MACROMEDIA COLDFUSION MX 61-DEVELOPING COLDFUSION MX, Develop Manual

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438 Chapter 21: Updating Your Database
About updating your dataSbase
ColdFusion was originally developed as a way to readily interact with databases. You can quickly
insert, update, and delete the contents of your database by using ColdFusion forms, which are
typically a pair of pages. One page displays the form with which your end user will enter values;
the other page performs the action (insert, update or delete).
Depending on the extent and type of data manipulation, you can use CFML with or without
SQL commands. If you use SQL commands, ColdFusion requires a minimal amount of SQL
knowledge.
Inserting data
You usually use two application pages to insert data into a database:
•
An insert form
•
An insert action page
You can create an insert form with standard HTML form tags or with
cfform
tags (see “Creating
forms with the cfform tag” on page 584 ). When the user submits the form, form variables are
passed to a ColdFusion action page that performs an insert operation (and whatever else is called
for) on the specified data source. The insert action page can contain either a
cfinsert
tag or a
cfquery
tag with a SQL INSERT statement. The insert action page should also contain a
confirmation message for the end user.
Creating an HTML insert form
The following procedure creates a form using standard HTML tags. The form looks like the
following in your web browser: