What Scene Builder needs YESTERDAY!

[Jeff Martin]

I actually have a bit of this in SnapCode - you can draw and configure arbitrary shapes with fills and effects, bring up the animation inspector and set the time slider to a new time and reconfigure attributes for that new key-frame (such as size, location, rotation, scale, skew, color), then save and launch to see the animation.

Here is a quick demo: SnapCode JavaFX Animation

If you create a snap “WebPage” subclass by the same name, this JavaFX is automatically loaded into it and you have programatic access and control over it. I also have support for animation along a path and morphing animation, but that code hasn’t had much love recently. I wish I could get this stuff polished up and out to the real world faster, but I’m a little under-resourced. :-)

jeff


On Nov 24, 2014, at 6:37 AM, Tom Eugelink <tbee at tbee.org> wrote:

> Oh, you are right, if the JavaFX team does not need to make choices on where to invest their precious time, then all possible usages could be implemented immediately. Unfortunately they too have to place priorities and then the most likely usage will get implemented first (since most usages already have some existing platform, "alternative" or "replacement" for an that platform comes to mind).
> 
> Apparently it is not animations, personally I'm still hoping 3rd party controls support in SceneBuilder will get higher on the list, but I'm not getting my hopes up. But as Mike pointed out; it is a missing functionality, go build it! ;-)
> 
> Tom
> 
> 
> On 24-11-2014 13:18, Felix Bembrick wrote:
>> JavaFX should not be seen as a "replacement" for anything or an "alternative".  It has characteristics of both Flash and Flex along with Silverlight and especially Qt, (not to mention even HTML5/CSS/JS), but is a separate and distinct product in its own class.
>> 
>> Just because the Flash visual editor may have "got in the way" of your desire to code directly, that doesn't mean that JavaFX should not have such an editor for all the same reasons and use cases that Flash had one.
>> 
>> Sure, for *your* purposes of "decorative effects", I am confident that coding would suffice but for *my* purposes (and anyone who has worked in the animation industry or worked creating visualisations) I really need a visual editor of the ilk I have described.
>> 
>> Why just make one class of user happy but seriously limit the effectiveness of another (and in doing so possibly significantly limit the market of JavaFX)?
>> 
>> I am sure at least one of the developers on the JavaFX team has at one point at least envisaged JavaFX being used for complex animations, visualisations or even non-trivial games.  What they need to do now is make such use cases feasible.
>> 
>> On 24 November 2014 at 22:04, Tom Eugelink <tbee at tbee.org <mailto:tbee at tbee.org>> wrote:
>> 
>>    I have no problems using JavaFX's animations for my purposes, which are decorative effects. I do not need an editor for that, forced me to use it and it probably will even get in my way. Which BTW was the case with the Flash coding that I have done; I hated that Flash EDI, it was way too much focussed on animation. Actually that is why Adobe created Flex, which basically was flash-for-developers (instead of animators). JavaFX is more a alternative for Flex than Flash.
>> 
>>    Tom
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>    On 24-11-2014 11:20, Felix Bembrick wrote:
>>>    Really? My point is, why have such good built-on classes to support the building of everything from simple animations to complex visualisations if it is practically impossible to do so?
>>> 
>>>    On 24 November 2014 at 21:02, Tom Eugelink <tbee at tbee.org <mailto:tbee at tbee.org>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>        I do not think that JavaFX is aiming at replacing flash, HTML and javascript are doing a great job there, hence animations are not equally important as they were for flash.
>>> 
>>>        Tom
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>        On 24-11-2014 10:46, Felix Bembrick wrote:
>>> 
>>>            I am surprised more people have not expressed an opinion on this.  To me,
>>>            it seems absolutely *vital* to the long term (or any term) success of
>>>            JavaFX.
>>> 
>>>            Haven't any of you ever programmed in Flash?  Can you imagine trying to
>>>            create any of those complex (or even the simple) animations and
>>>            visualisations *without* a visual editor and by doing it code alone?  It
>>>            wouldn't have been practical (read possible) and similarly, and with JavaFX
>>>            having even richer features, to do this "by hand".
>>> 
>>>            To me, this is the reason why we haven't seen any great
>>>            animations/visualisations/applications using JavaFX and we probably never
>>>            will until a visual animation editor is available.  Specifying and
>>>            controlling the motion and appearance of numerous complex objects and their
>>>            transitions relying exclusively on code would not be possible for even the
>>>            "gunnest" JFX coder...
>>> 
>>>            On 18 November 2014 at 02:48, Richard Bair <richard.bair at oracle.com <mailto:richard.bair at oracle.com>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>                I’m afraid at this time there are no plans for adding an
>>>                animation/transition effect editor to Scene Builder, certainly not in the
>>>                short-term.
>>> 
>>>                Thanks
>>>                Richard
>>> 
>>>                    On Nov 13, 2014, at 7:34 PM, Felix Bembrick <felix.bembrick at gmail.com <mailto:felix.bembrick at gmail.com>>
>>> 
>>>                wrote:
>>> 
>>>                    Java applets were the first "programs" to run inside a web browser and
>>> 
>>>                for
>>> 
>>>                    a (little) while they were flavour of the month.
>>> 
>>>                    But then along came Flash which had several advantages such as faster
>>> 
>>>                load
>>> 
>>>                    times, consistent loads and antialiased fonts/graphics and soon
>>> 
>>>                completely
>>> 
>>>                    surpassed applets.
>>> 
>>>                    But the MAIN reason why Flash was initially so successful and went on for
>>>                    years and years of domination is that the Flash tools had an
>>>                    Animation/Timeline Editor pretty much from the beginning.  This enabled
>>>                    even a novice to drag images around and draw the path they wanted them to
>>>                    move along, add all sorts of bouncing effects and sounds and the result
>>> 
>>>                was
>>> 
>>>                    the birth of the online greeting card company.
>>> 
>>>                    But Flash soon went on to be so much more.  As the Adobe tools improved,
>>> 
>>>                so
>>> 
>>>                    did the SWFs and soon entire websites were written in Flash.
>>> 
>>>                    Meanwhile, applet programmers had absolutely nothing remotely similar and
>>>                    had to try (and I stress try) to tediously hand code any animations and
>>>                    transitions and effects and I don't think it ever worked.
>>> 
>>>                    Fast forward 15-20 years and now we have JavaFX which doesn't need to run
>>>                    in the browser, has even more features than Flash, uses hardware
>>>                    acceleration for superior performance, has a wide range of built-in
>>>                    animations, transitions and effects but STILL we have to hand code any
>>>                    animation/transitions.
>>> 
>>>                    This is INCREDIBLY inefficient and unless Scene Builder incorporates a
>>>                    powerful, sophisticated animation/transition and effect editor VERY, VERY
>>>                    SOON I fear that the advanced graphics features are never going to be
>>> 
>>>                used
>>> 
>>>                    to their full potential (much to the detriment of JavaFX itself).
>>> 
>>>                    Does anyone know if one is in the pipeline?  I see this as one of the
>>> 
>>>                most
>>> 
>>>                    vital features for the JavaFX ecosystem to achieve more penetration and,
>>>                    eventually, survive.
>>> 
>>>                    Felix
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>> 
>> 
>