We have a happy client with a working application. We have good separation of concerns with MVC. What could possibly be left?
Well, Contact-O-Matic is looking like a pretty good application now. It would be nice if we could easily install it onto other sites. It would be especially nice if it would adopt the look and global settings of that site.
In order to do this, our program needs to match the Neptune Program Guidelines. Fortunately, the one that we just created does.
The most important thing for automatically installing a program is the Program.cfc file.
As soon as you browse to a folder containing a Program.cfc file, the program will be automatically installed (if it isn't already, of course). For our example, that will include creating the appropriate entries in /_config/components.cfm and loading ContactOMatic.cfc (which will create the needed tables and data). Read the Program.cfc documentation to find out about other installation activities it can perform.
The framework also has an associated code generator which can be used online or downloaded. It could be used to quickly create the Contact-O-Matic program that we just created by hand.
That's it! You have now created a fully functional Neptune program that can be installed on any Neptune site by copying the folder and then loading it your browser. Neptune (and its associated tags and components) has a lot more to offer as well. So look through the documentation and feel free to contact us with any questions or feedback.
Next: In the Real World