Switching Back To CFEclipse From CFBuilder

Posted At : March 24, 2010 7:33 PM | Posted By : Ryan Vikander
Related Categories: CFBuilder, Coldfusion

So I have been on the private beta of CFBuilder since it was Bolt when it first went to private testing and have loved most of it. I love the Extensions, the RDS is pretty cool, and being able to manage my servers inside the IDE is pretty slick. Although I have dealt with all the performance issues between each release I do have to say that I am in love with CFBuilder. Unfortunately what has killed most of my love for Builder is the price tag. $300 is a bit much for an IDE. Especially since there are a few really good ones that are free. Now you don't get as much of the cool stuff Builder offers, but it is pretty darn close. Also, $300 is fine when you are purchasing one license and that is it. As some people know I work at a pretty big Coldfusion shop. There are probably about 50 CF developers maybe. And at $300 bucks its a bit much. Event if they could do half off that is that is still $7,500 total. I don't know, it hurts me to switch off but I think I will live.

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If you haven't already please consider joining the CFEclipse mailing list. We've got an active development group working on fixing bugs and some enhancements.

# Posted By Jim Priest | 3/24/10 6:27 PM

Unfortunately, I am in the same boat. We are have replicated most of the functionality with free products. There will be 2 or 3 i'll miss, but for $300 per developer we can deal without. Atleast until they provide more functionality.

Also, I'm curious what the ratio of people using the beta are going back to cfEclipse.

# Posted By Craig Benner | 3/24/10 7:25 PM

I will have to join the CFEclipse mailing list. Is there a lot of active development happening? Any new features coming up on the horizon?

# Posted By Ryan Vikander | 3/24/10 7:38 PM

to view some upcoming enhancements look at http://trac.cfeclipse.org/ and don't forget some people have customized e edit and notepad++ to do what they want, their is nothing wrong with that. If you actually use some of the advanced features of cfeclipse then it really stands its on its own two feet....whatever that means

# Posted By Josh Knutson | 3/24/10 10:29 PM

One thing to consider, for the long term, is that the upgrade pricing is considerably less (I'm basing pricing on Flash Builder 4 Standard as there is obviously no upgrading pricing for CFB).

If you took out maintenance, then this cost is even less than upgrade pricing (albeit you have to pay out more initially).

I'd seriously consider pinging one of the folks listed on http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/buy/#cfb and see what they can do for you.

You don't get if you don't ask. And if you still can't work something out, then CFEclipse is your friend.

# Posted By Andy Allan | 3/25/10 5:30 AM

"$300 is a bit much for an IDE" is a very broad statement without any support. Zen Studio based on Eclipse (php editor) is US$399. Tasktop Pro is US$99 for task focused ability in Eclipse. FusionDebug is US$299.

And a shop with 50 cf developer is spending millions on software so 8k is a drop in the bucket plus they will get a volume discount.

# Posted By Mike Henke | 3/25/10 6:34 AM

I think CFBuilder helps CFEclipse. If people don't want to doll out the money, they have been exposed to CFBuilder/Eclipse and may want to use CFEclipse. It shouldn't be an us verses them. Look at Zen Studio and PDT.

# Posted By Mike Henke | 3/25/10 6:55 AM

I'll ditto Mike here - 300 shouldn't be a lot to a company like ImageTrend, and you should at least call your Adobe sales rep. Time and time again I hear them say - if you want to make a deal, they will try.

# Posted By Raymond Camden | 3/25/10 7:10 AM

Ryan, I switched back too. It wasn't the price tag that killed the deal, it was the value of the product. CFBuilder, in my opinion did not offer enough compelling features to add value over CFEclipse to justify the cost.

This is sort of like the DVD/Blu-Ray argument. VHS to DVD was a huge jump in technology, remember what it was like to rewind movies, nevermind the video/audio improvements. Now comes Blu-Ray and HD content, there's not a compelling enough value for an upgrade. DVDs look great on up-scaling DVD players and are inexpensive.

It's the same problem with CFBuilder. Adobe missed the opportunity to maximize the value of the product; making an existing product a perfectly suitable substitute. Further, by not supporting HTML5 and disclosing it is set to be included in CFBuilder 2.0, means you're already looking at a pay-for upgrade over the $300 entry.
Respectfully,

Ray K. Ragan

# Posted By Ray K. Ragan | 3/25/10 11:16 AM

Agreed, Switched back to CFEclipse. The price was part of the consideration but not the main focus, if you spend a little time building up a Eclipse build your functionality can come pretty close.

However one other comment, i think they should have released the pricing long ago. Two weeks before the close of the CFbuilder trial is a little short notice for those who actually were using. Switching tools mid-project can be a pain so had to dump it a little while ago.

# Posted By Nathan Kondra | 3/25/10 1:46 PM

Thanks for the comments everyone! It's good to hear some feedback from the community. I will definitely have to check out what kind of deals Adobe could give us. What is hard is trying to convince some of my fellow co-workers that have dealt with some of the frustrations that CFBuilder has brought on. One thing that I have noticed that they have not fixed is when working on a long line of code Builder shoots you back to the beginning of the line. It isn't a big bug but it can be annoying at times.

# Posted By Ryan Vikander | 3/25/10 2:06 PM

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