JavaFX on iOS and Android: The real problem and challenge

[Richard Bair]

Totally, I think the normal process for this is to create a new OpenJDK project, is it not? Can you take a look at the OpenJDK bylaws and report back on the process? I think it would be awesome to do a port. Note that there are a few OpenJDK ports already which have ARM support, you might want to look there as a starting point?

Richard

On Nov 8, 2013, at 1:29 PM, Florian Brunner <fbrunner at gmx.ch> wrote:

> Yes, I agree, we need professional JVM ports for iOS, Android and Windows 8.
> 
> @Oracle: Could you set up the according project sites for these 3 platforms on openjdk.java.net and document what exactly has to be done to port OpenJDK (at least some kind of JavaFX compact profile e.g. without the AWT stack) to these platforms? Also the Mercurial repository and the build should be prepared.
> 
> I think if there were an easy starting point it would lower the barrier to work on these ports.
> 
> -Florian
> 
> Am Donnerstag, 24. Oktober 2013, 08.41:32 schrieb Tobias Bley:
>> Hello to the community,
>> 
>> I read the last discussion about „JavaFX native look and feel“ and have to get out of my mind the following:
>> 
>> In my opinion the MAIN point is not „how to bring the native look and feel to iOS/Android“, the real MAIN issue is: we need a professional JVM(!) which works performant and reliable on iOS, Android and Windows 8! Only if we have such a JVM, developers and companies are motivated to develop real commercial apps with JavaFX and contribute stuff back to OpenJFX!
>> 
>> RoboVM is a good „prototype“. Niklas is currently one of the most important people for the JavaFX community. He and his company has build the first and one and only real solution to deploy Java and JavaFX code to the iOS platform! His work is really great! But: He is only one(!) person! This kind of complex task I would expect from big companies like Oracle, IBM, SAP or Twitter. But from this direction we don’t hear anything about it.
>> 
>> It is not enough that people like Niklas (Trillian AB) or Matthias and me (UltraMixer) are trying to bring JavaFX to iOS and Android. It’s all experimental stuff! Yes, currently we can start JavaFX apps on a real iPhone and iPad. And yes, we have managed to start JavaFX on a real Android device using the Dalvik VM. BUT: this is not a long term solution and only experimental! RoboVM on iOS uses the android class library instead of the real Java = OpenJDK. Our „JavaFX on Android“ solution uses Google Dalvik VM and the Android class library as well! So both solutions use the real Java platform (=OpenJDK)!
>> 
>> In my opinion there are only two solutions: 1) Oracle releases their JVM for iOS and Android. 2) The „community“ starts a new company who develops a professional, performant and reliable solution for „JavaFX on iOS and Android“ which contains of a JVM and the 6 degrees Felix described in his blog post, mainly native integration (API) and look and feel (skins, native controls).
>> 
>> Cheers,
>> Tobi
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Am 23.10.2013 um 22:30 schrieb Richard Bair <richard.bair at oracle.com>:
>> 
>>> Yes, definitely.
>>> 
>>>> On Oct 23, 2013, at 11:52 AM, Scott Palmer <swpalmer at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> This is starting to sound like it may also partially address the issue in the desktop space of supplying a native surface (the heavyweight) to draw in that is part of the scene graph.  It may not be the ideal solution, but could be useful for specific use cases, like a video preview overlay. Would that make any sense?
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Scott
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>>> On Tue, Oct 22, 2013 at 7:59 PM, Richard Bair <richard.bair at oracle.com> wrote:
>>>>> To do this we need to either solve the auto-layer problem in the NG nodes / Glass / Quantum, or we need to ask the app developer to use SubScene and put all the native stuff in a single SubScene, and all lightweight content above and below it. For the short term, we could use the SubScene approach ("Just be careful and don't draw lightweight on top of heavyweights unless you layer an entire sub scene above them") which is probably a perfectly workable solution in the short term. Then somebody just needs to write a set of skins (which can be done in an external project) that map various UI controls directly to native controls. This approach would allow people to have completely native controls while using the FX API, or they can use the lightweight controls (with Modena or with an iOS 7 skin or iOS 6 skin etc).
>>>>> 
