Unleash SDK

Library for interacting with Unleash feature flags

Requirements

• Adobe ColdFusion 2018+
• Lucee 5+
• ColdBox 6+

This module takes heavy advantage of ColdBox's async scheduling. There are no plans to make this module work outside of ColdBox.

Configuration

The UnleashSDK needs some jars to be available on the classpath. Add this to your Application.cfc: (Adjust the paths as necessary.)

this.javaSettings = {
    loadPaths = [
        expandPath( "/modules/unleashsdk/lib" )
    ],
    loadColdFusionClassPath = true,
    reloadOnChange = false
};

Here are the settings for the UnleashSDK:

settings = {
    "appName": getApplicationName(), // Defaults to `this.name` in `Application.cfc`.
    "instanceId": resolveHostname(), // Attempts to resolve the hostname. "unknown", otherwise.
    "environment": variables.controller.getSetting( "environment" ),
    "contextProvider": "DefaultContextProvider@unleashsdk",
    "apiURL": getSystemSetting( "UNLEASH_API_URL" ),
    "apiToken": getSystemSetting( "UNLEASH_API_TOKEN" ),
    "refreshInterval": 10,
    "metricsInterval": 60
}

Any of these settings can be overridden inside your config/ColdBox.cfc. If you don't need to modify the default settings, you can supply your Unleash configuration directly through environment variables via UNLEASH_API_URL and UNLEASH_API_TOKEN.

Usage

The main usage of the UnleashSDK is checking if a feature flag is enabled. This is done using the isEnabled method. (There is also a helper isDisabled method for your convenience.)

isEnabled

Evaluates the feature with the current and provided context to determine if it is enabled for the current request.

Returns: boolean

Name	Type	Required	Default	Description
name	string	true		The name of the feature flag to evaluate
additionalContext	struct	false	{}	Any additional context items for this check. This struct will override any duplicate keys in the context from the ContextProvider.
defaultValue	boolean	false	false	The default value to use if the feature does not exist.

Context and ContextProviders

Context refers to information about the current request that Unleash will use when evaluating feature toggles. Context includes the following fields:

context = {
    "appName"       : getApplicationName(), // Defaults to `this.name` in `Application.cfc`
    "environment"   : variables.environment, // `controller.getSetting( "environment" )`
    "userId"        : "",
    "sessionId"     : getSessionId(), // `session.sessionid`
    "remoteAddress" : CGI.REMOTE_ADDR,
    "hostname"      : resolveHostname() // Attempts to resolve the hostname. "unknown", otherwise.
};

Context is generated using a ContextProvider and/or the context arguments to isEnabled. The context provided to isEnabled will overwrite any duplicate keys in the context generated by the ContextProvider.

A ContextProvider is a component with getContext() method. That method should return the context fields shown above.

You can register a custom ContextProvider by the setting contextProvider in your config/ColdBox.cfc. A custom ContextProvider can enabled you to always provide specific user or session information for your application without having to pass it in manually each time you call isEnabled.