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WireBox: The Enterprise Dependency Injection Framework

Introduction

WireBox is an enterprise ColdFusion dependency injection and AOP framework. This project has been part of ColdBox since its early version 2.0 releases but it is also a standalone library that can be used in ANY ColdFusion application or framework. WireBox's inspiration has been based on the idea of rapid workflows when building object oriented ColdFusion applications, programmatic configurations and simplicity. With that motivation we introduced dependency injection by annotations and conventions, which has been the core foundation of WireBox. We have definitely been influenced by great DI projects like Google Guice, Grails Framework, Spring and ColdSpring so we thank them for their contributions and inspiration.

Overview

Dependency injection is the art of making work come home to you.
- Dhanji R. Prasanna

WireBox alleviates the need for custom object factories or manual object creation in your ColdFusion applications. It provides a standardized approach to object construction and assembling that will make your code easier to adapt to changes, easier to test, mock and extend.

As software developers we are always challenged with maintenance and one ever occurring annoyance,change. Therefore, the more sustainable and maintainable our software, the more we can concentrate on real problems and make our lives more productive. WireBox leverages an array of metadata annotations to make your object assembling, storage and creation easy as pie! We have leveraged the power of event driven architecture via object listeners or interceptors so you can extend not only WireBox but the way objects are analyzed, created, wired and much more. To the extent that ourAOP capabilities are all driven by our AOP listener which decouples itself from WireBox code and makes it extremely flexible.

We have also seen the value of a central location for object configuration and behavior so we created our very own WireBox Programmatic Mapping DSL (Domain Specific Language) that you can use to define object construction, relationships, AOP, etc in pure ColdFusion (No XML!). We welcome you to stick around and read our documentation so you can see the true value of WireBox in your web applications.

Useful Resources

• http://code.google.com/p/google-guice
• http://www.manning.com/prasanna/
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect-oriented_programming
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dependency_injection
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inversion_of_control
• http://martinfowler.com/articles/injection.html
• http://www.theserverside.com/news/1321158/A-beginners-guide-to-Dependency-Injection
• http://www.developer.com/net/net/article.php/3636501
• http://code.google.com/p/google-guice/

Training, Presentations, More

• ColdBox Connection: Introducing WireBox

Features At A Glance

Here are a simple listing of features WireBox brings to the table:

• Annotation driven dependency injection
• 0 configuration mode or a programmatic binder configuration approach via ColdFusion (No XML!)
• Creation and Wiring of or by:
  • ColdFusion Components
  • Java Classes
  • RSS Feeds
  • WebService objects
  • Constant values
  • DSL string building
  • Factory Methods
• Multiple Injection Styles: Property, Setter, Method, Constructor
• Automatic Package/Directory object scanning and registration
• Multiple object life cycle persistence scopes:
  • No Scope (Transients)
  • Singletons
  • Request Scoped
  • Session Scoped
  • Application Scoped
  • Server Scoped
  • CacheBox Scoped
• Integrated logging via LogBox, never try to figure out what in the world the DI engine is doing
• Parent Factories
• Factory Method Object Creations
• Object life cycle events via WireBox Listeners/Interceptors
• Customizable injection DSL
• WireBox object providers to avoid scope-widening issues on time/volatile persisted objects
• Aspect Oriented Programming
• Standalone ORM Entity Injection

Installing WireBox

WireBox can be downloaded as a separate framework or it is included with the latest ColdBox Platform release. The main difference between both versions is the instantiation and usage namespace, the rest is the same.

Standalone

wirebox.system.ioc

ColdBox

coldbox.system.ioc

Download

• Download WireBox
• Download API Docs

System Requirements

• ColdFusion 8 and above
• Railo 3.1 and above

Installation

If you are using WireBox within a ColdBox application context, then WireBox is part of the platform. Just install ColdBox normally. If you are using WireBox standalone, just drop WireBox in your application root or create a mapping called wirebox that points to the installation folder. If you can run the following snippet, then WireBox is installed correctly:

wirebox = createObject("component","wirebox.system.ioc.Injector").init();

Dependency Injection Explained

We have released one of our chapters from our CBOX202: Dependency Injection course that deals with getting started with Dependency Injection, the problem, the benefits and the solutions. We encourage you to download it, print it, share it, digest it and learn it: http://ortus-public.s3.amazonaws.com/cbox202-unit1-3.pdf

Advantages of a DI Framework

Compared to manual DI, using WireBox can lead to the following advantages:

• You will write less boilerplate code.
• By giving WireBox DI responsibilities, you will stop creating objects manually or using custom object factories.
• You can leverage object persistence scopes for performance and scalability. Even create time persisted objects.
• You will not have any object creation or wiring code in your application, but have it abstracted via WireBox. Which will lead to more cohesive code that is not plagued with boilerplate code or factory code.
• Objects will become more testable and easier to mock, which in turn can accelerate your development by using a TDD (Test Driven Development) approach.
• Once WireBox leverages your objects you can take advantage of AOP or other event life cycle processes to really get funky with OO.

Getting Jiggy Wit It!

A primer to WireBox usage

Dependency injection and instance construction with WireBox is easy. In its most simplest form we can just leverage annotations and be off to dancing Big Willy style! You can use our global injection annotation inject on cfproperties, setter methods or constructor arguments. This annotation tells WireBox to inject something in place of the property, argument or method; basically it is your code shouting "Hey buddy, I need your help here". What it injects depends on the contents of this annotation that leverages our injection DSL (Domain Specific Language). The simplest form of the DSL is to just tell WireBox what mapping to bring in for injection. Please note that I say mapping and not object directly, because WireBox works on the concept of an object mapping. This mapping in all reality can be a CFC, a java object, an RSS feed, a webservice, a constant value or pretty much anything you like. If you don't like annotations because you feel they are too intrusive to your taste, don't worry, we also have a programmatic configuration binder you can use to define all your objects and their dependencies. We will discuss object mappings and our configuration binders later on, so let's look at how cool this is by checking out our Coffee Shop sample class. The CoffeeShop class below will use our three types of injections to showcase how WireBox works, please note that most likely we would build this class by picking one or the other, which in itself brings in pros and cons for each approach.

component name="CoffeeShop" singleton{

// define a property and tell WireBox to inject it
property name="espressoMachine" inject="id:espressoMachine";
    
    function init(any owner inject){ 
		variables.owner = arguments.owner;
		return this; 
	}
	
	function openShop() onDiComplete{
		espressoMachine.turnOn();
		owner.nap();
	}
	
	function setCashRegister(cashRegister) inject="id"{
		variables.cashRegister= arguments.cashRegister;
	}
    
    function makeEspresso(){
    	return espressoMachine.makeEspresso();
    }
}

So let's break this class down. First, you can see a singleton annotation on the component declaration. This tells WireBox that this class should only be created once and then cached in its internal singleton scope of the injector. In other words, this is called object life scopes. You can refer to the persistence scopes annotations later on in the guide to learn all about how to scope your classes.

Second, we built our coffee shop class with three external dependencies: 1 by cfproperty, 1 by constructor argument and 1 by setter injection. Again, you can see later on in this guide the difference between all these injection styles and choose what you prefer. In this example, we just showcase the different injection styles. Also, as you can see from the source code the three types of injection uses the inject annotation but with different content:

1. property name="espressoMachine" inject="id:espressoMachine";
2. function init(any owner inject)
3. function setCashRegister(cashRegister) inject="id"

If you just mark a property, argument or method with the inject annotation, WireBox will assume it is a mapping and the ID should be either the property name, the argument name or the method name. However, if you want to specify the id in the DSL string, just use the simple id:{mapping} dsl notation. That's it! Isn't that cool, you just mark out your dependencies and WireBox will build and inject them for you!

Thirdly, this class has the following method:

function openShop() onDIComplete{
	espressoMachine.turnOn();
	owner.nap();
}
// or
<cffunction name="openShop" returnType="void" output="false" onDIComplete>
</cffunction>

The method has a cool little annotation called onDIComplete that tells WireBox that after all DI dependencies have been injected, then execute the method. That is so cool, WireBox can even open the coffee shop for me so I can get my espresso fix. Not only that but you can have multiple onDIComplete methods declared and WireBox will call them for you (in discovered order). These are called object post processors that are discovered by annotations or can be configured via our configuration binder and we will learn about them later on. WireBox also fires a series of object life cycle events throughout an object's life span in which you can build listens to and actually perform some cool stuff on them. So now that we got all excited about opening the coffee shop let's get into something even more interesting, unit testing and mocking.

Another important aspect leveraging DI concepts when building our components is that we can immediately write tests for them and leverage mocking to test for actual behaviors. This is a great advantage as it allows you to rapidly test to confirm your component is working without worrying about building or assembling objects in your tests. You have eliminated all kinds of crazy creation and assembler code and just concentrated yourself on the problem at hand. You are now focused to code the greatest piece of software you have ever imagined, thanks to WireBox!

So let's build our unit test (Please note we use our base ColdBox testing classes for ease of use and MockBox integration):

component extends="coldbox.system.testing.BaseModelTest"{

	function setup(){
		// mock some owner
		mockOwner = getMockBox.createEmtpyMock("Owner");
    	// create our coffee shop class with mocking capabilities
		shop = getMockBox().createMock("CoffeeShop").init(mockOwner);
		// mock the espresso machine
		mockMachine = getMockBox().createEmptyMock("EspressoMachine"); 
		// inject to the shop's variables scope to simulate DI
        shop.$property("espressoMachine","variables",mockMachine);
	}

	function testMakeEspresso(){
		// mock methods
		mockMachine.$("makeEspresso", createStub());
		 // test
        shop.makeEspresso();
        assertTrue( mockMachine.$once('makeEspresso') );
    }
	
	function testOpenShop(){
		//mocks
		mockMachine.$("turnOn");
		mockOwner.$("nap");
		// test
		shop.openShop();
		assertTrue( mockMachine.$once('turnOn') );
		assertTrue( mockOwner.$once('nap') );
	}
}

Now we can run our tests and verify that our coffee shop is operational and producing sweet sweet espresso!

Instance Creations

We have now coded our classes and unit tests with some cool annotations in record time, so what do we do next? Well, WireBox works on the idea of three ways to discover and create your classes:

So let's do examples for each where our classes we just built are placed in a directory called model of the root directory.

Implicit Creation

injector = createObject("component","wirebox.system.ioc.Injector").init();
espresso = injector.getInstance("model.CoffeeShop").makeEspresso();

Explicit Binder Configuration

map("CoolShop").to("model.CoffeeShop");

Explicit Creation

injector = createObject("component","wirebox.system.ioc.Injector").init();
espresso = injector.getInstance("CoolShop").makeEspresso();

Scan Locations Binder Configuration

wirebox.scanLocations = ["model"];

Scan Locations Creation

injector = createObject("component","wirebox.system.ioc.Injector").init();
espresso = injector.getInstance("CoffeeShop").makeEspresso();;

So our recommendation is to always try to create configuration binders as best practice, but your requirements might dictate something else.

Binder Introduction

In all reality we could be building our objects and its dependencies, object graph, without any configuration just plain location and implicit conventions. This is great but not very flexible for refactoring, so let's do the best practice of defining a mapping or an alias to a real object. We do this by creating a WireBox configuration binder (wirebox.system.ioc.config.Binder), which is a simple CFC that defines the way WireBox behaves and defines object mappings. This binder is then used to initialize WireBox so it has knowledge of these mappings and our settings.

Scoping

We touched briefly on singleton and no scope objects in this section, so let's delve a little into what scoping is. WireBox's default behavior is to create a new instance of an object each time you request it via creation or injection (Transient/Prototype objects), this is the NO SCOPE scope. Scopes allow you to customize the object's life span and duration. The singleton scope allows for the creation of only one instance of an object that will live for the entire life span of the injector. WireBox ships with several different life span scopes but you can also create your own custom scopes (please see the custom scopes section). You can also tell WireBox in what scope to place the instance into by annotations or via the configuration binder. We have an entire section dedicated to discovering all the WireBox annotations, but let's get a sneak peek at them and also how to do it via our mapping DSL.

Scope Annotations

• You can tag a cfcomponent tag or component declaration with a scope={named scope} annotation that tells WireBox what scope to use
• You can have nothing on the cfcomponent tag or component declaration which denotes the NO SCOPE
• You can tag a cfcomponent tag or component declaration with a singleton annotation

Scope Configuration Binder

component extends="wirebox.system.ioc.config.Binder"{
	
	function configure(){
		
		// map with shorthand or full scope notation
		mapPath("model.CofeeShop").asSingleton();
		mapPath("model.CofeeShop").into(this.SCOPES.SINGLETON);
		// map some long espresso into request scope
		map("longEspress")
			.to("model.Espresso")
			.into(this.SCOPES.REQUEST);
		// cache some tea
		map("GreenTea")
			.to("model.Tea")
			.inCacheBox(timeout=20,provider="ehCache");
		// cache some google news that refresh themselves every 40 minutes or after 20 minutes of inactivity
		map("latestNews")
			.inCacheBox(timeout=40,lastAccessTimeout=20,provider="ehCache");
			.toRSS("http://news.google.com/news?output=rss")
	}
	
}

Internal Scopes

Here are the internal scopes that ship with WireBox:

This is cool! We can now have full control of how objects are persisted via the WireBox injector, we are not constricted to one type of persistence anymore.

Eager Init

Another aspect of our objects is when are they created? Good question! By default all objects are created ONLY when they are requested, in other words they are lazy created. But what if you are spoiled and you want your stuff NOW NOW NOW! Well, you can, you rude little brat! Just tell WireBox that you want your objects to be eagerly created. How? Via the mapping DSL and our cool asEagerInit() function.

component extends="wirebox.system.ioc.config.Binder"{
	
	function configure(){
		
		// map with shorthand or full scope notation
		mapPath("model.CofeeShop")
			.asSingleton()
			.asEagerInit();
	}
	
}

How WireBox Resolves Dependencies

Most of the time we believe our DI engines should be black boxes, but we try to think otherwise. We encourage developers to know what is going on so they can debug easily and not hit their foreheads against their keyboards. Believe me, I have done so before. That is why WireBox is tightly integrated with LogBox to provide incredible debugging information to ANY appender you desire so you can know what is going on. Another aspect of knowing what the DI engine does is how dependencies are resolved. Here is a typical flow of injection:

Instance Creation

1. Object is requested by name and the Injector tries to check if the mapping exists for that name. If no mapping is found then it tries to locate the object by using the internal scan locations to try to find it. If it cannot find it and there is a parent injector defined, then the request is funneled to the parent injector and we start our process again. If no parent injector is declared and no localization, then we throw a not located exception.
2. If the object was found via the scan locations, then we register a new mapping according to its location and discover all the metadata out of the object in preparation for construction and DI
3. We now have a guaranteed mapping so we retrieve it and we verify if the mapping's metadata has been processed or not. If the mapping is marked with no autowiring then we skip to the next step. If not, we process the mapping's metadata and prepare it for DI
4. We verify that the scope define for the mapping exists, else we throw an invalid scope exception
5. We ask the scope to produce the mapping object for us. The scope is in charge of persistence, locking, etc.
6. The scope builds the instance by asking the injector to build a new instance with the correct constructor and constructor arguments and stores it in its scope once the injector builds it. The builder decides what type of construction is needed for the mapping as it can be a CFC, java object, webservice, RSS feed, factory method call, etc. Each constructor argument is processed for dependency resolution.
7. The scope then sends the instance for DI wiring and process back to the injector
8. The injector returns the instance

Dependency Resolution

1. Arrive at the desired injection point and get the injection DSL. If the DSL is empty, then it defaults to the id/model namespace. For this injection DSL Namespace we try to find a valid DSL builder for it. If none is found an exception is thrown. If we have a match, then the DSL builder is called with the DSL string to retrieve.
2. The DSL builder then tries to parse and process the DSL string for object retrieval. If the DSL is a WireBox mapping then we try to retrieve the instance by name (Refer back to Instance Creation).
3. If the builder could not produce an instance, it is logged and DI is skipped on it.

