Customer Reviews

JavaFX: Developing Rich Internet Applications

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JavaFX is a family of products developed at Sun Microsystems. It is a platform that includes a high performance declarative scripting language for building Rich Internet Applications. JavaFX code is much easier to write than straight Java code, yet it integrates easily with Java programs. This book explores the key features of JavaFX and how it should be used. You don't have to be a Java programmer to understand this book, but it helps. The following is an outline of the book's chapters and contents, which does not yet appear to be available via the product description:

Chapter 1. Getting Started - How to write your first JavaFX application using three different methods - via Netbeans, the command line, or Eclipse.
Installing the JavaFX Platform
Setting Up NetBeans IDE for JavaFX 1.2
Command Line
Eclipse

Chapter 2. JavaFX for the Graphic Designer - This talks about the tools that a graphic designer, as opposed to a programmer, will use to produce JavaFX programs. You can skip this if you are a programmer.
Graphic Design and JavaFX
JavaFX Production Suite
Adobe Illustrator CS3
Adobe Photoshop CS3
Scalable Vector Graphics

Chapter 3. JavaFX Primer - Covers key concepts in the JavaFX scripting language. Shows you how to declare a script and instance variables create and modify sequences, and how to control logic flow.
JavaFX Script Basics
JavaFX Script Language
Class Declaration
Mixin Classes
Object Literals
Variables
Sequences
Functions
Strings
Expressions and Operators

Chapter 4. Synchronize Data Models - Looks at how binding can be used in JavaFX to associate unrelated entities such that changes in one can be seen in the other.
Binding
Bidirectional Binding
Advanced Binding Topics
Triggers
Coming Features

Chapter 5. Create User Interfaces - Discusses the stage, scene, style sheets, JavaFX nodes, custom nodes, layout options, and Java Swing Components. These are the basics that enable the creation of media rich interfaces.
User Interfaces
The Stage
The Scene
Nodes
Layout
Input Events
Text Display
Custom Controls
Shapes
Java Swing Extension

Chapter 6. Apply Special Effects - This is where things really get interesting. The chapter talks about the effects that come as part of the JavaFX platform and includes simple examples of how effects are used.
Effects

Chapter 7. Add Motion with JavaFX Animation - Discusses the basics of animation in JavaFX. Covered are the classes used to define animation and how to use the standard interpolators. Also you learn how to build your own custom interpolator. A couple of examples are shown to give you the idea.
Computer Animation
Timelines
Key Frames
Interpolation
Path-Based Animation
Total Solar Eclipse Examples

Chapter 8. Include Multimedia - There are several specific classes that deal with sound, video, and images, and they are discussed here and illustrated with examples. If you are familiar with the old Java Media Framework, some of this might look familiar.
Multimedia
Images
Media--Audio and Video

Chapter 9. Add JavaFX to Web Pages with Applets - The JavaFX applet model has been completely rewritten to be based on Java Web Start, allowing applets to use its caching mechanisms and speed applet start-up time. There is also consistency across browsers, thus fixing the old Java applet model.
JavaFX and Applets
Deploying a JavaFX Application as an Applet
Java Web Start

Chapter 10. Create RESTful Applications - JavaFX applications make ideal REST clients, and this chapter shows you how and why. There's also a brief explanation of what exactly REST and these other web technologies are.
What Is REST?
JavaScript Object Notation (JSON)
JavaFX and REST
JavaFX and XML

Chapter 11. JavaFX and Java Technology - Shows you how to incorporate Java classes into JavaFX script along with the rules for doing this.
Classes
Java Objects
Function Parameter and Return Mapping
Java Scripting
JavaFX Reflection

Chapter 12. JavaFX Code Recipes - Contains a few code recipes that might help you develop others for your own applications. Examples always help like nothing else.
JavaFX and JavaBeans
Server Call Back
Node Effects--Fader and Magnifier
Wizard Framework
Progress Bar
Slider
Matrix

Chapter 13. Sudoku Application - The game of Sudoku is written in JavaFX. If you're not familiar with the game, that is explained too.
How to Access the JavaFX Sudoku Application
The Interface
Source for the Sudoku Application
The Overall Design
Interfacing with Java Components

This is the first book that really whetted my appetite for JavaFX. The others were so busy trying to shove Netbeans down my throat that I lost interest not far into the read. This book shows you the Netbeans approach, but also recognizes that some of us aren't interested in Netbeans and doesn't try to drop you into the middle of - IMHO - that entangled mess of a technology. I found this book quite approachable and helpful, and most of all, direct, particularly with all of the examples. Highly recommended.

