Seb Duggan

Typically, the very first time I tried to use CF9's ORM, I ran into a bizarre problem which had me scratching my head for hours...

The setup was this: a table in my SQL database called "member". A member.cfc object with the following code:

component  output="false" persistent="true"
{
	property name="memberid" fieldtype="id"; 
	property name="firstname";
	property name="lastname";  
}

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One feature that is missing from Mura’s site member tools is the ability for an administrator to log in to the site as a particular user.

So I hacked together a very quick tool which will allow you to do just that.

Once installed, go to the plugins page for your site, and click on the name of the Impersonate User plugin.

You’ll then get a form in which you can enter either a UserID (a UUID) or a username. Click the button, and you’ll be immediately logged out of the admin, logged in as the requested user, and directed to the site’s home page.

You can now see the site exactly as that user would, even though you don’t know what their password is…

You can find the source code on the plugin’s github repository, and you can download the plugin here.

One of the great things about Mura - much like Mango - is its extensibility via its plugin architecture.

The basic user validation in Mura doesn't do much in the way of checking a username. It's required, and it cannot be the same as an existing username. That's as far as it goes.

If you have forums, or other public displays of usernames, you probably don't want users registering with a name containing "admin" or your company or product name. And one-letter usernames aren't great, either.

So, wanting a bit more, I set about writing a plugin - and just a few hours later, here it is, ready for release into the wild.

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A few weeks ago, I was landed with an emergency web project - due to a number of factors, I needed to design and build a fully functional product launch site with site membership, CMS facilities, integrated forums and a free trial signup process. In two and a half weeks.

I'd looked briefly at Mura CMS a while back, but didn't have a use for it at the time. This seemed the ideal project to implement Mura, if only the learning curve would be easy enough. So I took a day or two to install Mura, play with it, get to grips with the structure and conventions, and see if it fitted the task. A bit of a gamble, as if it wasn't a good fit then I'd have wasted two precious days, but well worth the effort.

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My latest web project has just launched - a mobile-optimised version of the successful LoveHoney website, where I've been doing web and ColdFusion work on and off for the last couple of years.

LoveHoney have been selling sex toys and lingerie in the UK and around the world for 6 years - so be warned, the sites may not be safe for work! (So all the more reason to browse on your mobile phone...)

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