Need to learn CF FAST!!!

[Guiseppe Louiji]

Hi, I have been appointed to do a site makeover and the site is in CF and I'm
not!?! I wanted to take it off CF and goto ASP.NET but the boss says he has too
much invested... The site is a mess and I have a hard time trying to decrypt
what the last guru did. Is there a way to just snatch out what I want to save
and go from there. I have to make the site into a "my" portal site and we have
tons of databases already. The site has been up for 8 years and the server is a
"cluster fcuk". I'm lost, dazed, and worried I won't be able to pull it off. I
bought CF in 21 days and statred to mull around inside the server, but gee
wally, it's a mess! Any suggestions for damage control?

[Kronin555]

Odds are since it's been up for 8 years, there's lots of crufty code. What's it
running on now? MX 6? MX 7?

How do you know the server is a "cluster f__ck"?

You want to rewrite the whole site in a different technology just for a
makeover?

How long do you have to do it? There isn't anyone at your company that knows
CF? The original coder is gone? How willing are you to put in overtime to get
this done?

Suggestions for damage control:
1) don't touch/change/delete anything until you understand exactly what it
does on the site and what code paths it's used in.
2) tell your boss you don't know CF, so his expectations for timing are going
to have to be realistic, taking that into consideration.
3) do a full audit of databases/CF server/webserver and make sure you know
where everything is located, where it's configured, how it's accessed, how to
bring it back up if it dies, what patch level it's at, etc. (unless you have a
sysadmin around that can/has already done this)

[Dan Bracuk]

My suggestion is to do the complete CF in 21 days first, and then look at the application you inherited.

[tclaremont]

My suggestion is to do a complete backup of the current system and tuck it
away. You are probably going to refer to it a myriad number of times.

Don't REMOVE code if you dont want to use it. Comment it out until you know
your changes are working as expected.

Don't get paranoid and change to an inferior language just because you do not
understand this one. Take this opportunity to learn a new language and put it
under your belt.