I've been considering a post like this for a while, and for one reason or another I've just never got around to it. However considering the recent Connect meeting given to the Adobe User Group Managers and Community Experts, in addition to Ray Camden's blog posts [1][2], I thought it was time I finally hit submit on the post.

As a Certified Instructor for CF it pains me to teach the official courses. They suck just as much as the whole certification process.

I'll explain why in the next couple of paragraphs. Just to answer a few questions first. Why do the certification? Because I need it to be a Certified Instructor. Why be a Certified Instructor? We (Fuzzy Orange) write our own ColdFusion courses, so when teaching them it's nice to be able to say that although the courses aren't certified by Adobe, I am.

I don't need to repeat what Ray has already said about the certification process, other than it seriously does suck. Unless you're going after Certified Instructor status I tell all clients, developers and any one else who asks NOT to do the exam.

As for the two main official courses; Fast Track to CF and Advanced ColdFusion ... boy, where do I start.

First, if you decide to go after your certification, neither of these courses will actually help you. The courses are lame, only cover certain aspects of CF... in the exam you can get asked on anything. Even the parts the courses cover won't help you. Honestly.

As for the Fast Track course... to accurately describe it, it's an Introduction to Dreamweaver. You really learn sod all about ColdFusion, and any coding you do is done via Dreamweaver's wizards. You come out of the Fast Track in no way better prepared to do any ColdFusion coding.

I'll be honest, when I'm teaching the Fast Track course I tend to ignore most of the official course material. If the course material says you need to click on the Query Wizard tab, and then point and click on database columns you want returned, etc ... I ignore it. I make you type the code in manually.

If you want to know how to use Dreamweaver, go on a Dreamweaver course (though they probably suck too). I want folks to come out of the CF courses to be better prepared to handle CF code that is thrown at them. I want them to be that bit more knowledgeable about CFML and to have a better understanding of exactly what they are doing. Using wizards does NOT do that. Using Dreamweaver typically does not assist with that.

The Advanced course is ... anything but Advanced. It introduces CFC, covers Lists, Arrays and Structs, does a bit more on CFCs, looks at Custom Tags, Web Services and the .NET integration, PDF stuff, <cfimage> and <cffeed> and finishes with a crappy chapter on supposedly scaling applications.

Most of this so called advanced stuff should belong in an introductory class; lists, arrays, structs and CFCs all belong there. They are the bread and butter of any ColdFusion application. These topics are anything but Advanced. The other stuff, is just fluff. I don't mean that it isn't useful material, but I could buy the ColdFusion 8 special edition of the FAQU and save myself a fortune.

Seriously, go buy yourself a subscription to the FAQU, it's so much better value than the official Adobe ColdFusion training

Now, don't get me wrong, a lot of hard work has went into preparing these courses, good or otherwise. I'm in a better position that most to appreciate the amount of work. Aside from teaching courses, I also write them. Fuzzy Orange offer two courses based on ColdFusion Administration and we spend a lot of time re-evaluating these after every course and every bit of feedback. However, the official ColdFusion courses really haven't changed since version 6. It's obviously Adobe aren't listening to feedback. From anyone. Which leads onto ...

... In regards the official Adobe certification process, and not just for ColdFusion, it's obvious Adobe really don't give a damn. They've pretty much stated it in the Connect presentation. It's got to the stage whereby I'm wondering if being a Certified Instructor is worse all the hassle. When your Instructors are questioning the entire process, c'mon Adobe, you really need to take notice!

I could also go to town on the whole Adobe Partner set up; Solution Partner, Training, etc, but that's for another blog post. Actually, I could write a book about how bad the entire Partner program is. And I'm not alone in this opinion.

Back to the point at hand though; certification.

The ColdFusion certification is NOT worth it. It won't make you a better developer, the vast majority of people in the know will not put you before another candidate just because you have it. If you absolutely have to do it, then you have my sympathy. If you happen to fail the exam, or don't get the Advanced status, simply shrug it off. By no means does passing the ColdFusion exam accurately qualify your skills as a ColdFusion developer.

I've been considering this one for a while, but because of Scotch on the Rocks, moving house and planning a wedding - well, Leanne has been planning and I'm just nodding in agreement - it's sort of slipped off the radar.

The plan quite simply is... one days free training on "something" ColdFusion 8 related.

Since CF8 came out, I've given a few presentations, I've been writing tutorials for Web Designer Magazine, I've been organising Scotch and now I want to lay on a days worth of training. To be honest, if I can find some assistance I'll increase that to two days. I potentially have a venue lined up free of charge, and I'm going to give my time for free as well.

I'm expecting those who would attend to primarily be members of the ScottishCFUG, but I've decided to blog about it as well, just in case we have anyone from further afield who is interested.

Ultimately, the big question I've been asking, is just what features of CF8 do you want to learn more about?

Additionally, I'm looking at lining up a second batch of free training, this time on something complimentary. There's been a lot of demand for a bit of training on SVN/Trac/Mylyn/Ant. I know I can't fit all of that into one day, so again, if I can find some sponsorship I'll look at doing this over 2 days.