The WireBox Injector

WireBox bases itself on the idea of creating object injectors (wirebox.system.ioc.Injector) that in turn will produce and wire all your objects. You can create as many injector instances as you like in your applications, each with configurable differences or be linked hierarchically by setting each other as parent injectors. Each injector can be configured with a configuration binder or none at all. If you are a purely annotations based kind of developer and don't mind requesting pathed components by convention, then you can use the no-configuration approach and not even have a single configuration file, all using autowiring and discovery of conventions. However, if you would like to alter the behavior of the injector and also create object mappings, you will need a configuration binder. The next section explains the way to create this configuration binder, below is how to startup or bootstrap the injector in different manners:

No Configuration Binder:

 
myObject = createObject("component","coldbox.system.ioc.Injector").init().getInstance("my.object");

With a Configuration Binder:

 
myObject = createObject("component","coldbox.system.ioc.Injector").init("myBinderPath").getInstance("CoolObject");

The WireBox injector class is the pivotal class that orchestrates DI, instance events and so much more. We really encourage you to study its API Docs to learn more about its construction and usage methods.

Injector Constructor Arguments

The injector can be constructed with three optional arguments:

If you are using WireBox within a ColdBox application, you don't even need to do any of this, we do it for you by using some configuration data in your ColdBox configuration file or conventions. Please see the ColdBox application section for more information.

Injection Idioms

Now that we have constructed our injector let's discuss a little about injection idioms or styles WireBox offers before we go all cowboy and start configuring and using this puppy. Below is a nice chart that showcases the WireBox injection styles, but we really encourage you to review our dependency injection section to learn the different approaches to DI, their values, and when to use them.

These are the three injection styles that WireBox supports and which style you choose depends on your requirements and also your personal taste. The setter method approach is linked to the way Spring and ColdSpring approach it which is the traditional JavaBean style of setXXX where XXX is the name of the mapping or object to pass into the setter method for injection.

Common Methods

The following chart shows you the most common methods when dealing with the WireBox Injector. This doesn't mean there are no other methods on the Injector that are of value, so please check out the CFC Docs for more in-depth knowledge.

Configuring WireBox

You can configure WireBox in two approaches:

1. Create a simple configuration CFC that has a configure(binder) method that accepts a WireBox configuration binder object

 
component{
	function configure(required binder){
	
	}
}

2. Create a configuration CFC that extends the WireBox configuration object: coldbox.system.ioc.config.Binder and has a configure() method.

 
component extends="coldbox.system.ioc.config.Binder"{
	function configure(){
	
	}
}

From the configure() method you will be able to interact with the Binder methods or creating implicit DSL structures in order to configure WireBox for operation and also to create object mappings.

Binder Configuration Properties

Whether you use WireBox standalone or within a ColdBox context a Binder gets a structure of configuration properties so it can use them whenever you are configuring it or declaring mappings. If you are in standalone mode, the Injector can be constructed with a properties structure that will be passed to the binder for usage. If you are in a ColdBox application the ColdBox application configuration structure is passed for you. You can then use these properties with the following methods:

• getProperty(name,[default]) : Get a specific property
• getProperties() : Get all the properties structure
• propertyExists(name) : Check if a property exists
• setProperty(name,value) : Dynamically add properties to the structure

ColdBox Enhanced Binder

If you are using your configuration binder within a ColdBox application you will have some extra goodies in the Binder that come in very handy:

• getColdBox() : Retrieve the instance of the running ColdBox application
• getAppMapping() : Get the current AppMapping setting for the running ColdBox application

// map the model folder
mapDirectory( getAppMapping() & ".model" );

Types & Scopes

Each configuration binder has two public properties accessible in the this scope:

1. this.TYPES : A reference to coldbox.system.ioc.Types used to declare what type of object you are registering for construction or wiring
2. this.SCOPES : A reference to coldbox.system.ioc.Scopes used to declare in what life cycle scope the object will be stored under

These two classes contain static public members in the this scope that facilitate the declaration of persistence scopes and construction types for object mappings. Below are the valid enumerations for these two classes:

this.TYPES.

• CFC : Construction of a CFC
• JAVA : Construction of a Java class
• WEBSERVICE : Construction of a webservice object
• RSS : Construction of an RSS feed
• DSL : Construction by DSL string
• CONSTANT : A constant value
• FACTORY : Construction by factory method

this.SCOPES.

• NOSCOPE : Transient objects
• PROTOTYPE : Transient objects
• SINGLETON : Objects constructed only once and stored in the injector
• SESSION : ColdFusion session scoped based objects
• APPLICATION : ColdFusion application scope based objects
• REQUEST : ColdFusion request scope based objects
• SERVER : ColdFusion server scope based objects
• CACHEBOX : CacheBox scoped objects

Implicit Configuration Settings

In this configure() method you can create a structure called wirebox in the variables scope that will hold the configuration data for WireBox. The following are the keys you can create in this structure:

logBoxConfig

A string containing the path of the LogBox configuration file. If you are using WireBox within a ColdBox application this setting is ignored.

wirebox.logBoxConfig = "coldbox.system.ioc.config.LogBox";

cachebox

If you are using WireBox within a ColdBox application this setting is ignored. The following are the keys for this configuration structure:

wirebox.cacheBox = {
	enabled = false, 
	configFile = "coldbox.system.ioc.config.CacheBox", //An optional configuration file to use for loading CacheBox
	cacheFactory = "", //A reference to an already instantiated CacheBox CacheFactory
	classNamespace = "" //A class path namespace to use to create CacheBox: Default=coldbox.system.cache or wirebox.system.cache
};

scopeRegistration

This structure tells WireBox how to leach itself into any ColdFusion scope when initialized.

wirebox.scopeRegistration = {
	enabled = true,
	scope   = "application", // server, cluster, session, application
	key		= "wireBox"
};

customDSL

Please refer to the Custom DSL section to find out more about custom DSLs, the following are just the way you declare them:

wirebox.customDSL = {
	cool = "my.path.CoolDSLBuilder",
	funkyBox = "my.funky.DSLBuilder"
};

customScopes

Please refer to the Custom scopes section to find out more about custom scopes, the following are just the way you declare them:

wirebox.customScopes = {
	CoolSingletons = "my.path.SingletonScope",
	FunkyTransaction = "my.funky.Transaction"
};

scanLocations

The instantiation paths that this Injector will have registered to do object locations in order. So if you request an object called Service and no mapping has been configured for it, then WireBox will search all these scan locations for a Service.cfc in the specified order. The last lookup is the no namespace lookup which basically represents a createObject("component","Service") call. If you are using WireBox within a ColdBox application, ColdBox will register the models convention folder for you and also whenever a ColdBox module is activated, that module's model convention folder will be added here too.

wirebox.scanLocations = ["model","transfer.com","org.majano"];

stopRecursions

This is an array of class path's that WireBox will use to stop recursion on any object graph that has inheritance when looking for dependencies. For example, let's say your object inherits from transfer.com.TransferDecorator, but you don't want WireBox to go past that inheritance class when looking for DI data, then you would add transfer.com.TransferDecorator to this setting.

wirebox.stopRecursions = ["transfer.com.TransferDecorator","coldbox.system.EventHandler"];

parentInjector

This setting is actually a reference to another parent injector you would like this injector to set as its parent injector. Now say this sentence 10 times without hiccuping.

wirebox.parentInjector = application.coolInjector;
// or
wirebox.parentInjector = createObject("component","coldbox.system.ioc.Injector").init("old.legacy.binder");

listeners

This section only shows you how to register WireBox listeners, so please refer to the object life cycle events section for more information. This setting is an array of listener structure definitions that WireBox's event manager will use when broadcasting object life cycle events. Each interceptor structure definition has the following keys:

wirebox.listeners = [
	{class="my.AOPTracker"},
	{class="annotationTransactioner",properties={target='*'} },
	{class="Timer", name="CoolTimer"}
];

