Today was a busy interesting day for lots of my fellow geeks (like you, perhaps) in that I found myself listening to two webcasts at the same time: The Apple iPad announcement, and the Oracle/Sun Strategy announcements. Being a JavaFX developer, I was particularly interested in the extent to which Oracle is going to embrace JavaFX (and how much crow I would have to eat from my April 21, 2009 What, Me Worry post).
In the live Oracle/Sun Strategy webcast, I heard encouraging statements like:
- We will invest heavily in JavaFX
- Significant investment will be made in JavaFX; focus on designers; fusion of DHTML, JavaScript, Java, JavaFX
In the Java-specific Oracle/Sun Strategy webcast, Jeet Kaul (VP of Java Development shown in the screen shot above), made statements such as the following:
- A JDK 7 release will happen in 2010
- The Java runtime environment is currently installed on over 840 million Internet-connected desktop machines worldwide, and the JavaFX functionality has been added to the Java core runtime.
- Oracle will continue investing in Java, including on the desktop, in the enterprise, and on mobile. Glassfish will continue to move forward.
- The core Java ME platform will be optimized to run JavaFX
- The APIs for Java SE and Java ME will be unified.
- Efforts are underway to make Java, JavaFX and JavaScript increasingly interoperable.
- Oracle is committed to JavaFX proliferation on TV and mobile platforms. JavaFX will complement the work that Oracle has done with ADF and ADF Mobile.
- Oracle will expand partnerships with vendors in the area of embedded Java devices, Java Card, etc.
During the webcast, it was announced that JavaOne will now be co-located with OracleWorld, and will occur in San Francisco on Sep. 19-23, 2010. JavaOne will also be held in Brazil, Russia, India and China later in 2010.
I am even more convinced by today's events that JavaFX will continue to move forward and be chosen with increasing frequency as the rich internet application (RIA) platform for new applications. There are at least three big challenges for JavaFX that need to be overcome, so I trust that Oracle's resources will be focused quickly on these challenges:
- Deployment speed and reliability, especially in the browser. In my experience, deploying JavaFX applications via Java Web Start has been deterministic and relatively fast. Deploying in the browser has been slow, unpredictable, and frustrating for the user and developer. Browser deployment is always compared to Flash/Flex, which is way ahead of the game in this regard (except on the iPad announced today, which has some folks *really* peeved). But I digress...
- A full complement of JavaFX UI components. I know that more are coming soon, and that great care is being taken to create the right UI components for today's varying application-styles and platforms. However, I think that this needs to happen at a faster pace, and I'm hopeful that the Oracle/Sun strategy will make this happen.
- Availability on mobile devices. It is my understanding that JavaFX is supported on Windows Mobile devices, but for JavaFX to really be on "all the screens of my life", it needs to run on a variety of popular smart phones. What I wouldn't give to be able to develop JavaFX applications for my Android, for example :-)
I am looking forward to seeing Java continue to be open and embraced by the thriving Java community. I'm also excited about the prospect of JavaFX continuing to flourish and being the platform of choice for rich internet applications.
What, me worry?
Jim Weaver
