TeraTech

Today I'm flying to Las Vegas, NV for Adobe Summit. It is Mon 6/22 - Tue 6/23/26.

I'm excited about the topics this year! Several modern CF trends stand out:

1) AI everywhere - agents, MCP, RAG, vector databases, semantic search, AI governance, AI security, AI ROI, observability, and AI-assisted development.

2) Modernizing legacy applications - practical techniques for improving and extending existing ColdFusion applications without risky rewrites.

3) Cloud and scale - Google Cloud, AWS, serverless deployments, event-driven architectures, and enterprise-scale data processing.

4) Security and reliability - passkeys, SSO, authentication, JVM troubleshooting, monitoring, performance tuning, backups, and operational excellence.

5) ACF 2025 - new CFML language features, migration strategies, and hidden gems many teams may not be using yet.

One thing I like about this year's conference is that it balances innovation with reality. There are plenty of AI sessions, but also lots of content focused on maintaining, modernizing, securing, and scaling real production systems. That is where many CFer hobbits in the trenches are still working keeping production systems healthy and modern. :-)

A big thank you to all the speakers sharing their experience with the ColdFusion community:

Aaron Rouse, Adeyemi Ritchards, Alex Yablonsky, Amit Dayal, Anastasia Zamyshlyaeva, Ben Forta, Charlie Arehart, Charvi Dhoot, Corbin Crutchley, Dakota Clum, Dave Ferguson, David Byers, David Tattersall, David Timczyk, Guust Nieuwenhuis, Justin Scott, Kevin Schmidt, Kevin Wright, Larry Lyons, Madeline Hou, Mark Takata, Matt Mersing, Michael Hayes, Monte Chan, NIKHIL DUBEY, Nolan Erck, Pete Freitag, Scott Bennett, Shawn Oden, Vikas Yadav, Vivek Kumar

I'll be there representing TeraTech and the CF Alive podcast.

Full details on CF Summit in the first comment.

Who else is attending? Comment below if you're going. I'd love to connect in person and talk ColdFusion, AI, modernization, or whatever challenge you're currently facing.

Hear Grant talk about Supabase and maling your project Supa!
cfcamp day talks at Munich.

Jochem Von Dieten at cfcamp day 2! Serverless is the way!
BoxLang

Keynote talk at cfcamp day 2
8 - Evolving CFML for a New Era
Michael, Zac Spitzer and Mark Drew
Awesome presentations

The ColdFusion Slowdown: Slay the Lag

“Oh the horror! Oh my, the agony!”

No, we’re not talking about an orc ambush. We’re talking about something worse...

Waiting for an app to load.

In the tech world, a few seconds can feel like a thousand years. Your users expect speed. Your clients expect results. Your servers... well, they’re doing their best. But when an app gets slow, the whole realm feels it.

The good news? ColdFusion is built for speed.

The better news? Most CF app performance issues are fixable.

Today we’ll cover:

1. What causes “slow”
2. How to tune your app for speed
3. How to prevent future slowness

Let’s sharpen our swords and our queries.

1. What Causes “Slow”?

“Slow” is a symptom, not a diagnosis.

I once met a client who clicked open a payroll app and casually said, “Okay, while we wait for that to load…”

Wait?! For payroll?!

Turns out, some CIOs don’t even realize how sluggish their apps are. When “slow” is your normal, you forget what fast feels like.

But here’s why it matters: If one piece of code takes 500 milliseconds and runs 100 times an hour, that’s 120 hours of server time each year. Multiply that across users and tasks, and the cost adds up fast.

With public apps, page load time is one of the major factors Google uses to rank search results. Slower sites get less search traffic.

2. Where Is the Lag Coming From?

Here’s how to find the bottleneck:

Check Your Logs & Metrics ColdFusion’s logs and the Adobe Performance Monitoring Toolset (PMT) give a behind-the-scenes view of app performance.
Use Third-Party Tools Tools like FusionReactor help you diagnose speed drains with surgical precision.
Watch Out for Your Own Success Sometimes “slow” just means too many users for your current setup. That’s when performance tuning becomes your new best friend.

3. Speed Up with Performance Tuning

Every ColdFusion developer should carry a +2 Performance Tuning Toolkit. Here’s what that looks like:

Tune Your SQL (aka, don’t let the database become Mount Doom)

Gert Franz https://www.linkedin.com/in/gert-franz-4056807/, a legendary dev who abandoned astrophysics for CF wizardry, laid out some great tips:

1. Limit queries (especially queries of queries)
2. Avoid layered queries when simpler ones will do
3. No lists! Use arrays instead. They’re faster, cleaner, safer
4. Keep database calls lean and mean
5. Manage garbage collection carefully. Too much or too little is bad

Need more? Gert’s talk and his episode on ColdFusion Alive https://teratech.com/024-cfml-debugging-jedi-tricks-templates-gert-franz-transcript/ are worth bookmarking for every dev in your company.

Run Load Tests Like You Mean It

Simulate a flood of realistic traffic and find out:

* Where things break
* When response times spike
* How your app actually handles real-world pressure

Here’s the wild part: You want to break your app.

Because only when it breaks do you know where the real weaknesses lie.

Then fix. Then test again. Then fix again. Repeat until ready for prime time.

4. Preventing Future Slowdowns

You want to stop future lag before it starts? Then you need a prevention mindset.

Here’s your four-part path to performance protection:

1. Design your data for success Assume your app will be popular and model your databases accordingly. Over-plan now, under-stress later.
2. Upgrade your gear Don’t let ancient hardware kneecap a modern app. ColdFusion runs best on fast specs.
3. Build maintenance into your dev cycle
4. Repeat the process Tuning isn’t one and done. It’s the equivalent of keeping your sword sharp before every battle.

Final Words from the Fellowship

In Middleware-earth, speed isn’t a luxury. It’s survival.

A slow ColdFusion app can mean lost users, abandoned carts, angry clients, and yes... a grumpy boss.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. You can tune. You can test. You can triumph.

And the best part? You don’t need to be a wizard. Just follow the path, ask the right questions, and wield your tools with care.

Onward! 🌟

Over the next two weeks, we tackle the mystical arts of getting things done. Because every developer Hobbit occasionally suffers from productivity issues.

P.S. If your CF application feels as cursed and creaky as the halls of Weathertop on a stormy night, fear not, resolute 'Strider of Systems'! Send your message through the wind-whipped ruins https://teratech.com/contact/, carve a rune into ancient stone, or light a fire beneath the stars and get a free assessment https://teratech.com/coldfusion-modernization-and-maintenance-assessment/. As vigilant as the Ranger keeping watch in the wild, we are here to defend, restore, and renew your digital road. Together, we’ll stand against the shadows of obsolescence and bring your project back into the light, swift and sharp as a sword reforged. 🌫️🔥

The noise
The co-worker
Fusion Reactor
And David T.
Great