Mapping DSL

WireBox can also be configured by using the programmatic Mapping DSL exposed in the configuration binder instead of the implicit data structures DSL we just saw. Our recommendation is to use this mapping DSL as it makes your configuration become alive and more human readable than creating a bunch of arrays and structures. All mappings DSL methods return back an instance of the binder so you can concatenate methods to create readable execution chains:

map("Lui")
	.to("model.Awesomeness")
	.asEagerInit()
	.asSingleton();

WireBox Configuration

The configuration binder has the same methods as the implicit structures that can be used to configure WireBox for operation:

logBoxConfig("config.LogBox")
	.scanLocations( getAppMappig() & ".includes.models" )
	.stopRecursions( "model.BaseService,model.BaseModel" )
	.mapScope( "Ortus", "model.scopes.Ortus" );

Mapping Initiators

Ok, now that we know how to configure WireBox, let's get into the fun stuff of object mapping. How do we do this? By using our DSL mapping initiators that tell WireBox how to start the object registration process. You will then concatenate the initiators with some DSL destinations methods, DI data, etc to tell WireBox all the information it might need to construct, wire and persist the object. Here are the DSL initiators:

Mapping Destinations

The mapping destinations tell WireBox what type of object you are mapping to. You will usually use these methods by concatenating map() or with() initiator calls:

Here are some examples:

// CFC
map("FunkyObject").to("myapp.model.service.FunkyService");
mapPath("myapp.model.service.FunkyService");
mapDirectory("myapp.model");
// Java
map("buffer").toJava("java.lang.StringBuffer");
// RSS feed
map("googleNews").toRSS("http://news.google.com/news?output=rss");
// Webservice
map("myWS").toWebservice("http://myapp.com/app.cfc?wsdl");
// Provider
map("Espresso").toProvider("FunkyEspressoProvider");
// DSL
map("Logger").toDSL("logbox:root");

// factory methods
map("ColdboxFactory").to("coldbox.system.extras.ColdboxFactory");
map("ColdBoxController").toFactoryMethod(factory="ColdBoxFactory",method="getColdBox");
map("BeanInjector")
	.toFactoryMethod(factory="ColdBoxFactory",method="getPlugin")
	.methodArg(name="plugin",value="BeanFactory")
	
// Mixin a new method in my object that dispenses users
mapPath("UserService")
	.providerMethod("getUser","User");

Persistence DSL

The next step in our mapping DSL excursion is to learn about how WireBox will persist these object mappings into WireBox scopes. By default (as we have seen), all object mappings are transient objects and they belong to a scope type called NOSCOPE. However, we need to specifically tell WireBox into what scope the declared mapped objects should be placed on in order for us to leverage caching, the singleton pattern, etc. This is accomplished by leveraging our persistence component annotations or the following methods if you prefer a non-annotation approach:

So just remember that these persistence DSL methods are not mandatory. If you are an annotations kinda developer, then you can easily add these persistence annotations to your classes.

// CFC
map("FunkyObject")
	.to("myapp.model.service.FunkyService")
	.asSingleton();
mapPath("myapp.model.service.FunkyService")
	.into(this.SCOPES.REQUEST);
// Java as NO SCOPE
map("buffer").toJava("java.lang.StringBuffer");
// RSS feed
map("googleNews")
	.toRSS("http://news.google.com/news?output=rss")
	.inCacheBox(timeout=60,lastAccessTimeout=15);
// Webservice
map("myWS")
	.toWebservice("http://myapp.com/app.cfc?wsdl")
	.into(this.SCOPES.APPLICATION);

Dependencies DSL

The dependencies DSL methods are mostly used to define dependencies and also to activate advanced features on target objects, such as runtime mixins, virtual inheritance, etc.

Mapping Extra Attributes

You can store a-la-carte attributes in a specific mapping so it can be retrieved at a later time by either an AOP aspect or Events. This is a great way to store custom metadata about an object so it can be read later for some meaningful purpose. Let's say you want to tag a mapping with a custom type that is not so easily determined from the object instance itself. You don't want to do all kinds of introspection in order to know what object you received in an aspect or an event.

map("MyPlugin")
	.to("plugins.CustomPlugin")
	.extraAttributes({
		pluginPath 	= pluginLocation,
		custom 	 	= arguments.custom,
		module 		= arguments.module,
		isPlugin	= true
	});

This mapping declares that an object has some extra attributes that will be stored in the mapping, such as the location, if it is a custom plugin, if it belongs to a module and a marker that determines if it is a plugin or not. This is then incredibly useful when you have an attached listener to WireBox:

function afterInstanceAutowire(event, interceptData){
	var attribs = interceptData.mapping.getExtraAttributes();
	var iData 	= {};
	
	// listen to plugins only
	if( structKeyExists(attribs, "isPlugin") ){
		//Fill-up Intercepted MetaData
		iData.pluginPath = attribs.pluginPath;
		iData.custom 	 = attribs.custom;	
		iData.module 	 = attribs.module;		
		iData.oPlugin    = interceptData.target;
		
		//Fire My Own Custom Interception
		instance.interceptorService.processState("afterPluginCreation",iData);
	}
}

As you can see from this sample, the extra attributes are incredibly essential, as the listener just sends the target object. It would take lots of introspection and metadata inspections in order for me to determine if the incoming object is my system's plugin or not. However, with the extra attributes, it is just a snap!

Component Annotations

The following are all the annotations that are discovered by WireBox on any component declaration that WireBox constructs:

Scope Persistence Annotations

The following annotations can be placed in the component declaration to tell the WireBox injector where to persist the constructed object. If no scope annotations are found on the component or mappings then the object is treated as NO SCOPE or a prototype/transient object; one that gets constructed every time.

• singleton - singleton object
• scope="registered_scope" : Registered Scope: session, request, singleton, custom, etc.

component singleton{}

component scope="singleton"{}

component scope="request"{}

component singleton threadsafe{}

CacheBox Integration

If you would like to use CacheBox for persistence for you objects you will need to mark your CFC with the following annotation(s)

• cachebox="[provider]" - The default provider is called 'default', so this annotation can be empty or a named cache provider
• cache - Cache into the default provider, shorthand annotation, no value needed

This annotation has two sub annotations that you can also leverage for granular control of your CacheBox integration:

• cacheTimeout - The timeout in minutes (optional)
• cacheLastAccessTimeout - The last access or idle timeout in minutes (optional)

// cache into the default provider
component cache{}
// cache into the default provider
component cachebox{}

// cache into the ehcache provider
component cachebox="ehcache"{}

// cache into the ehcache provider with settings
component cachebox="ehcache" cacheTimeout="20"{}

// cache with settings
component cache cacheTimeout="60" cacheLastAccessTimeout="10"{}

Injection DSL

The injection DSL is a domain specific language that denotes what to inject in the current placeholder: property, argument, or method via the inject annotation. This injection DSL not only can it be used via annotations but also via our mapping dsl whenever a dsl argument can be used. This DSL is constructed by joining words separated by a : colon. The first part of this string is what we will denote as the injection DSL Namespace.

inject="{namespace}:extra:extra:extra"

Property Annotation

Every cfproperty can be annotated with our injection annotations:

• @inject : The injection DSL
• @scope : The visibility scope to inject the dependency into. By default it injects into variables scope

property name="service" inject="id:MyService";

property name="TYPES" inject="id:CustomTypes" scope="this";

property name="roles" inject="id:RoleService:getRoles" scope="instance";

Constructor Argument Annotation

You can also annotated constructor arguments with the inject annotation.

<---  Via tag based annotations --->
<cffunction name="init" returntype="any" output="false">
	<cfargument name="myService" inject="UserService">
	<cfargument name="cache" 	 inject="cachebox:default">

</cffunction>


// Via script but alternative method as inline annotations are broken in ACF

/**
* Init
* @myService.inject UserService
* @cache.inject cachebox:default
*/
function init(required myService, required cache){
}

Setter Method Annotation

You can also annotate setter methods with the inject annotation to provide injections

<---  Via tag based annotations --->
<cffunction name="setService" returntype="any" output="false" inject="UserService">
	<cfargument name="service">
</cffunction>


function setService(required service) inject="UserService"{
  variables.service = arguments.service;
}

WireBox offers a wide gamut of annotation namespaces you can use in your applications and ColdBox applications. However, we took it a step further and allowed you to create your own custom DSL namespaces making your annotations come alive! So let's investigate the shipped namespaces:

ID-Model-Empty Namespace

The default namespace is not specifying one. This namespace is used to retreive either named mappings or full component paths.

