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BOSTON (07/31/2008) - Developers will be able to get their hands on a preview SDK (software development kit) for JavaFX as of Thursday, marking Sun's entry into the RIA (rich Internet application) framework wars.

Learning JavaFX, especially at this early stage in its development, is a big undertaking; but it can also be fun. So we'll take our time getting to know the JavaFX SDK, starting this month with using JavaFX and Project Nile from within the NetBeans 6.1 IDE. We'll install the components and then I'll walk you through some easy RIA development using your new tools. Later articles in the series will explore the JavaFX Script language and its APIs. Tutorials will be based on the JavaFX Preview SDK, which is available now, and on JavaFX SDK 1.0, once it is released.

JavaFX 1.0 makes its debut today amid high hopes and a sea of doubt. Some in the Java community believe JavaFX could become "the application environment for the Java platform," while others say Sun has made nothing but mistakes on the client side, and JFX is too little, too late. In this talk with Sun Microsystems Senior Director of Java Marketing Param Singh, and JavaFX Architect John Burkey, Andrew Glover addresses both the concerns associated with JavaFX 1.0 and its potential. Get the developer's perspective on what you'll be able to do with JavaFX 1.0. Also hear Sun's answer to the question: What does JavaFX 1.0 mean for Swing?

Before you can create rich internet applications in JavaFX, you need to get to know the JavaFX Script language. So, fire up your NetBeans IDE and take Jeff Friesen's scripted tour of JavaFX Script's language features. Learn how JavaFX Script handles basic constructs like variable declarations, fundamental types, and expressions; then jump into advanced features such as sequences, replace triggers, and data binding. Level: Beginner to Intermediate

Developers will be able to get their hands on a preview software development kit for JavaFX as of Thursday, marking Sun's entry into the rich Internet-application framework wars.

SAN FRANCISCO (07/20/2007) - Sun Microsystems has been quiet about its JavaFX technology for building graphical applications since introducing it in May, but on Friday the company added a compiler to the platform. Also on tap is an updated plug-in to outfit the open source NetBeans platform for building JavaFX applications. New online demonstrations also are being made available. Based on the Swing GUI toolkit for Java, JavaFX is intended to bolster development of graphical user experiences for systems ranging from desktops to mobile clients and even TVs. "JavaFX makes the power that existed within Swing more accessible to developers so they can create exciting applications," featuring visual interaction, said Jean Elliott, Sun's senior director of Java software product marketing. At the JavaOne conference in May, Sun unveiled two critical components planned for the platform: JavaFX Script, which is a scripting language for content creation, and JavaFX Mobile, which provides a software system for mobile devices. JavaFX technologies are only in a very early stage of development. Applications will run with a Java Virtual Machine. A beta release of JavaFX technology is intended for release at the JavaOne conference next May, but early access code -- described as "sub-alpha" code by Sun -- has been made available. Source code for the OpenJavaFX Compiler is now available. The compiler enables JavaFX Script code to be compiled into Java code. "What you really want to do is compile an entire program, get it all into Java to begin with and it compiles much faster," said Chet Haase, Sun Java chief client architect. The NetBeans plug-in, meanwhile, will provide for developing JavaFX Script programs in the IDE. JavaFX programs can be built easier, Haase said. JavaFX programs will be available as NetBeans projects. The plug-in will work with NetBeans 5.5 and is due to be incorporated this fall into NetBeans 6.0, the upcoming version of the IDE. The NetBeans 6.0 version of the plug-in features a preview of JavaFXPad integration. JavaFXPad is a lightweight tool for building graphical elements using JavaFX Script. Both the NetBeans 5.5 and 6.0 plug-ins are available, as well as two demonstrations showing an instant messaging client and SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) integration. Users must first have the Java development kit installed to view the demonstrations. With JavaFX Sun seeks to enable more lightweight, easier development of consumer-oriented applications, Haase said. These could include Web sites with rich animation and user interfaces that are more dynamic than a typical forms-based application, he said. JavaFX joins what is becoming a crowded market for technologies to create graphical interfaces. "The market is only recently crowded," said analyst Joe Niski, of Burton Group. Adobe's Flash and Flex technologies have been around for a while but have not generated a lot of excitement lately, Niski said. But Sun's JavaFX and Microsoft's new Silverlight platform have been added to the mix, he noted. Sun is off to a good start with JavaFX, said Niski. "They have a really compelling story, at least with the platform penetration, because JavaFX will run on any JVM," Niski said. "The one thing that it lacks is good graphical tooling targeting Web designers," he said. "It's good to see Sun putting attention into the user experience," said Niski. JavaFX extends beyond AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML). "AJAX makes it easier to build more dynamic Web pages but it's still about static Web pages," Haase said. "It's not as rich an interface for the user," as JavaFX, he said. JavaFX Script was built with developers of graphical and GUI applications in mind, Elliott said. JavaFX Script code was downloaded 3,000 times from May 13 to June 10. Microsoft is set to soon ship a release candidate for Silverlight. A release candidate is considered a precursor to the general release of the technology.

