Sun Releases JavaFX 185
ink writes "Sun released JavaFX 1.0 today, in a bid to take on Adobe's Flash and Microsoft's Silverlight technologies. It is Sun's first Java release to include standardized, cross-platform audio and video playback code (in the form of On2 licensed codecs). The lack of a Linux or Solaris release is a notable absence. The development kit currently consists of the base run-time, a NetBeans/Eclipse plug-in and a set of artifact exporters for Adobe CS 3&4." An anonymous reader adds a link to several tutorials accompanying the new release.
JavaFX on Android (Score:5, Insightful)
What I'd really like to see is JavaFX running on Android. I saw a presentation from Java One where it showed a JavaFX app running on Android. Has anyone been able to duplicate this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYy4j9x2Mi4 [youtube.com]
I've played around with JavaFX and it seems pretty nice. I've been able to write small widgets with it. Whether it can take on Silverlight and Flash still remains to be seem. What's awesome is that JavaFX has the support of Java's rich API and 3rd-party libraries (you can easily import them into a JavaFX program).
Also if JavaFX apps can run properly on Android or the iPhone, I think that would also help it be more successful.
Flash and Silverlight the target? (Score:2, Insightful)
Flash and Silverlight? Yeah, right. Sun knows that Yet Another Web Development Framework isn't going to take over the desktop. This is a blatant attempt to stop Android taking over the mobile phone space. Android added native media playback classes and a bunch of other stuff to the J2ME mix, the HTC G1 was a surprise hit, and a whole bunch of cell phone manufacturers have now announced Android phones - not J2ME phones. Sun is seeing its lock on the mobile phone application market disappearing overnight, and Google side-stepped whatever patent claims it might have exerted by running "Dalvik" byte-code instead of Java byte-code.
So, it's closed source, and phone manufacturers have to pay a royalty to Sun for every handset shipped? In the meantime, Android is getting the press, HTC has shipped half a million G1 handsets in the past couple of months, Android is open source and free to implement, and there are numerous Android phones from multiple manufacturers on the horizon. Why would any of these manufacturers choose JavaFX instead?
Holy Halleluja! Unbelievable! (Score:5, Insightful)
They've done it! They have *finally* done it. Beyond all hype, potential vaporware and marketing bullcrap they have - for once - actually pulled through with RIAs. People this is the first time in history that Sun has actually pulled through with implementing a piece of Java in a form that Java was initially meant for: A cross plattform rich & powerfull client enviroment. Finally Java and its VM have stepped up and entered the ring with Flash!
Only intially releasing for OS X and Windows is a large downside, as it will get negative votes from opinion leaders in the field, but the simple fact that they pulled through and didn't stop at 20% with some half-assed crappy Java Media Framework or some other piece of sh*t they've released ever since Flash took the helm at rich clients 10 years ago is a very big supprising plus!!! And the release-website [javafx.com] (why the f*ck isn't this, the most important prime sorce even linked in the GP metaarticle???) doesn't even look like total crap.
If they actually manage to pull through with a broad parallel release policy for this in the near future, manage to reduce JFX deployment to zero-fuss Flash-style and release the java-based FOSS tools and IDEs for JFX as announced a year ago, we will - for the first time in the history of the web - see a true competitor to Flash rise. This is good news in so many ways I can't even describe. If Sun plays its cards right and continues applying common sense and not screwing around this time and Adobe isn't on its toes, we will have a fully free open source rich client platform in just a few years and Flash will be history. Yay! Go, Sun, go!
I can't tell you how much I and many other professional Flash developers have waited for this moment for the last 8 years.
Re:Linux support is 'coming' (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Linux support is 'coming' (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux and Solaris count towards less than 5% of the market. Sun did the smart thing by bringing it to the mass OS market, instead of delaying it. If they delayed it, they'd have lost their window of entry, and maybe lost the market entirely to Adobe AIR.
Re:Holy Halleluja! Unbelievable! (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah! Java finally made it in the form is was meant to be. We love you Sun.
Oh. Wait a moment. override? bind? def? public-init? WTF.
Re:Probably Also Contending with OpenLaszlo (Score:5, Insightful)
OpenLaszlo compiles to either flash or DHTML. Its not a Flash lock-in.
I'd be surprised if it were possible to display streaming video in just DHTML.
Re:Linux support is 'coming' (Score:2, Insightful)
Linux and Solaris count towards less than 5% of the market.
Right. A *desktop* market. Actually much less than 5%. It is about less than 3% for both.
Re:Probably Also Contending with OpenLaszlo (Score:3, Insightful)
Can DHTML display video? the GP poster talked about video specifically.
Talk about delusions of grandeur (Score:3, Insightful)
Not supporting linux and solaris, which have less than 5% of the desktop market, is not notable and is, in fact, good business sense.