// Let's assume we have mapped a few objects called: UserService, SecurityService and RoleService

// Empty inject, use the property name, argument name or setter name
property name="userService" inject;

// Using the name of the mapping as the value of the inject
property name="security" inject="SecurityService";

// Using the full namespace
property name="userService" inject="id:UserService";
property name="userService" inject="model:UserService";

// Simple factory method
property name="roles" inject="id:RoleService:getRoles";

Provider Namespace

Inject object providers, please refer to our provider section in this guide.

property name="timedService" inject="provider:TimedService";

WireBox Namespace

Talk and get objects from the current wirebox injector

property name="beanFactory" inject="wirebox";
property name="settings" inject="wirebox:properties";
property name="singletonCache" inject="wirebox:scope:singleton";
property name="populator" inject="wirebox:populator";
property name="binder" inject="wirebox:binder";

CacheBox Namespace

This DSL namespace is only active if using CacheBox or a ColdBox application context.

property name="cacheFactory" inject="cacheBox";
property name="cache" inject="cachebox:default";
property name="data" inject="cachebox:default:myKey";

EntityService Namespace

Gives you the ability to easily inject base orm services or binded virtual entity services for you:

// Generic ORM service layer
property name="genericService" inject="entityService";
// Virtual service layer based on the User entity
property name="userService" inject="entityService:User";

LogBox Namespace

Interact with LogBox

property name="logbox" inject="logbox";
property name="log" inject="logbox:root";
property name="log" inject="logbox:logger:myapi";
property name="log" inject="logbox:logger:{this}";

ColdBox Namespace

This namespace is a combination of namespaces that are only active when used within a ColdBox application:

// some examples
property name="logbox" inject="logbox";
property name="rootLogger" inject="logbox:root";
property name="logger" inject="logbox:logger:model.com.UserService";
property name="moduleService" inject="coldbox:moduleService";
property name="producer" inject="coldbox:interceptor:MessageProducer";
property name="configBean" inject="coldbox:fwConfigBean";
property name="producer" inject="interceptor:MessageProducer";
property name="appPath" inject="coldbox:fwSetting:ApplicationPath";

// JavaLoader goodness
property name="binaryHeap" inject="javaLoader:org.apache.commons.collections.BinaryHeap";
property name="email" inject="javaLoader:org.apache.commons.mail.SimpleEmail";

ORM Entity Injection

WireBox is fully capable to do ORM entity injection in your ColdFusion applications in two approaches:

1. ColdBox Applications - for use in ColdBox applications
2. Standalone WireBox - for use in ColdBox or any framework or any ColdFusion application.

Virtual Inheritance

You can make two CFCs blend together simulating a virtual runtime inheritance with WireBox. WireBox will grab the target CFC and blend into it all of the virtual inheritance CFC's methods and properties. It will then also create a $super reference in the target and a $superinit() reference. This is a great alternative to real inheritance and allow for runtime mixins to occur. You start off my mapping the base or source CFC and then mapping the target CFC and declaring a virtualInheritance to the base or source CFC:

// Declare base CFC
map("BaseModel").to("model.base.BaseModel");

map("UserService").to("model.users.UserService").virtualInheritance("BaseModel");

This will grab all methods and properties in the AbstractModel CFC and mix them into the UserService, then create a virtual $super scope which will map to an instantiated instance of the BaseModel object.

Runtime Mixins()

You can use the mixins() binder method or mixins annotation to define that a mapping should be mixed in with one or more set of templates. It will then at runtime inject all the methods in those templates and mix them into the target object as public methods.

// map with mixins
map("MyService")
	.to("model.UserService")
	.mixins("/helpers/base");

// map with mixins as list
map("MyService")
	.to("model.UserService")
	.mixins("/helpers/base, /helpers/model");

// map with mixins as array
map("MyService")
	.to("model.UserService")
	.mixins( ["/helpers/base", "/helpers/model"] );


// Via annotation
component mixins="/helpers/base"{

}

This will grab all the methods in the base.cfm and model.cfm templates and inject them into the target mapping as public methods. Awesome right?

Parent Object Definitions

Thanks to Phill Nacelli, you can reuse object definitions in your binder or via annotations. This means that you can declare an object with its dependencies and then create other definitions that use all of this parent object's definitions. This saves tons of time in declarations and provides you with great reusability.

// Binder method
parent(alias);

// Parent Annotation
component parent="alias"{}

Here is a small example:

// PARENT Mappings
map("AbstractService").to("model.AbstractService");
	.property(name:"someAlphaDAO", ref:"someAlphaDAO")
	.property(name:"someBravoDAO", ref:"someBravoDAO");

// Concrete service with parent and also some added dpendencies of its own
map("ConcreteService").to("#myPath#.parent.SomeConcreteService")
	.parent("AbstractService")
	.property(name:"someCharlieDAO", ref:"someCharlieDAO")
	.property(name:"someDeltaDAO", ref:"someDeltaDAO");;

WireBox Event Model

WireBox also sports a very nice event model that can announce several object life cycle events. You can listen to these events and interact with WireBox at runtime very easily, whether you are in standalone mode or within a ColdBox application. Of course, if you are within a ColdBox application, you get the benefit of all the potential of ColdBox Interceptors and if you are in standalone mode, well, you just get the listener and that's it. Each event execution also comes with a structure of name-value pairs called interceptData that can contain objects, variables and all kinds of data that can be useful for listeners to use. This data is sent by the event caller and each event caller decides what this data sent is. Also, remember that WireBox also can be ran with a reference to CacheBox, which also offers lots of internal events that you can tap into. So let's start investigating first the object life cycle events.

WireBox Events

WireBox's offers a wide gamut of life cycle events that are announced at certain points in execution time. Below are the current events announced by the Injector coldbox.system.ioc.Injector.

WireBox Listeners

We have already seen in our previous section all the events that are announced by WireBox, but how do we listen? There are two ways to build WireBox listeners because there are two modes of operations, but the core is the same. Listeners are simple CFCs that must create methods that match the same' name of the event they want to listen to. If you are running WireBox within a ColdBox application, listeners are Interceptors and you declare them and register them exactly the same way that you do with normal interceptors. Also, these methods can take up to two parameters depending on your mode of operation (standalone or coldbox). The one main difference between pure Wirebox listeners and ColdBox interceptors are that the configure method for the standalone WireBox is different. Please see samples.

ColdBox Mode Listener

So let's say that we want to listen on the beforeInjectorShutdown and on the afterInstanceCreation event in our listener.

component{

	function configure(){}
	
	function beforeInjectorShutdown(event, interceptData){
		var injector = arguments.interceptData.injector;
		// Do my stuff here:
		
		// I can use a log object because ColdBox is cool and injects one for me already.
		log.info("DUDE, I am going down!!!");
	}
	
	function afterInstanceCreation(event, interceptData){
		var injector = arguments.interceptData.injector;
		var target = arguments.interceptData.target;
		var mapping = arguments.interceptData.mapping;
		
		log.info("The object #mapping.getName()# has just been built, performing my awesome AOP processing on it.");
		
		// process awesome AOP on this target
		processAwesomeAOP( target );
	}
}

Standalone Mode Listener

component{

	function configure(injector,properties){
		variables.injector = arguments.injector;
		variables.properties = arguments.properties;
		
		log = variables.injector.getLogBox().getLogger( this );
	}
	
	function beforeInjectorShutdown(interceptData){
		// Do my stuff here:
		
		// I can use a log object because ColdBox is cool and injects one for me already.
		log.info("DUDE, I am going down!!!");
	}
	
	function afterInstanceCreation(interceptData){
		var target = arguments.interceptData.target;
		var mapping = arguments.interceptData.mapping;
		
		log.info("The object #mapping.getName()# has just been built, performing my awesome AOP processing on it.");
		
		// process awesome AOP on this target
		processAwesomeAOP( target );
	}
}

Please note the configure() method in the standalone listener. This is necessary when you are using Wirebox listeners outside of a ColdBox application. The configure() method receives two parameters:

• injector : An instance reference to the calling Injector where this listener will be registered with.
• properties : A structure of properties that passes through from the configuration file.