>>>>> I'm thinking about how to implement the auto-layer, and I'm not sure of the best approach. It seems like you need to hook into the sync-time to determine which nodes can be batched into the same layer, reusing previous layers where possible. If there is a way to then setup the NG peer side so that it thinks it was setup in sub scenes etc, although it really wasn't, then that would leave prism out of the problem (which makes this an easier thing to pull off). hmmm. SubScene itself has a peer. So what I'm thinking is, suppose I have a package:
>>>>> 
>>>>> com.sun.javafx.ext.ios.controls
>>>>> 
>>>>> and in this package you have all the skins. There is also someplace in here a map of skin -> sub scene peer, indicating which of the nodes is in which sub scene peer ("layer"). Then when the sync takes place, a skin node looks back at siblings etc to determine if it can be placed in the same layer as something before it. If so, then it sets itself as a child on the sub scene as needed. If not, then it creates a new sub scene peer and sets itself on there and then carry on. So then it isn't sync'd to the "real" scene but instead to one of these fake sub scenes that was created.
>>>>> 
>>>>> The idea can be refined, but actually I think this approach might be workable for doing auto-layering.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Richard
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Oct 22, 2013, at 4:10 PM, Felix Bembrick <felix.bembrick at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>>> Yes, having viable implementations of both options would be ideal.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> How long till Oracle and/or the community gets to that point? ;-)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On 23 October 2013 10:06, Stephen F Northover
>>>>>> <steve.x.northover at oracle.com>wrote:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> Rather than arguing this point, the correct answer is to provide both and
>>>>>>> let the application developer choose.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> Do you guys know how old this argument is?  Hint: It predates Java.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> Steve
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> On 2013-10-22 6:17 PM, Pedro Duque Vieira wrote:
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> Even the most fab skins or CSS is not going to get us away from the need
>>>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>>>> integrate JavaFX controls with true native controls.  As has been pointed
>>>>>>>>> out, there are some native controls on both iOS and Android for which
>>>>>>>>> there
>>>>>>>>> is no JavaFX equivalent and this will always be the case.  Even if
>>>>>>>>> someone
>>>>>>>>> were to develop near identical lightweight controls in JavaFX, they would
>>>>>>>>> need to behave slightly differently on iOS than they do on Android and
>>>>>>>>> vice
>>>>>>>>> versa.
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> I don't think this is exactly this straight forward. Ideally you would
>>>>>>>> want
>>>>>>>> to have this kind of native behavior on every platform. But having this
>>>>>>>> native behavior involves having a different version of your app for each
>>>>>>>> OS
>>>>>>>> you want to deploy in, which might not be what the developers want.
>>>>>>>> Remember JavaFX is a cross platform development kit and the major reason a
>>>>>>>> developer would choose JavaFX over doing native mobile development is that
>>>>>>>> his app can run on a variety of mobile platforms: windows 8, ipad,
>>>>>>>> android,
>>>>>>>> iPhone, etc with the same code base and *MOST* importantly with much less
>>>>>>>> development time than building an app for each platform.
>>>>>>>> For the sake of development time an app that doesn't go against any of the
>>>>>>>> different platforms UX but that has the least common denominator so that
>>>>>>>> each user in each different platform understands the UI might be a better
>>>>>>>> solution for the sake of development time. One such example is the back
>>>>>>>> button that appears when you drill down a list on an ios app but doesn't
>>>>>>>> appear in an android app because every android phone as a physical back
>>>>>>>> button.
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> I do agree with you that there are some places where a native looking
>>>>>>>> control is ideal and doesn't involve any extra effort from the developer
>>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>>> customize it for the given platform like for instance comboboxs where a
>>>>>>>> kind of wheel appears where the user can choose an option, or input
>>>>>>>> controls where the native keyboard pops up.
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> Thanks, best regards,
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> 
>>>> 
>> 
>