If you're interested in either course, please leave a comment, and in regards the CF8 course, some additional information on what you'd really like to know more about.

update: I should point out that this training will take place in either Edinburgh or Glasgow.

Well, after slagging Adobe UK for never giving us competitions/sweepstakes/or free beer, they go and announce a similar CS3 sweepstake like the one I mentioned in this blog post.

Basically, buy any CS3 Premium edition bit of software, and you'll be entered into the hat for a chance to win a copy of Master Collection.

Read the Official Rules to make sure you do everything required to be in with a chance of winning... don't think there are any maths questions involved this time ;)

http://www.adobe.com/uk/special/sweepstakes/

One of the great things about Scotch on the Rocks, is the ability to call on Adobe Consulting EMEA. The old iteration::two crowd were acquired by Macromedia and therefore Adobe and are based out of Edinburgh, and that gives us an incredible talent to call upon.

And with that, we have 6 sessions from Steven Webster's team.

• Alex Uhlmann - Test Driven Develompent Applied to Flex
• Alistair McLeod - Realtime Collaboration and Adobe Flex
• Paul Williams - Patterns and Best-Practices for Rich Internet Applications: Exploring the Presentation
• Peter Martin - Introduction to Data Management Services with Flex
• Leon Tanner - Modularising your Flex Application
• Borre Wessel - Automated Building and Testing of Rich Internet Applications

Steven won't be given a session this year, however he will be part of the Wednesday morning keynote session, that will also feature Ben Forta, Adam Lehman and Andrew Shorten.

We will be releasing a new version of the agenda soon to take into account these new sessions.

I can't quite remember why I ended up reading the official rules to the "Suite Life Sweepstake" competition on Adobe.com, but I'm still trying to make sense of something.

You can find a link to the sweepstake on the Adobe.com homepage (bottom left box on right hand side).

In typical Adobe fashion, the sweepstake is open only to the US and Canada - we don't get competitions or offers in the UK, because the UK office can't be bothered.

Anyway, for some reason I decided to read all the rules of the sweepstake... I really must have been bored, but when I arrived at the end of point (4)... well. I'm amused, confused, bewildered and totally dumbfounded.

I would like to quote the part of rule (4) that ... well, read the full thing yourself at http://www.adobe.com/special/sweepstakes/terms/

If the selected winner is from Canada, the winner will be required to correctly answer a math problem prior to receiving the prize.

Why????

Seriously, why? Is there a reason that a winner from the US is simply given a prize, but one from Canada has to answer a maths problem?

Flex Builder for Linux Alpha 3 is now out.

http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flex/flexbuilder_linux/

Nothing more needs said...

http://www.adobe.com/go/airlinux

Next Friday (April 3rd) I'll be heading to Edinburgh for the one day Highland Fling conference.

The theme for Highland Fling is "The Browser and Beyond" and features speakers from Yahoo, Opera, and the one and only Aral Balkan. I'm looking forward to Aral's talk, and I'll also be catching up with him as he is also presenting at Scotch on the Rocks. More on that in a second.

I'm also hoping to jump across the water to Dublin to attend Scotch on Air. This is a half day event taking place April 11, being organised by the Scotch on the Rocks team to replace the cancelled Adobe OnAir, Dublin.

Adobe's Ryan Stewart and Ted Patrick will be presenting, along side Scotch's Kev McCabe. It's a free event and should be good fun.

Next, we have the biggie. Scotch on the Rocks. Three days, 45 sessions, 150+ delegates and more ColdFusion, Air, Flex and LiveCycle than you can shake a stick at!

After this, it will most likely be MAX Europe in Milan. With any luck I'll be back as a speaker, but regardless I'll be in attendance.

A little off-shoot of the Scotch on the Rocks conference will take place in Dublin, Ireland on April 11th.

Scotch on Air effectively replaces the cancelled date of the Adobe onAir tour.

Scotch organiser Kev McCabe, who was attending the Dublin leg of the tour, has taken the lead on putting together this little show, and we're delighted to say that Adobe's Ryan Stewart and Ted Patrick will be there to talk about Air and Flex respectively. Kev will be dicsussing ColdFusion.

Unless my schedule changes at the last minute, I unfortunately won't make it over, but if you can be there, make sure you are cause it will undoubtedly be a blast.

Update:The Adobe web team have been quick to change the CS3 video and remove the "strobe-like" text changing part, at the beginning of the video. The part which caused my better halfs seizure. Well done, and thank you. The new design still leaves a lot to be desired however.

The new Adobe website, which I really don't rate at all, is your one stop shop to giving you a fit and having you pass out.

The CS3 Flash animation/video/whatever on the home page could easily cause an epileptic fit, and in fact, if this was in a movie, there would be warnings to say just that.

Now, I'm sure some people would say I'm just being really annoyingly pinickity about this, but seeing as my better half suffers the effects of strobe lighting, or fast, random changing images, etc ... well, she passed out whilst going to see what the new Adobe site was all about.

Adobe, please drop this video, or at least give some sort of warning!