Original review by Pasquale Granato, JUG Lugano [...]

Approaching a book about a brand new technology can be dangerously misleading because you can end up to write about the latter instead to focus on the former. On the other side it's really hard to separate the two things but I swear that I'll do my best.

Let's start talking about the book intended audience. The authors target the book to Java developers and to graphic designers as well. Probably people without a specific programming background will have some serious difficulties to follow many of the topics covered in the book. Speaking as a Java programmer I'd have appreciated more explanations where needed on the differences between Java and JavaFX script.

(Personal annotation. I looked astonished for five minutes at this

var num = if(sizeof args > 0) {
java.lang.Integer.valueOf(args[0]);
} else {
10;
}

before be acquainted with it. The JavaFX Script programming language is indeed an expression language, which means that everything, including loops, conditionals and even blocks, are expressions and can return a value.)

The first two chapters of the book are devoted to set up the environments for both the programmers and the graphic designers. In a few pages it really makes clear how to get started using NetBeans or Eclipse (for programmers) and Photoshop or Illustrator (for graphic designers). Just to reassure you: yes, "Hello, world!" is the very first example of the book.

In chapters three and four authors introduce the core of the JavaFX scripting language. Topics like sequences, expressions, binding and triggers are clearly covered with many short examples.

After this boring but necessary stuff the fireworks begin. From the chapter five to eight the power of JavaFX is unleashed: the creation of cool and appealing user interfaces.
The theater metaphor within the JavaFX user interface framework is really well covered. The reader will learn about the Stage, the Scene and the Nodes and how they combine as basic elements to make complex user interfaces. Special effects and animations are topics exceptionally well enlightened with clear descriptions, many examples, pictures and graphs.
In comparison, the multimedia topic is covered extremely concisely. This is due to the fact that putting images and video in a JavaFX project is really simple.

The publication of JavaFX project is an important topic covered in good detail in the chapter nine. The use of applet and Java Web Start as a way of publication is explained with many hints and with a cool paragraph about the integration between JavaFX and JavaScript. Unfortunately no attention is paid to other publication methods like mobile or television profile.

An advanced topic, namely the creation of RESTful applications, is covered in chapter ten which presents an example widget that shows current weather conditions using data received form external web services.

Java programmers will then be grateful for the chapter eleven, which covers in deep detail the integration between JavaFX and Java, with many tables about function parameter and return mapping and about type conversion mapping.

A special mention should be deserved for the contents of the chapter twelve, JavaFX Code Recipes. In this chapter the authors present many code samples that will help the reader in several real world situation. For a new technology like JavaFX the value of being taught by the creators comes out in this advices that surely help to understand the language and to avoid the traps.

In the last chapter of the book a complete Sudoku application is presented. This is an invaluable reference because all the range of topics are dissected, starting from the concept and the design, to the logic, to the interface. Many excerpts of code are analyzed with several useful considerations.

The book has been written before the specification JavaFX 1.2 was finalized. So in many parts of the book the authors complain the absence of definitive example and send the reader to the web site in which they'll publish as soon as finished new chapters on 1.2 and revised examples. As this review has been written, those chapters have not yet been published on the web site. The examples instead have been updated for 1.2 specifications and can be downloaded for free.

In conclusion, this is a really good book to learn JavaFX. All topics are presented clearly and the overall readability of the book is excellent. It should be used for linear reading only; it hardly will work as a reference. JavaFX experts will do better looking somewhere else. New comers of the technology (with a good background of Java) will probably not find any better.

Jim Clarke, Jim Connors and Eric Bruno's JAVA FX: DEVELOPING RICH INTERNET APPLICATIONS tells how to build Rich Applications that run on the desktop, the web, or mobile devices alike. Using Java FX, developers and graphic designers will find plenty of enabling methods using the Java programming platform. From building JavaFX programs to adding special effects, motion, and blending in pictures and videos from other applications, this is a fine pick for any Java programmer's collection.