| Dreamweaver MX 2004 has a number of features designed to help you create Web pages that pull data from databases via ColdFusion. (It also supports other dynamic data technologies, such as PHP, ASP, ASP.NET, and JSP. This chapter focuses exclusively on ColdFusion, however.) Many of these features are based on auto-generation of HTML and ColdFusion Markup Language (CFML). NOTE ColdFusion Markup Language (CFML) is the HTML-like language for giving instructions to the ColdFusion server. CFML tags are highly intuitive for someone who already knows some HTML.
Some features generate individual words, such as the name of a database table or column, which you can drag and drop into the document window. Some generate blocks of code, complete pages, or even multiple pages for database interactions such as previewing, inserting, updating, and displaying data. Dreamweaver auto-generates code for dynamic tables, input forms, links to other files, conditional "if-else-then" logic, error trapping, and many other HTML and CFML features. For instance, to create a dynamic table (a table populated with data from a database), you press a button and fill in a few parameters on a dialog screen. Dreamweaver auto-generates an ordinary HTML table, with a little CFML thrown in to do the database work. Among the most advanced and useful Dreamweaver features are those that auto-generate ColdFusion components (CFCs) that make ColdFusion functions more easily accessible to clients, including Flash clients that use Macromedia's Flash Remoting technology and Web services clients that use Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP). Creating useful CFCs and Web services requires programming in CFML or Server-Side ActionScript. However, Dreamweaver and ColdFusion make the mechanics of creating and deploying CFCs and Web services very, very easy.  For more on Flash Remoting and Web services, see "Flash Remoting ," page 666 , and "Web Services," page 672 , both in Chapter 23, "Using Flash for Dynamic Data."
 | When they're created, dynamic objects (such as the dynamic table) are not formatted in any way, so they look very plain. For clarity's sake, I've left objects in their simplest forms in this chapter. However, because they are ordinary HTML objects, you can use standard HTML formatting techniques, including CSS, to make them look nice. |
Dreamweaver MX 2004 doesn't bring any new features for developing ColdFusion applications. However, the interface you use to get to those features has changed somewhat, mainly in the redesign of the Dreamweaver Insert bar, which now gives you a choice between a tabbed and a menu interface. (Before it was always tabbed.) There's also a new Favorites category on the Insert bar, which you can populate with your most frequently used objects. The other main interface to dynamic data- related features, the Application panel, has not changed. For more on the redesigned Insert bar, see "Exploring the Document Window," page 76 , in Chapter 5, "Working in the Dreamweaver Environment."
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