CFWheels Dictionary for Mac OS X

Working with any framework involves learning many things like file structure, information flow, etc. One of the most critical aspects of being proficient in a framework is how well one has learned the API. And this holds true of CFWheels as well.

CFWheels provides a simple API that one has to refer to time and again as one learns and develops with it. The CFWheels website has a great section on documentation which lists various API calls. And this helps the process of learning/working with the framework. But…

There were a couple of occasions when I was offline and a few when my connectivity not too good. Under those circumstances it was proving a little slow to figure out various API calls.

So I was browsing around a few months back and came across the ColdFusion 9 dictionary for Mac. That got me thinking that I should probably do something like that for CFWheels. The nice thing about a dictionary is that it is a desktop application, so it is very quick, has a very nice search, and most importantly, integrates very well with native Mac apps.

So here it is!

Download: CFWheels Dictionary for Mac

Installation is simple.

Unzip the zip file
Copy CFWheels.dictionary to either /Library/Dictionaries OR ~/Library/Dictionaries.

Fire up the Dictionary app, and you should see the CFWheels dictionary in the list of dictionaries available.

A few tips:

Once the CFWheels dictionary is installed, you can search for the word “api” and it lists a page where all CFWheels API calls are available. You can select what you want.
If you use a native Mac app like Panic’s Coda or TextMate the Mac dictionary service integrates beautifully with them. What that means is that you can select a word and right-click it and then “Look Up in Dictionary”. It opens dictionary and information about the text you selected.
Setup a keyboard shortcut (through System Preferences > Keyboards > Keyboard Shortcuts) for “Look Up in Dictionary” so that you can fire it up through keyboard.
If you want you can enable/disable various dictionaries through the Preferences menu of the Dictionary app. I find that to be quite handy.

Have fun! And do drop me a line if you like it! Or if you find any bugs/issues.