As you can see from the examples above, each Listener component can listen to multiple events. Now you might be asking yourself, in what order are these listeners executed in? Well, they are executed in the order they are declared in either the ColdBox configuration file as interceptors or the WireBox configuration file as listeners.

Providers

Let's get funky now! We have seen how to inject objects and how to scope objects. However, we need to talk about a cool WireBox feature called object providers. We learned that when you request an object from WireBox it creates it and injects it immediately. However, sometimes we need more control like:

• Delay construction of the dependency until some point in time during your controlled execution. Maybe you don't want to construct some dependencies until some feature in your application is enabled.
• You need multiple instances of a class. Like a User service producing transient users, or our espresso machine creating espressos.
• You need to access scoped objects that might need reconstruction. Maybe you want to check the cache first for existence or a ColdFusion scope in order to avoid scope widening injection.
• You have some old legacy funkiness for building stuff that has to remain as its own factory

All of these areas is where WireBox Providers can really save the day. WireBox offers automatically a way to create providers for you by creating generic provider classes (coldbox.system.ioc.Provider) that will be configured to provide the mapping you want, then injected instead of the real object requested. This happens whenever you use the provider DSL injection namespace or annotate methods with a provider annotation. It also gives you an interface (coldbox.system.ioc.IProvider), which is very simple, that you can implement in order to register your own complex providers with WireBox. You would usually do the latter if you have legacy code you need to abstract out, had funky construction processes, etc. Let's start by looking at how registering custom providers work first and then how to use the automatic WireBox providers work.

Custom Providers

If you need to abstract old legacy code or have funky construction processes, we would recommend you build your own provider objects. This means that you will create a component that implements coldbox.system.ioc.IProvider (one get() method) and then you can map it. Once mapped, you can use it anywhere WireBox listens for providers:

• The injection DSL -> inject="provider:{name}"
• The mapping DSL
  • toProvider('name')
  • setter,property,methodArg,initArg(name="",dsl="provider:{name}");

Here is the interface you need to implement:

<cfinterface hint="The WireBox Provider Interface that follows the provider pattern">
	<---  get --->
    <cffunction name="get" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Get the provided object">
    </cffunction>
</cfinterface>

The CFC you build will need to be mapped so it can be retrieved by name and also so if it needs DI or any other WireBox funkiness, it can get it. So let's look at our FunkyEspressoProvider that we needed to create since we have some old legacy machines that we need to revamp:

component name="FunkyEspressoProvider" implements="coldbox.system.ioc.IProvider" singleton{
	
	property name="log" inject="logbox:logger:FunkyEspressoProvider";
	
	public function init(){ return this; }
	
	Espresso public function get(){
		// log
		log.canDebug(){ log.debug("Requested funky espresso"); }
		var espresso = createObject("component","old.legacy.Espresso").init();
		// add some sugar as the old legacy machine is not that great.
		espresso.addSugar(1);
		// returned provided object.
		return espresso;
	}

}

Finally we map to the provider using the .toProvider() mapping method in the binder so anytime somebody requests an Espresso we can get it from our funky provider. Please note that I also map the provider because it also has some DI needed.

component extends="coldbox.system.ioc.config.Binder"{
	function configure(){
		// map the provider first, so it can be constructed and DI performed on it.
		map("FunkyEspressoProvider")
			.to("model.legacy.FunkyEspressoProvider");
		
		// map espresso's to the old funky provider for construction and retrieval.
		map("Espresso")
			.toProvider("FunkyEspressoProvider");
	
	}
}

Cool! That's it, anytime you request an Espresso, WireBox will direct its construction to the provider you registered it with.

Virtual Provider Injection DSL

You can inject automatic object providers by using the provider injection dsl namespace. This will inject a WireBox provider class (coldbox.system.ioc.Provider) that follows our Provider pattern with one method on it: get() that will provide you with the requested mapped object. The difference between custom providers here is that WireBox will create a virtual provider object for you, configure it to retrieve a specific type of mapping and then use that for you.

// use the provider DSL namespace on a property
property name="searchCriteria" inject="provider:requestCriteria"; 

// use the provider DSL namespace on a constructor argument
function init(coolObjectProvider inject="provider:HardToConstructObject"){
	variables.coolObjectProvider = arguments.coolObjectProvider;
	return this;
}
 
// To use it
searchCriteria.get().getCriteria();
coolObjectProvider.get().executeSomeMethod();

That's it! You basically use the provider:{mapping} injection DSL to tell a property, setter or argument that you want a provider object instead of the real deal. This will allow you to delay construction of such object or avoid the nasty pitfall of scope widening injection.

Virtual Provider Mapping DSL

You can also use our cool mapping DSL to create mappings that refer to provided objects by using the dsl construction type:

// map an object to a virtual provided object
map("coolObjectProvider")
	.toDSL("provider:HardToConstructObject");

// map an object an set the explicit DI arguments or DI setters to virtual provided objects
map("SearchService")
	.to("model.search.SearchService")
	.initArg(name="searchCriteria",dsl="provider:requestCriteria");

You can use the following mapping methods to map to virtual providers by using their dsl arguments:

• mapDSL()
• initArg(name="",dsl="")
• property(name="",dsl="")
• setter(name="",dsl="")
• methodArg(name="",dsl="")

Virtual Provider Lookup Methods

This is a ColdFusion 9 feature only, where you can mark methods in your components with a special provider annotation so they can serve the objects you requested automatically for you. This is an amazing feature as it will take the original method signature and replace the method for you with one that will serve the provided objects for you automatically. How insane is that! You deserve some getting jiggy wit it dancing!

public Espresso function getEspresso() provider="espresso"{}

Wow! That's it! Yep, just create an empty method signature and annotated with provider={mapping} and then WireBox will read these annotated methods and replace them for you at runtime so when you call getEspresso() it actually calls the WireBox injector and requests a new espresso instance and it returns it.

Provider onMissingMethod Proxy

Thanks to our friend Brad Wood, we have a feature in our Providers that you can leverage its onMissngMethod() to proxy calls into the provided object itself. So let's say our provided object has a method called sayHello(), then with an injected provider you must do this:

property name="chatter" inject="provider:Chat";

function useChatter(){
	return chatter.get().sayHello();	
}

That is great, but you can proxy calls into the provider itself by doing this:

property name="chatter" inject="provider:Chat";

function useChatter(){
	return chatter.sayHello();	
}

The WireBox provider object (coldbox.system.ioc.Provider) has an onMissingMethod() function that will take all missing method calls and proxy them to the provided object. Now, this is great but be ready to lose on performance if you use this approach. That is the only caveat to this approach, is that you will be impacted by performance, not crazy, but try it.

Scope Widening Injection

An object that is scoped into request, session, server, cachebox or application scopes and if wired into a persisted object will remain around even when this object has expired from the scope. This is called scope-widening injection and is a problem that must be addressed by NOT injecting them into persisted objects directly but by using WireBox's provider approach. This guarantees that the object's scope lifecycle will be maintained and your singleton or other persistent objects will be decoupled from the scope by accessing the target object via its provider.

For example, let's say you have a handler that wires in a user object that is scoped into session scope, but the handler itself is scoped as a singleton:

component name="handler" singleton{

	property name="user" inject="id:user";
}

//user component
component name="user" scope="session"{
}

So when the handler is created and persisted as a singleton, the user object get's created, stored in session and also referenced into the lifecycle of the handler object. So now, if the user expires from session, the handler does not know about it, because all it knows it that a direct reference to that out of context object still remains. So if the user needed things in session to exist, this will now fail. This problem is much how hibernate and detached objects works. Objects are no longer in session, they are detached. This scope widening issue is resolved by NOT injecting the user object directly into the handler but by using a provider.

