Coldfusion 2018 update 11 error

Report · Mar 25, 2021

After installing the update, form variables being sent as a list, cannot be read as a simple values, they are now being sent as arrays.

error message is

 Complex object types cannot be converted to simple values

Report · Mar 25, 2021

test

Report · Mar 25, 2021

<!doctype html>
<cfparam name="form.testtext" default="">
<cfdump var="#form.testtext#" expand="yes">
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>Untitled Document</title>
</head>

<body>
<form action="test.cfm" method="post">


<input type="text" value="1" name="testtext">
<input type="text" value="2" name="testtext">
<input type="text" value="3" name="testtext">
<input type="text" value="4" name="testtext">
<input
type="submit">
</form>
</body>
</html>

executing that prior to updating returns

1,2,3,4

after updating, it returns

array11223344

Report · Mar 26, 2021

I wasn't able to duplicate the issue you're seeing. I still get 1,2,3,4 as the result with CF2018 Update 11.

My test page had no application.cfm or application.cfc, so you might want to try that if you haven't already. The test was done on a Windows 10 system using the built in CF web server.

Report · Mar 26, 2021

The form has nothing to do with CFML, as it is just text. ColdFusion was probably confused by:

<cfparam name="form.testtext" default=""> <!--- You've set the value of form.testtext to a string --->
<cfdump var="#form.testtext#" expand="yes"> <!--- Why dump a string? Why use the 'expand' attribute --->

What you perhaps mean is:

<cfparam name="form.testtext" default="">
<cfdump var="#form#" expand="yes">

Report · Apr 07, 2021

I appreciate your answer BRBK, but I have the same issue - the problem is that the functionality of ColdFusion has changed. in some cases, where it used to return a set of comma separated values, it now returns an array.

Right now, i have no idea where the issue will crop up in my thousands of lines of legacy code, but it has disabled several pages.

I have to dig out where we were relying on the old functionality, and change it either to produce a comma separated value list in a new way, or to change the code that was expecting a comma separated value list to process an array Adobe needs to research this.

Report · Apr 08, 2021

Hi @John Gillis and @sgean01 , apologies for doubting your findings. I tested with different types of forms, but couldn't reproduce what you have found.

There is no question that this is a bug. Suppose, as in John's form (above), that the 4 input fields are returned as an array containing 4 elements. Then, for consistency, a single input field will have to be returned as an array containing 1 element. Which would be absurd. After all, the value of the field is text (a simple value), not an array (a complex type).

Report · Apr 07, 2021

This is a known issue. The recent March cf updates changed this. And whether it is right or wrong (that they did that), there is at least a work-around. And no, you do NOT need to hunt down every program, just every CF application (at least until perhaps Adobe may offer a JVM arg to revert things instance-wide):

if using application.cfc put in this.sameformfieldsasarray="false"
if using application.cfm put the same attribute (as sameformfieldsasarray="false") into your cfapplication tag

(Update: Note in both cases, there's an "s" after "form field" there. When I first wrote this, I mistakenly left it off, though I had it right in the other thread I refer to in a moment, as did some other folks writing here. Apologies for the finger fumble. )

As for where to raise a stink about this, you have choices:

you can certainly comment right here, or in another similar thread here that had much more discussion (and in which some others here participated before sgean01's comment today and the previous ones about 10 days ago)
you can add a vote to either of these CF bug reports about this: mine, or this one that mine was marked to be a dupe of, or this earliest one on a related aspect to this (from BEFORE the March updates)
It's not clear where is the most likely place that Adobe will see your comments. They tend not to participate here, but it's not clear which of those 3 bug reports they will pay attention to

Let us know if this helps.

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart.org)

Report · Apr 07, 2021

This is strange. I have CF2016,0,17,325979 & CF2021,0,01,325996 (both Developer Edition) updated to the most recent version and they both return a string instead of an array. I verified that neither sameFormFieldsAsArray or sameURLFieldsAsArray are configured in the application.cfc.

QUESTION: Are duplicated URL parameters being treated like this too or only FORM parameters?

For the sake of comparison as a result of migration testing, I reviewed our tests using Lucee (server.coldfusion.productversion 2016,0,03,300357) and it didn't return an array for duplicated form or URL parameters.

