Fedex and UPS Integration

Report · Oct 06, 2010

I'd like to start a conversation as to why there are not more commercially available tags to integrate ColdFusion with major shipping, such as FedEx, UPS and USPS for shipping. In fact I've struggled to find any, besides the Google Code project cffedexrates, that are kept current. Why is this? If there's no marketplace for pre-designed shipping components, does this indicate ColdFusion's irrelevance in the market? Or simply a lack of need for this type of product?

Yes there are a few commercial shopping cart solutions that integrate, but that's not always an appropriate solution. It seems that re-creating the wheel to build a FedEx, UPS, or USPS component isn't very efficient. Yet for the most part creating an e-commerce site requires a custom solution to integrate with these and other similar services.

CF 9 introduced CFMap to integrate with Google Maps. Wouldn't similar tags to provide major e-commerce capability greatly enhance ColdFusion's claim to being a cost effective development solution?

I'm just fascinated that no one sells a modern shipping tag or Adobe hasn't considered this as a built-in functionality (given they did include CFMap).

Report · Oct 06, 2010

Dumb question - but did you look at RIAForge? cfups.riaforge.org - an

open source, free UPS integration tool.

Report · Oct 06, 2010

Sorry, I probably should have been a bit clearer in my question. I know there are some open source projects out there which may be great. But there are no commercial solutions which often exist for other environments. While open source or community projects can be great, commercial solutions can be more reliable and better documented (a general statement not specific to any particular project).

I suppose I'm looking at this more from the marketplace standpoint not the developer viewpoint.

Report · Oct 06, 2010

I agree that commercial products tend to be better supported,

documented, but, in general, if you need to do X, I don't see it

making sense to ignore the OS solutions out there. All should be

considered. (imho

Report · Oct 06, 2010

"does this indicate ColdFusion's irrelevance in the market" - don't even start on that one unless you want to be flamed to death by pretty much everyone on here.

Would Adobe make any more sales if they had a CFFEDEX tag? Nope. Would it cost them a fortune in development time? Yup. Does the fact that CF doesn't have these tags imply no-one uses CF? Or is it the opposite, that no-one using CF needs this functionality because of the nature of what CF applications tend to do and what scale they're on?

It's been said a million times before - CF is not as widely-used as PHP or .NET, therefore there are going to be fewer plugins and frameworks available. CFMap has only just been added so maybe this is indicative of things to come, but I wouldn't hold your breath.

Report · Oct 06, 2010

Not trying to start that old debate or suggest CF is dead. Quite the contrary, but it does need to continue to grow and thrive to maintain critical mass. I doubt Adobe looks at future functionality strictly on a profit/loss basis per feature; they should look overall at ColdFusion's usability and ability to compete in the market.

Possibly the answer is that ColdFusion is simply targeted to major companies or for large scale projects and this type of function isn't needed. Or maybe because ColdFusion is better than other solutions this type of pre-built functionality isn't needed.

Report · Oct 06, 2010

Regarding lack of commercial components vs open source. I work on commercial CF software. I will say that the market isn't huge for widgets and small plugin type functionality. If someone has done a good job and it is open source, why reinvent the wheel? It is pretty darn hard to make enough on selling a widget to make up for the support costs of it. If, on the other hand, there is a need for commercial Fedex/UPS integration and OS isn't cutting it solution wise, maybe it is a good opportunity for you to make some money?

When it comes to bundling that sort of stuff in with CF, I think one of the trouble parts, much like cfmap or ext libraries, etc. is that it involves evolving/changing api's and or code libraries. Those are likely to change more often then CF releases. Not impossible to deal with, but a pain no doubt to measure against the relative gain in adding that functionality.