Over at The Register I wrote about my recent experiences playing with (whoops, evaluating) JavaFX. (Note this is part 1 of 2 articles). Judging by the comments, and also comments from the folks in the JavaLobby community, the article's being read as "This guy's saying that JavaFX is doomed already."
Yes in a sense, if the project remains on its current course. A pretty major problem is that Flex, already at version 3, is leaps and bounds ahead. But Flex also happens to be more well thought out.
One example that I don't mention in the article is with stylesheets. Whilst trying out JavaFX, I found myself thinking: "It would make so much more sense if these components could be styled using a separate CSS file."
A major complaint with applets, from enterprise players early on, was that applets don't integrate at all well with the web page they're squatting in. If the page's (or site's) stylesheet is modified, you would have to re-code the applet and recompile it to make it match the new style. If it could use the same set of stylesheets (or even just a separate file that roughly matches standard CSS), that would be so much easier.
Of course, Flex works in exactly this way. Its CSS-equivalent almost matches W3C's CSS standard: there are bound to be some differences as you're using it to style different component types etc. But it's close enough, and you can keep the style in a separate file from your deployed SWF.
Why Sun aren't doing this plainly obvious thing with JavaFX is beyond me.
So, is JavaFX doomed already? I hope not. I really do want JavaFX to succeed, and I hope it does, as (from a purely selfish perspective!) I can then proceed to use it on new projects.
In fact there is still time for Sun to rescue JavaFX. Of course, first they have to recognise that it needs rescuing... but judging from the hype around it, they appear to believe that it's already a fait accompli.
Watch out for Part II of the Register article in which I look at the current/emerging tools support for JavaFX. Tools support will likely be the deciding factor in its success or failure.
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