JavaFX at JavaOne 2008

Posted by Jon Rose on May 07, 2008

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JavaOne 2008

So far, JavaOne has been heavy on JavaFX content. It is clear that a lot of work has been done since the initial announcement at last year’s conference. The language is taking shape, and there have been a number of demos of applications built using JavaFX. The early adopters building applications are proving that it is possible to build real applications using early versions of JavaFX. Although, the technologies do not appear to be ready for the typical developer, as the public “early access” version of the SDK will not be available until this summer and there is little talk of tools support.

One of the more impressive demos was a fully functional version of Parleys.com written in JavaFX. In March, InfoQ.com featured an interview with Parleys.com founder Stephan Janssen where he shared a number of details on the AIR/Flex version of the site. The lack of native support in AIR led Stephan and Parley's lead JavaFX developer, Jo Voordeckers, to pursue the JavaFX technologies, as they will require native support, like socket listeners, to move towards a file sharing model for video distribution. Along with demonstrating the JavaFX version, Stephan also announced that Parleys.com will now offer free space to both Java and Adobe user groups for posting their content.

Michael Levin detailed a cool new feature of the JRE that was used in a number of the JavaFX demos:

One of the demos at JavaOne is billed as the "Return of the Applet." Detachable applets can live outside the browser. This is a cool technology. Basically, you can drag an applet from your browser onto your desktop and leave it there, even after the browser is closed. This reminds me of widgets and gadgets. It's yet another move in a web-centric direction.

Tuesday also included the announcement of JavaFX.com on Joshua Marinacci’s blog:

We launched JavaFX.com today. I'm very excited about this site since I was personally involved in putting it together. We have videos of the JavaFX demos from each keynote as well as explanations of what JavaFX is, where you can get more info, and a signup page to get the SDK when it's ready.

Sun is clearly putting a lot of focus on JavaFX. It does appear to be progressing from its premature launch last year, but from all appearances it still has a long way to go before it is ready for the masses.

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