I am super excited to announce the ColdBox Platform 3.0.0 M6 release! Why? Because it holds one of my favorite subjects......Caching! With this release we complete yet another standalone framework cycle with the introduction to CacheBox. However, we won't delve too much on CacheBox in this post as it is deserving of its own, so the next post is the announcement of the release of CacheBox 1.0. However, the major part of this release is CacheBox, so lets introduce this bad boy:

Read more...

Our amazing LogBox: Enterprise Logging Library reaches another step in maturity to version 1.4.  This release has some great additions but also some needed fixes.  We have now also added the ability to download and view the CFC API Docs online thanks to Mark Mandel's ColdDoc, thanks Mark! ColdDoc is now part of the build processes of ColdBox and auxiliary frameworks.

You can now download the LogBox version that contains the docs and both versions of LogBox: standalone and coldbox enabled.  Of course, all our docs are now updated also.

This release includes the following:

 

Version 1.4

http://coldbox.assembla.com/spaces/coldbox/milestones/222897-logbox-1-4

1006	Fixes to DSL when doing appender affinity, not converting log levels to numeric You can now define the log levels as numerical values or the static constant strings
1007	logLevels isLevelValid not assuring a valid level wrong boolean operation
1008	appender() not doing level checks It now can handle both numeric and string constants
1009	refactoring the log levels argument types to consolidate them at the three input methods thanks to brad wood
1010	Appender registration an init() not registering the log levels correctly
1011	refactor logger and appender to verify logging levels sent via init()
1032	Update the ensurance of datasources and let CF throw exception instead in the Database Appender
1054	Creation of XML schema for LogBox, you can now use a schema located in the config folder.

Appender Affinity
You can now define a last line of defense at the appender level.  Each appender can define their own logging levels if needed.

LogBox Schema
If you like XML (we won't hold it against you), you can now use our nifty schema to get tag insight and validation.  The schema can be located in "logbox/system/config/LogBoxConfig.xsd" or can be found online on a per version basis:
http://coldbox.org/schema/LogBoxConfig_1.4.xsd

Our now famous LogBox: Enterprise Logging Library reaches another step in maturity to version 1.3.  This release includes the following:

Version 1.3

http://coldbox.assembla.com/spaces/coldbox/milestones/187467-logbox-1-3

• Varscoping issue for DBAppender
• Varscoping issue for Logger object
• fix for category inheritance issues on locateCategoryParentLogger thanks to Sean Corfield
• fixes when declaring appenders and * appenders on XML declarations
• Add the ability to configure levels of logging on Appenders as a last line of granularity (some nice candy)

Apart from several fixes we managed to squeeze a nice little gem, appender logging affinity. What this gem feature enables you to do is basically also designate a logging severity window for the appenders.  This provides great flexibilty when you want only certain appenders to listen to certain severities.  So all you do now is add a levelMin and levelMax to the appender declarations, whether you are using the LogBox programmatic DSL or the XML.  Of course, all the features and fixes have been documented.  Also, please note that LogBox is embedded in ColdBox 3.0.0 also or can be used via its standalone framework download.

On the spirit of non-stop releases, here is LogBox version 1.2.  Apart from some bug fixes we have squeezed in some great new functionality, especially when dealing with configuring LogBox and portability. Check out our milestone tickets for further review. Version 1.2 Tickets

• Added some new methods to the LogBoxConfig object: resetAppenders(), resetCategories and resetRoot() to reset some configurations.
• Fixes on appender declarations and layouts
• Addition of the LogBox DSL to coldbox configuration file, so now you can configure logbox via a cool DSL
• Ability to configure LogBox via a simple CFC with a simple configure() method and our cool DSL

The major portion of this release is three words "Portabiity in Style".  We wanted to add a new way to configure LogBox in ColdBox style, a cool data definition DSL. Of course, our documentation is updated and now online: http://wiki.coldbox.org/wiki/LogBox.cfm#LogBox_DSL. Here is a little tast of the DSL: function configure(){

logBox = {
   // Appenders   appenders = {
      appenderName = {
         class="class.to.appender",
         layout="class.to.layout",
         properties={
            name = value,
            prop2 = value 2
         }
   },
   // Root Logger   root = {levelMin="FATAL", levelMax="DEBUG", appenders="*"},
   // Granualr Categories   categories = {
      "coldbox.system" = { levelMin="FATAL", levelMax="INFO", appenders="*"},
      "model.security" = { levelMax="DEBUG", appenders="console,twitter"}
   }
   // Implicit categories   debug = ["coldbox.system.interceptors"],
   info = ["model.class", "model2.class2"],
   warn = ["model.class", "model2.class2"],
   error = ["model.class", "model2.class2"],
   fatal = ["model.class", "model2.class2"],
   off = ["model.class", "model2.class2"]
};

}

Welcome to another week of wonderful releases.  We start of with our two awesome logging and mocking frameworks LogBox and MockBox.  They have both just graduated to version 1.1 and can be downloaded today as standalone frameworks or via the 3.0.0 M4 bundle, ahh yes, another blog post after this.

So what's new with LogBox 1.1, well here are the tickets:

890	add all appenders to a logbox category by default even from coldbox apps	Fixed
891	category definitions should allow the * for appenders when definining them, instead of listing them	Fixed
907	Async Appenders need way to distinguish between threading and not	Fixed
910	LogBox standalone is now refactored to work under the logbox namespace	Fixed
941	new properties for EmailAppender: useTLS and useSSL	Fixed

The most important considerations are that we now have a utility that distinguishes when you are within an executed cfthread in any CFML engine.  LogBox uses this now for all of its asynchronous operations.  We also have refactored the download so LogBox can be installed alongside any ColdBox version or any other framework.  If you want to use LogBox in your ColdBox 3.0.0 applications, you already have it installed, so don't worry. 

Category definitions can now use '*' to define that you want ALL appenders for a specific logging category.  You can also omit them and LogBox will add all of them too.  However, be precise and use '*' if you want all appenders.

The last ticket was contributed to us and it is a great addition to the Email Appender, so now you can set the flags for SSL and TLS a-la-carte.  So enjoy LogBox 1.1!

Now to our mocking and stubbing library MockBox! So what's new with MockBox 1.1:

911	Standalone version should be refactored into its own namespace	Fixed
940	new method querySim() to help simulate queries	Fixed

We have also refactored the standalone download so it can be used alongside any ColdBox version or framework.  We have also added a nice UDF to simulate queries called querySim().  This way you can easily simulate and mock queries from your tests by doing things like:

mockQuery = querySim("col1, col2
val1 | val2
valrow2 | valRow2
valRow3 | valRow3");

That's it, just use the first line of the call to put your columns comma delimited and then a break and you rows separated by breaks and columns separated by '|'.  A very cool way to simulate queries. 

And finally, it has some minor fixes and tweaks, nothing extraordinary apart from the library itself!

So enjoy these two new standalone releases which can also be found in our upcoming ColdBox 3.0.0 Milestone 4 release!