Below is my favorite approach to solving the issue which is by using provided methods:

component name="handler" singleton{

	function getUser() provider="user"{}

}

That's it! My getUser() method will be replaced by WireBox with a proxy provider method that will request from the WireBox injector the user mapping instance.

Object Persistence & Thread Safety

While the injector can help in many ways to secure the creation of your objects, it is ultimately up to you to create code that is both thread safe and tested. It is always a great idea to design your objects without the injector in mind for threading and concurrency. DI is not a silver bullet, but a tool to relieve object creation and not to relieve the burden of good object design. Thread safety is much more complex and can be compromised when using persistent scopes like singleton, session, server, application and cache box, as more than one thread will be trying to access your code and dependencies. The only guarantee the injector can provide is the constructor and constructor dependency creation to be completely locked. The following object is to be guaranteed to be locked when created and wired with dependencies:

component{

     /**
     * @log.inject logbox:logger:{this}
     * @dao.inject id:MyDAO
     */
     function init(required log, required dao){
          variables.log = arguments.log;
          variables.dao = arguments.dao;
          return this;
     }

}

An example of a flawed object could be the following:

component{

     property name="dao" inject="id:MyDAO";
     property name="log" inject="logbox:logger:{this}";

     function init(){
          return this;
     }
}

Why is this object flawed? It is flawed because the majority of DI engines, including WireBox, will lock for constructing the object and its constructor arguments. However, once it is constructed, it will store the object in the persistence scope of choice in order to satisfy the potential of circular dependencies in the object graph. After it is placed in the storage, the DI engines will wire up setter and property mixin injections and WireBox's onDiComplete() method. With this normal approach, the wiring of dependencies and onDiComplete() have the potential of mixups due to concurrency. This is a normal side-effect and risk that developers take due that Java makes no guarantees that any thread other than the one that set its dependencies will see the dependencies. The memory between threads is not final or immutable so properties can enter an altered state.

"The subtle reason has to do with the way Java Virtual Machines (JVM) are designed to manage threads. Threads may keep local, cached copies of non-volatile fields that can quickly get out of sync with one another unless they are synchronized correctly." From Dependency Injection by Dhanji R. Prasanna

WireBox, can help you lock and provide thread safety to setter and property injections by providing you with the ThreadSafe annotation or our binder threadSafe() tagging method. So if we wanted to make the last example thread safe for property and setter wiring then we would do the following:

component threadSafe{

     property name="dao" inject="id:MyDAO";
     property name="log" inject="logbox:logger:{this}";

     function init(){
          return this;
     }
}

// or
component threadSafe=true{

     property name="dao" inject="id:MyDAO";
     property name="log" inject="logbox:logger:{this}";

     function init(){
          return this;
     }
}

// or you can bind it as a thread safe component
map("MyObject").to("path.model.MyObject").asSingleton().threadSafe();

Our threadSafe annotation and binder tagging property will allow for these objects to be completely locked and synchronized for object creation, wiring and onDiComplete(). However, circular dependencies will now fail as persistence cannot be guaranteed for the setter or property dependencies. However, since WireBox is so awesome, you can still use circular dependencies by wiring instead our object providers. (Please see providers section). In conclusion, constructing and designing a CFC that is thread safe is often a very arduous process. It is also very difficult to test and recreate threading issues in your objects and applications. So don't feel bad, as even the best of us can get into some nasty wormholes when dealing with concurrency and thread safety. However, always try to design for as much concurrency as possible and test test test!

Custom DSL Builder

WireBox allows you to create your own DSL object builders and then register them via your configuration binder. This allows you to create a namespace or override an internal namespace with your own object builder. By now we have seen our injection DSL and noticed that we have internal namespaces. With this feature we can alter it or create new ones so our annotations and injection DSLs can be customized to satisfaction. This is easily done in the following process

1. Create a CFC that implements coldbox.system.ioc.dsl.IDSLBuilder
2. Register your custom DSL builder in your configuration binder

The DSL Builder Interface

<cfinterface hint="The main interface to produce WireBox namespace DSL Builders">

	<---  init --->
    <cffunction name="init" output="false" access="public" returntype="any">
    	<cfargument name="injector" 	type="any" required="true"/>
    	<cfargument name="targetObject" type="any" required="false"/>
	</cffunction>
	
	<---  process --->
    <cffunction name="process" output="false" access="public" returntype="any">
		<cfargument name="definition" required="true"/>    	
    </cffunction>
	
</cfinterface>

The main method here to notice is the process() method. This method receives the injection dsl annotation value and it will be up to the builder to parse it and decide what to do with it. If this method returns null then WireBox will log it for you at that specific injection dependency resolution. However, we also encourage you to use best practices and log from your builders also.

Registering a custom DSL builder

If you refer back to the configuration section you can see the customDSL structure or mapDSL() method that you can use for registering custom DSL namespaces.

customDSL = {
	ortus = "path.model.dsl.OrtusBuilder"	
};

or 
mapDSL("ortus","path.model.dsl.OrtusBuilder");

This will register a new injection DSL namespace called ortus that maps to that instantiation component path.model.dsl.OrtusBuilder. Here is a very simple DSL Builder:

<cfcomponent implements="coldbox.system.ioc.dsl.IDSLBuilder" output="false">

	<---  init --->
    <cffunction name="init" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Configure the DSL for operation and returns itself" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.dsl.IDSLBuilder">
    	<cfargument name="injector" type="any" required="true" hint="The linked WireBox injector" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.Injector"/>
		<cfscript>
			instance = { injector = arguments.injector };
			instance.log		= instance.injector.getLogBox().getLogger( this );
			
			return this;
		</cfscript>   
    </cffunction>
	
	<---  process --->
    <cffunction name="process" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Process an incoming DSL definition and produce an object with it.">
		<cfargument name="definition" required="true" hint="The injection dsl definition structure to process. Keys: name, dsl"/>
		<cfscript>
			var thisType 			= arguments.definition.dsl;
			var thisTypeLen 		= listLen(thisType,":");
			var utilName 			= "";
			
			// DSL stages
			switch(thisTypeLen){
				// Ortus
				case 1 : { return instance.injector.getInstance('ortusUtil'); }
				// Ortus:utility
				case 2 : {
					utilName = getToken(thisType,2,":");
					// Verify that cache exists
					if( instance.injector.containsInstance( 'Ortus#utilName'# ) ){
						return instance.injector.getInstance( 'Ortus#utilName#' );
					}
					else if( instance.log.canDebug() ){
						instance.log.debug("Cannot find named ortus utility #utilName# using definition: #arguments.definition.toString()#");
					}
					break;
				}
			} // end level 2 main DSL
		</cfscript>   	
    </cffunction>		
	
</cfcomponent>

As you can see from the sample, creating your own DSL builder is fairly easy. The benefits of a custom DSL builder is that you can very easily create and extend the injection DSL language to your own benefit and if you are funky enough, override the behavior of the internal DSL Namespaces.

Custom Scopes

WireBox allows you to create your own object persistence scopes so you can have full control on their lifecycle. This is easily done in the following process:

1. Create a CFC that implements coldbox.system.ioc.scopes.IScope
2. Register your custom scope in your configuration binder

You can create your own persistence scope or if you are getting funky, override the internal persistence scopes with your own logic.