Report · Apr 08, 2021

James, I experienced that same vagary, when I first tried to help folks in that other thread that l listed above, and mentioned it in the bug report I filed (also listed above). It seems to vary at least based on OS, in an odd way. See those other two and comment there or here as you may see fit. Again, this is an odd one.

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart.org)

Report · Apr 08, 2021

Charlie, you are a lifesaver!! thank you for the work-around.

Report · Apr 08, 2021

Glad to have helped. It's been a curious issue.

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart.org)

Report · Apr 20, 2021

I am trying to add this to our legacy application.cfm.

Unfortunately, we dont use a CFAPPLICATON though we do use an Application.cfm.

We dont use an Application.cfc either. Is there a way I can set this?

Report · Apr 20, 2021

If you don't already have a cfapplication tag in your application.cfm then at the top of your application.cfm add

Report · Apr 21, 2021

We got an error that states "Attribute validation error for tag CFAPPLICATION. It does not allow the attribute(s) SAMEFORMFIELDASARRAY." However, in the list there is another one:

SAMEFORMFIELDSASARRAY.

So will attempt that one...

Report · Apr 21, 2021

Ok followup, this worked. However had to use the following which is different from the answer:

Name was required for the cfapp tag

I dont know why the S is required after the FIELD but our logs show that is a valid call.

We are using CF2018 with Java 11....

Report · Apr 21, 2021

Benjamin, thanks so much for that. You are right: there is indeed an s after formfield in that attribute.

And I contributed to the mistake in that my first post here (since marked as the answer) made that mistake. I have just corrected it.

I wrote that first reply after offering the same info in another thread earlier that day (which I link to in the answer). I had it right in that one, and just finger-fumbled when I wrote my first reply here, just in a hurry to offer it to help.

And now I see that others here also sometimes got it right or wrong...and it led to some confusion. I apologize to everyone for starting that mistake. It's an easy one to make. Heck the attribute name itself is awkward.

But anyway, let's all be on the lookout for this going forward. And perhaps some of you who also referred to the wrong version could edit your comments here. I may offer a couple more replies to other responses here where I sense it may be valuable, if they may not necessarily see this.

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart.org)

Report · Apr 21, 2021

Oh, and as for why a name was needed for your cfapplication tag (or a this.name if using application.cfc), that's controlled by a cf admin setting (in the "settings" page) that controls whether "unnamed" applications are allowed or not. So some folks will require it, while others will not. (FWIW, I offered a name in the example I first offered in the other post that I referred to, in my first answer here.)

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart.org)

Report · Apr 08, 2021

I tried this in my application.cfm

no joy, same error.

my work around is this, but it requires mitigating all my codebase.

Report · Apr 08, 2021

You're creating a variable with <cfset sameformfieldasarray....

You need to put it in the cfapplication tag.

<cfapplication sameformfieldasarray=false .....

Report · Apr 08, 2021

Thanks, that works.

Report · Apr 08, 2021

George nailed it, but I wanted to also point out that you could reduce your shown code to a single line by using the "elvis" operator:

<cfloop list="#(isArray(form.WK) ? arrayToList(form.WK) : form.WK)#" index="w">

This is just an illustration, I didn't test it, but barring any typos it should work.

Report · Apr 14, 2021

After more regression testing, found issues not fixed by sameformfieldasarray="false" the more issues which likely require your fix Eddie, thank you.

Report · Apr 14, 2021

When you refer to "issues not fixed by sameformfieldasarray, are you saying such issues are specifically related to multiple values of a given form field showing as arrays, even when you set that to false? That would be odd.

If that's the case, I'd wonder if the code that is "failing to work" is somehow under the influence of a new and different application, that does NOT have this sameformfieldasarray=false set. You may want to use CF's GetApplicationMetadata function (perhaps even in a try/catch of the error) to see what it shows in that case.

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart.org)

Report · Apr 20, 2021

I appreciate your help Charlie. I use application.cfm in my application, and the only CFAPPLICATION tag that exists is there.

this is a very old (and large) website that has moved up from CF10 to CF11 to CF2018. All I can say about it is that when hotfix11 is installed, I receive that error at various places in my code. Once I am done with my current development I will re-install hotfix11 and use GetApplicationMetadata to see what is happening.

--Shawn

Adobe Community

Coldfusion 2018 update 11 error

1 Correct answer