JavaFX is focused on the client side, and aims to improve the look and feel of Java GUIs so that users can experience more attractive interfaces. Of course, many client applications need to exchange information with a remote server. Nowadays, the HTTP protocol and XML are widely accepted as the best choices to exchange information, so we want to show how easy is in JavaFX to handle HTTP communication details and how we can parse and extract information from an XML data structure.

The seamless integration of JavaFX Script with pure Java code is one of the most interesting features of JavaFX Script. Using Java objects within JavaFX Script is simple, because JavaFX Script was designed with this feature in mind and the necessary instruments have been build into the language. This article will present possible ways to create JavaFX objects and use them in Java code.

We met with Tony Wyant, Sun's lead engineer for JavaFX media, to get an understanding of where JavaFX media might take us.

This tutorial is your starting point for learning the JavaFX Script programming language. It focuses on the fundamentals only: that is, on the underlying, non-visual, core constructs that are common to all FX applications. When finished, you will be ready for Building GUI Applications with JavaFX, the second tutorial in this series. After that, the Media Browser tutorial will walk you through the complete end-to-end development of a real-world application.

The application is created using the common profile API and can be run both on mobile devices and desktop platforms. If you want to learn more about the desktop platform API, refer to the JavaFX API and to the following chapters of the GUI tutorial. The screen captures provided in this lesson are taken from a desktop application.

This article builds on that information and contains an example program that will help you understand more JavaFX Script concepts. This example program focuses on teaching you to use the following user interface (UI) components available in JavaFX Script technology:

To do this we have enlisted the help of the Java programming language to perform the actual type conversion. Tapping into the existing Java ecosystem as needed brings tremendous power to this otherwise simple scripting language.

Whether you're new to the Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) or have been using it for a long time, right now is the perfect time to get started with JavaFX and JavaFX Mobile. The JavaFX 1.0 platform was released late last year, and it included several new capabilities and features that you may not be familiar with. The purpose of this article is to introduce you to the JavaFX platform, and to provide three really good reasons why your next Java ME mobile project should include JavaFX.

Sun officials acknowledged that JavaFX bears a similarity to enhanced graphics capabilities offered in the new Microsoft Silverlight platform. But Gosling added that Silverlight differs in that it is mostly focused on video-streaming.

JavaFX was understood by many to be primarily a high-level scripting language based on Sun engineer Chris Oliver's Form Follows Function, or F3, language. JavaFX, however, is meant to be more than just a scripting language for the client. In his interview with Artima, Jacob Lehrbaum, Sun's product line manager for client-side Java, explains that JavaFX is a client-side layer above the regular Java APIs that allow the easy creation and deployment of media-rich Java applications.

Chapter 2 of JavaFX in Action, a hands-on tutorial that introduces and explores JavaFX through numerous bite-sized projects, focuses on JavaFX Script data and variables. In this chapter, author Simon Morris introduces JavaFX Script sequences. Sequences are arrays with some clever extra functionality, making them more useful to the type of work JavaFX is designed to do. They differ widely from Java primitive arrays; indeed, they have more in common with Java's collection classes.

In order to fully immerse yourself in the community (and this goes for most dev.java.net projects), you should do the following (also note the JavaFX front page has a very similar How to Contribute guide):

JavaFX in Action is a hands-on tutorial that introduces and explores JavaFX through numerous bite-sized projects. The book provides a solid grounding in the JavaFX syntax and related APIs by showing you how to apply the key features of the JavaFX platform. You'll absorb the fundamentals of the technology while exploring the possibilities that JavaFX can open up for your designs.

Sun revealed JavaFX Script today, a new technology for constructing highly portable rich interactive applications with Java. Ars has some first impressions of Sun's latest tech.

JavaFX is so new there’s little documentation. (Actually that’s not fair, there’s a good deal of reference and some tutorials, but there is very little “here’s how you do X” documentation yet.) I’ve assembled a sample JavaFX application that includes a JavaFX component as a JComponent in a Swing application, but don’t view this application as a blueprint for your own application. There’s a good reason this isn’t an article - it is not a tutorial but my attempt to capture the first few hours of my experience with the technology. (Read: experimental)

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JavaFX Script is a scripting language designed to facilitate the creation of rich client and Internet applications. The language is highly portable and can run on any system that supports Java technology, without local installation. It uses underlying Java technologies to let you create GUIs of any size or complexity easily.

The highlight of Tuesday's general session at JavaOne was the debut of Sun's JavaFX. Sun defines JavaFX as "a comprehensive set of runtime environments, widgets, development tools and scripting environments, that will make it even easier for you to create and deploy next-generation services that run across virtually any device."