isDefined not working since migration to CF11

Question

Hello!We have a system running on Cold Fusion. The server was running on CF7 and we upgraded it to CF11 and now the isDefined are not working anymore.To be honest I do very few Cold Fusion coding, it's an old system that was not maintained that I just got and I have to manage. I am learning everything.I've read that isDefined is not the best and would be better to use structKeyExists instead. The problem is there is more than 1900 files and 3000 isDefined to change.Example :This line marks an error :Which I corrected and works fine :Error message :"Error","ajp-bio-8014-exec-1","09/26/17","09:59:25","database_name","Complex object types cannot be converted to simple values.The expression has requested a variable or an intermediate expression result as a simple value. However, the result cannot be converted to a simple value. Simple values are strings, numbers, boolean values, and date/time values. Queries, arrays, and COM objects are examples of complex values.

The most likely cause of the error is that you tried to use a complex value as a simple one. For example, you tried to use a query variable in a cfif tag. The specific sequence of files included or processed is: [FILE_PATH], line: 160 "I have the same problem on my local Cold Fusion Builder than on the Web Server (our DEV environment), both on CF11.Is it normal that it use to work great but it's not working anymore? Is there another workaround or another thing I missed (ex. Admin setting, other configuration, etc) ? I'd like to find a solution that would not necessitate to change the code.

Seb_Co · Accepted Answer

Finally the problem was not there at all, but in the data sent to this process. We had somewhere in the code 2 different variables with the same name, but they were not interacting with each other. One was containing a value and the other one is an array, and even if they don't touch at the same modules, they interfered one with each other. While moving to CF11 it became a problem and now we just renamed a variable without modifying all the code up here.

Thanks for your help,

I hope this might serve another someone in the future,

- Séb

BKBK · Answer

IsDefined is working. But it works differently from structKeyExists.

When you work with isDefined you have to be careful about certain things. The function expects, as argument, the full, scoped name of the test variable. For example, variables.x, form.y or caller.z. So the function does not expect you to use ## to evaluate dynamic variables within the argument. When you perform such evaluations, you risk error.

In fact, I suspect that the difference in the behaviour of isDefined between ColdFusion versions is due to subtle differences in order of processing. Isdefined("caller.#attributes.prefix_mandatory##fldname#")assumes that the order of evaluation is something like

#attributes.prefix_mandatory#

#fldname#

concatenation #attributes.prefix_mandatory##fldname#

result "caller.#attributes.prefix_mandatory##fldname#"

Different versions of ColdFusion may evaluate this in a different order. Perhaps the same version of ColdFusion may do the evaluation in a different order, depending on the circumstances.

As you have discovered, structKeyExists is more suitable when the variable name has to be evaluated dynamically. I think it is the best workaround. Should any isDefined call break, just replace it, as you have done, with structKeyExists. For the remaining hundreds of cases, I would say, if it ain't broke...

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