Are ColdFusion objects passed by reference or by value?

Question

Are ColdFusion objects (i.e. CFCs invoked via cfobject) normally passed by reference or by value (copied in memory)? And is it possible to force ColdFusion to pass an object in either manner?

Answer 1

ColdFusion objects are passed by reference. There's not really a way to pass an object by value, but you can create a copy using the duplicate() function.

Answer 2

Well, keep in mind that using duplicate() doesn't work in MX 7 for copying certain things, like CFCs and COM, CORBA, and Java objects. You can copy a CFC in CF 8, though.