ColdFusion Muse: CFMX and the Dot Operator - Migrating From CF 5 to CFMX

CFMX and the Dot Operator - Migrating From CF 5 to CFMX

Mark Kruger March 14, 2006 11:23 AM Coldfusion MX 7, Coldfusion Tips and Techniques Comments (4)

If you come from the old "Coldfusion 4-5" days (in fact many or our customers are still running CF 5) then you might remember how those earlier versions handled variables with periods in the name. If you created a variable with a period in the name CF simply treated the period as if it were part of the variable name. For example, if you did the following in CF 5:

You would not have created anything more than a primitive variable named "var1.var2.var3". If you tried to use <cfdump ...> to dump out var1 it would generate an error - var1 not found. If you intended for var1 to be a structure containing a structure var2 containing a primitive var3 then you would have to rewrite the code like this:

Fast forward to CFMX.

In CFMX the Dot is an Operator

In CFMX the dot is special. It is used as an "operator". No, that's not a middle aged woman in horned rim glasses asking "how may I direct your call?" It means that the period performs a function or operation on the "operands". To give a simple example, consider this equation.

3 + 5 = 9

The 3 and the 5 are the "operands" - the inputs - and the "+" is the operator. In CFMX, the string to the left and the string to the right of the period are the operands and the dot is the operator. So the code above (var1.var2.var3 = "My Dotty Variable") is actually instructing CF to do something specific to var1 and var2 and var3. It is telling CFMX to A) create a primitive variable called "var3" and place the string "My Dotty Variable" in it, and B) create a structure called "var2" and add var3 as a key and C) create a structure called var3 and add the structure var2 to it as a key. The result is an primitive inside of a structure inside of another structure. If you run this code in CFMX:

You will get this very interesting result:

struct

VAR2

struct
VAR3	My Dotty Variable

As you can see, CFMX has automatically created nested structures based on your operator.

The Gotcha

There is one important caveat to this behavior. It has to do with key naming in structures. You see while it is not possible to create a primitive (non-object) variable using the syntax above, it is possible to create a structure key that includes a dot. For example, if you had the following code in CFMX:

You would produce a key in the variables scope called "var1.var2.var3". In other words, the behavior would be exactly like CF 5. Why? Because you are not using the dot as an operator, and CFMX allows literally anything to be a key name for a structure. If you don't beleive me, see my post on isDefined() vs. structKeyExists(). Where this sometimes has implications is when items are passed in the URL or FORM scope. These are both structures, so passing a url variable like "?var.var2=blah" is the same as saying "url['var1.var2']" - in other words, no dot operator. So this code:

Would work, but this code:

Will complain that there is no variable named "var2" in the object named "var1". If you have old code lying around that passes variables like this but doesn't use the bracket notation (as in early versions of Fusebox) it will cause you problems.

Solution

The solution is to avoid using dotted notation for primitive variables. Only use dotted notation for variable naming when you intend to create a structure. Especially avoid passing such dottily named variables as URL or Form variables. It can be a real headache to ferret out all the places where this code exists when you are migrating code from CF 5 to CFMX.

4 Comments

Posted By
Adam Cameron | 3/14/06 5:15 PM

I think it's a bit "misleading" to suggest that the dot is an OPERATOR. It would be an operator if this was possible:

myStruct = "top" . "middle" . "bottom";

and that would create a struct like this:

myStruct.top.middle.bottom

(or, I dunno, something like that... it's nonsense so I don't know what my expectations would be, other than "an error").

But that's not how it works. For something to be an operator, it has to be usable in an expression; and usable with other operators and operands. Dots aren't.

It's simply part of a CF synactical construct which allows the autocreation of structures on the LHS of an expression.

When going:

mystruct.top.middle.bottom = "value";

mystruct, top, middle and bottom are NOT operands, and . is not an operator.

--
Adam
Posted By
Steven Erat | 3/14/06 7:05 PM

Nice post! While I knew that this was documented in as a change in the CFMX 6.0 documentation guide in the section on Migrating, I didn't know that it was possible to create struct keys having dots in the key name. Good technote :) Thx!
Posted By
Mkruger | 3/14/06 7:18 PM

Steve - thanks for the kind words.

Adam - while I see your point that the "dot" doesn't seem to have the same syntactical properties as the + or - etc... I would hasten to point out that the term "dot operator" is quite ubiquitous in the java world (as well as other OO languages). In fact the Coldfusion migration guide itself refers to the change in variable naming as follows:

--------------------------
You can no longer use a dot (.) in a variable name, because ColdFusion MX supports the dot notation as a DOT OPERATOR to create a struct. For example, last.name creates a struct called last with a key called name, instead of creating a simple variable whose name has a period in it.

--------------------------

So, while some folks who are unfamiliar with the idea of the dot being an operator might struggle initially at the idea, I think it is fairly well supported. I would add that your argument is more about syntax (which can vary widely based on the language used) than function. It may be fair to say that the dot operator has syntax rules attached to it - but I think it is definitely an operand.
Posted By
Adam Cameron | 3/15/06 3:37 AM

Fair cop.
I think you should probably remove the analogy to the + operator though, as it is misleading. It is not an operator in THAT sense of the notion.

Personally I think the existing - almost ubiquitous - usage is inaccurate, but that is a fight I think would be futile for me to engage in ;-)

ColdFusion Muse

CFMX and the Dot Operator - Migrating From CF 5 to CFMX

In CFMX the Dot is an Operator

The Gotcha

Solution

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