This blog post began as a simple comment to Ray's blog post "Are We Falling Behind", but darn him, he moved me such that it turned into multiple paragraphs!

So, here's the commentary that the afore mentioned post and the thoughts of all its commenters evoked from me.

In My Beginning, There Was Procedural

In 2004 MX6 made a leap in evolution that opened the doors many native OOers had been waiting for, and they began to weave all sorts of new and strange CF tapestries. At that time, all of my CF coworkers were buzzing about "MVC", all the time, constantly; it was SO annoying! I was coding as I always had and didn't see any gaps in my ability to produce good stuff; I'd never used a CFC before and had no intention of starting at that time. That, coupled with the fact that I unequivocably tend to ALWAYS be wary of whatever direction the herd is heading (I've read about those caveman bison hunts!), kept me perfectly content just as I was. Fast forward to 2006. What was a buzz is now a dull roar. Fusebox has taken a quantum leap. Model-Glue, Reactor, Mach II, Coldspring...they are now incarnate and catching plenty of attention. My job at that time had me maintaining legacy code, so I spent my days tracing variables through myriads of includes, trying to find their origins...nothing that involved any new dev, for the most part. Then the directive came down to rebuild all this legacy spaghetti. Myself and two other team members were mandated to recreate this app, in a fashion that would allow it to be easily configurable, easily connect to multiple database backends, easily support multiple clients and THEIR clients, be easily skinnable, and have certain aspects of it be consumable as web services by corporate and other satellite offices. It was at that point that the ton of bricks fell and I knew that it would be a very bad idea to try and weave this masterpiece from scratch, so the team and I decided that "frameworks it would be".

At The Crossroads

Ah, but which framework should we choose? None of us had any experience with any of them; we had only read blog posts and accumulated rough ideas, foggy understandings, and enough theory to fuel lunch time discussions. To decide the matter, we architected out a small application with basic security and crud, and we built that app with each of the frameworks we were considering. What that accomplished was to solidify the vague understandings we had, and it let us find the framework that most suited our own personal development style (terminology, syntax, organization, etc.). Since that first app in Model-Glue, I have written several more using that framework and some others; but I have also written a decent number strictly "plain vanilla", simply because their scope was smaller than the problem a framework addresses. The beauty of things now, though, is: I have a choice.

I have to make a confession: the directive to build an enterprise-size app was not my only motivation to learn the frameworks; that was just my paid opportunity to do so. My stronger, deeper, and truer motivation at that time was that dull incessant roar I mentioned, the one that was always in my ear and eventually DID manage to make me feel like I was being left behind, professionally. Was I, or was it perception only? Well, if in my future job quests I continually find that I am unqualified for the position due to my lack of specific CF skills, despite the fact that I've been using CF for a decade or more, then I would have to say that yes, I WAS left behind. If I'm well able to procure suitable employment without having added that knowledge to my quiver, then no, I was not left behind. I don't have a good enough feel for the pulse of the CF job market to know which it truly is, nor am I any sort of prognosticator on this matter, but I DO know that I have absolutely zero regrets having invested the time in stretching my brain to accommodate both the old AND the new.

Change IS Scary, But Possible

Making the leap to this strange new world is daunting, without a doubt, and anybody who tries to tell you otherwise is doing that smoke-blowing thing. My own leap was still recent enough for me that I remember the doubts, frustrations, and pain of persistently banging my head against this apparent brick wall. But eventually, with enough experimentation, reading, experimentation and reading, it DID sink in! There was no shortcuts over that mountain, so I just took that first grip and pulled until I could reach the next one. As I learned things I blogged about them, leaving behind what understandings I'd gleaned in hopes that those following me could gain an easier foothold. But the simple truth with this is, as with every other thing in life that's worthwhile: if you want it, you can get it, but to get it, it is gonna cost you something. Accept this gauntlet, then take off running. I guarantee you, it is impossible to fail to learn OO in a CF context if you determine in yourself that you are going to do it. There's just too many people who have gone before you, no smarter than you are, who have managed to accomplish it; there's just too many fellow CFers who are able and willing to assist you along the way. You can't fail at this, should you choose to do it.

Opting Out: Is It An Option?

But what if you should choose NOT to do it? Let me preface the rest of this by saying that I do indeed love all my fellow CF developers equally, and I'd love to drink a pint with each and every one of you. But, just speaking from my gut, I believe that if you are not in a constant state of professional growth, which includes frameworks and OO methodologies, you will minimally eventually find yourself to be part of a CF minority, if not already. And I do believe that that minority will find itself at the lower end of a continually expanding income gap between those who made the time for this particular vein of professional self-improvement and those who did not.

I'm not condemning anybody for something they do not know (Lawd knows there's PLENTY that I don't know!), but what I am doing is encouraging one and all to take/make the time to get more than just an arm chair knowledge of what is happening all around you in the CF world; acknowledge that ever increasing dull roar of OO that you can't help but hear, and (in this case only), take a sip of this kool-aid. You will never regret knowing more tomorrow than you do today.

Doug out :0)