You don't use an butter knife when you need a hatchet, nor a machete when you need a scalpel. When you're bringing Legacy Code out of the Dark Ages, you need the right tools. That old copy of ColdFusion Studio was the bomb in it's day, but it's not working so hot on your new Windows 8.1 laptop. On top of that, it's help dictionary is out of date by about 5 server revisions, and it's never even dreamed of HTML 5.
You need some good tools to resuscitate a dying app, and the first one is a good editor. I personally prefer Adobe ColdFusion Builder, but you could use CF Eclipse or Sublime Text 2. I like an IDE, and love Eclipse for it's plugin architecture, which allows me to handle the majority of my workflow directly in one environment. Others prefer just a text editor, and that's fine too, but at least pick something with code complete and up-to-date dictionary add ons.
Do you use Source Control? Now's the time to learn. The ability to branch, merge, and revert are critical for continuing to maintain a working application at this stage. I've used Subversion in the past, but have come to prefer Git. The learning curve is steep, but the benefits and flexibility are well worth the time investment, especially in a team environment.
Using MS SQL? Then you want the Redgate SQL Toolbelt. This one isn't cheap, but it's well worth the purchase. You can do comparisons of database schemas, source control sql, backup and restore at an object level, document your db, and the compression technology here can save you a bundle in storage costs. And all of that is just scratching the surface.
And when it's really time to dig in, you're going to want FusionReactor. For me, this tool paid for itself in the first five minutes. You can watch every single request that's hitting your app. Track your slowest requests, queries, and more. Get live data on memory utilization. You can setup notifications for different events, and even setup auto recovery scenarios. This is the must have tool when you're modernizing your application.
Finally, if your getting hit with security breaches right now, it'll probably take some time to pay off some of that code debt and get back on track. FuseGuard, from Foundeo, is an easy way to add some badly needed security when you have none. It won't do your work for you, but it can save you a lot of grief while you get it together.
This article is the third in a series of articles on bringing life back to your legacy ColdFusion applications. Follow along in the Legacy Code category.
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