The Scope Interface

<cfinterface hint="The main interface to produce WireBox storage scopes">

    <---  init --->
    <cffunction name="init" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Configure the scope for operation and returns itself" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.scopes.IScope">
    	<cfargument name="injector" type="any" required="true" hint="The linked WireBox injector" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.Injector"/>
    </cffunction>

    <---  getFromScope --->
    <cffunction name="getFromScope" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Retrieve an object from scope or create it if not found in scope">
    	<cfargument name="mapping" 		type="any" required="true"  hint="The object mapping" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.config.Mapping"/>
    	<cfargument name="initArguments" 	type="any" required="false" hint="The constructor structure of arguments to passthrough when initializing the instance" colddoc:generic="struct"/>
		
	</cffunction>
	
</cfinterface>

Scoping Process

The scoping process must be done by using some of the referenced injector's methods:

• buildInstance(mapping, initArguments)
• autowire()

These methods must be called sequentially in order to avoid circular reference locks. The first method buildInstance is used to construct and initialize an object instance. The autowire method is used then to process DI and AOP on the targeted object. Let's look at my Ortus Scope:

<cfcomponent output="false" implements="coldbox.system.ioc.scopes.IScope" hint="I am the Ortus Scope of Scopes">

	<---  init --->
    <cffunction name="init" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Configure the scope for operation">
    	<cfargument name="injector" type="any" required="true" hint="The linked WireBox injector" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.Injector"/>
		<cfscript>
			instance = {
				injector = arguments.injector,
				ortus = {}
			};
			return this;
		</cfscript>
    </cffunction>

	<---  getFromScope --->
    <cffunction name="getFromScope" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Retrieve an object from scope or create it if not found in scope">
    	<cfargument name="mapping" 			type="any" required="true"  hint="The object mapping" colddoc:generic="coldbox.system.ioc.config.Mapping"/>
		<cfargument name="initArguments" 	type="any" required="false" hint="The constructor structure of arguments to passthrough when initializing the instance" colddoc:generic="struct"/>
		<cfscript>
			var name = arguments.mapping.getName();
			if( structKeyExists(instance.ortus, name) ){
				return instance.ortus[name];	
			}
			
			lock name="ortus.scope.#arguments.mapping.getName()#"{
				instance.ortus[name] = instance.injector.buildInstance( arguments.mapping, arguments.initArguments );
			}
			
			// wire it
			instance.injector.autowire(target=instance.ortus[name],mapping=arguments.mapping);
			
			// send it back
			return instance.ortus[name];
		</cfscript>
    </cffunction>
	
</cfcomponent>

Registering A Custom Scope

If you refer back to the configuration section you can see the customScopes structure or mapScope() method that you can use for registering custom DSL namespaces.

customScopes = {
	ortus = "path.model.dsl.OrtusScope"	
};

or 
mapScope("ortus","path.model.dsl.OrtusScope");

Now I can use the ortus scope in my mappings DSL and even my annotations, isn't that cool!

component scope="ortus"{
	
}

// map it
map("Luis")
	.to("model.path.LuisService")
	.into("Ortus");

WireBox IInjector Interface

We also provide an interface to create objects that adhere to our injector interface: coldbox.system.ioc.IInjector. Then these objects can be used as parent injectors, great for legacy factories or creating hierarchies according to your specs. All you have to do is implement the following interface:

<cfinterface hint="An interface that enables any CFC to act like a parent injector within WireBox">
	
	<---  setParent --->
    <cffunction name="setParent" output="false" access="public" returntype="void" hint="Link a parent Injector with this injector">
    	<cfargument name="injector" required="true" hint="A WireBox Injector to assign as a parent to this Injector">
    </cffunction>
	
	<---  getParent --->
    <cffunction name="getParent" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Get a reference to the parent injector instance, else an empty simple string meaning nothing is set" >
    </cffunction>
	
	<---  getInstance --->
    <cffunction name="getInstance" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Locates, Creates, Injects and Configures an object model instance">
    	<cfargument name="name" required="false" 	hint="The mapping name or CFC instance path to try to build up"/>
		<cfargument name="dsl"	required="false" 	hint="The dsl string to use to retrieve the instance model object, mutually exclusive with 'name'"/>
		<cfargument name="initArguments" required="false" 	hint="The constructor structure of arguments to passthrough when initializing the instance"/>
	</cffunction>
	
	<---  containsInstance --->
    <cffunction name="containsInstance" output="false" access="public" returntype="any" hint="Checks if this injector can locate a model instance or not">
    	<cfargument name="name" required="true" hint="The object name or alias to search for if this container can locate it or has knowledge of it"/>
    </cffunction>

	<---  shutdown --->
    <cffunction name="shutdown" output="false" access="public" returntype="void" hint="Shutdown the injector gracefully by calling the shutdown events internally.">
    </cffunction>
	
</cfinterface>

Once you create this CFC that implements this interface then you can call on the injector's setParent() method and you are ready to roll.

WireBox ORM Services

WireBox includes all of our ORM services to enable you to work with ColdFusion ORM in a much more efficient manner without using ColdBox. Here are the main integrations we offer for ORM services:

• Base ORM Services : Our base class that enables you to work with ORM entities.
• Active Entity : Follows a similar Active Record pattern to ORM entities.
• Virtual Entity Services : Create virtual service layers for specific ORM entities for you.
• Criteria Builder : Tap into the power of Hibernate Criteria Queries with our Criteria Builder
• ORM Entity Injection : Use WireBox for applying dependency injection & AOP to ORM entities. Also use it as a way to proxy hibernate listeners

WireBox Object Populator

WireBox also comes packaged with our handy ColdBox object populator that has been so successful in our ColdBox applications. The object populator object can populate objects with data from XML, JSON, WDDX, structures, queries and much more. So we highly encourage you to check it out as it will really help out in your applications. The way to retrieve it is to use the getObjectPopulator() method on the injector and then call one of our populate methods you can see below. Please check out the CFC docs API for the latest and greatest.

populator = injector.getObjectPopulator();

populateFromXML

Populate a bean from an XML packet

Returns

• This function returns any

Arguments

populateFromQuery

Populate a bean from a query

Returns

• This function returns Any

Arguments

populateFromStruct

Populate a bean from a structure

Returns

• This function returns any

Arguments

populateFromQueryWithPrefix

Populates an Object using only specific columns from a query. Useful for performing a query with joins that needs to populate multiple objects.

Returns

• This function returns any

Arguments

populateFromJSON

Populate a bean from a json string

Returns

• This function returns any

Arguments

Mapping DSL Examples

mapPath("path")
mapDSL("cool", "model.CoolFactory");
 
map("SecurityService")
	.to("model.security.SecurityService")
	.onDICOmplete(["start","executeRoles"])
 
mapDirectory('/shared/model');
 
 // Eager initialized objects
map("luis,joe").to("model.Luis").into(this.SCOPES.SINGLETON).asEagerInit()
map(["luis","joe"]).to("model.Luis").into(this.SCOPES.SINGLETON).asEagerInit()
 
// map a property to a mapping id via DSL
map("Lui").toDSL("coldbox:setting:luis")
 
// using initWith() for passing name-value pairs or positional arguments for direct initialization of a mapping
map("transferConfig")
	.to("transfer.com.config.Configuration")
	.initWith(datasourcePath=getProperty('datasourcePath'),
	 	  configPath=getProperty('configPath'),
		  definitionPath=getProperty('definitionPath'));
			  
// Now doing with setter injection
map("transferConfig")
	.to("transfer.com.config.Configuration")
	.setter(name="datasourcePath", value=getProperty("datasourcePath"))
	.setter(name="configPath", value=getProperty("datasourcePath"))
	.setter(name="definitionPath", value=getProperty("definitionPath") );
			  
			  
// Map with constructor arguments
map("transfer")
	.to("transfer.com.Transfer")
	.into(SCOPES.SINGLETON)
	.noAutowire()
	.asEagerInit()
	.initArg(name="configuration",ref='transferConfig');  //ref = name by default, or have an explicit name
 
// RSS Integration With Caching.
map("googleNews")
	.toRSS("http://news.google.com/news?pz=1&ned=us&hl=en&topic=h&num=3&output=rss")
	.asEagerInit()
	.inCacheBox(timeout=20,lastAccessTimeout=30,provider="default",key="google-news");
 
// Java Integration with init arguments
map("Buffer").
	toJava("java.lang.StringBuffer").
	initArg(value="500",javaCast="long");
	
// Java integration with initWith() custom arguments and your own casting.
map("Buffer").
	toJava("java.lang.StringBuffer").
	initWit( javaCast("long",500) );