, and I had my database search up and running at 9 p.m. last night. I am by no means any kind of programmer except for the semester of BASIC I took in high school (15 years ago). I am, however, a technical writer, instructor, and consultant, who wishes she had majored in Computer Science instead of Journalism. This book is BY FAR the best instructional book I have read about setting up a database and working with the data over the internet. It doesn't assume that the reader knows much of anything about SQL, Access, and, of course, ColdFusion. I highly recommend this book to novices who are trying to learn ColdFusion and develop databases on the Internet...after all, if I can do it, anyone can!

This book was fantastic. Sure there are the few editing errors common with computer books. I knew NOTHING about Cold Fusion or database connectivity to the web before I got this and now I've written a dozen or so Cold Fusion applications for the UPS intranet. An EXCELLENT resource for beginners and professionals with a tag index for quick referencing. A chapter on SQL also for those who don't know it. It will teach you everything you need to know to get your application online and running. Great Great Great!

I read the first edition--and that was my introduction to both databases and Cold Fusion. It was a great book. And the second edition is even better! The author starts from very basic, and gradually takes the reader to the advanced concepts of Cold Fusion, all the time providing a real-life scenario-based development environment.

You will not find a more complete and thorough book on Cold Fusion, or on any other technology for that matter, than Ben's book.The guy knows his stuff, is thorough, and can write in English - you know the version of the language that mere mortals can understand. Even though I am not a developer, I quit my 6 figure job to start my own Internet startup & develop my own web applications - in large part because Ben's book made me realized that even a novice like me can develop powerful CF applications.