Eclipse meets JavaFX in e(fx)clipse 0.1.0

With Oracle actively pursuing a future for their rich internet application (RIA) platform, JavaFX, it’s interesting to monitor the progress of a expanding supporting cast.

Eclipse’s support for JavaFX 2.2 has received a big boost recently with the release of e(fx)clipse 0.1.0, the Eclipse IDE-flavoured tooling and runtime platform. The previous release came way back in December, and quite a bit has happened since for JavaFX. e(fx)clipse already has a fair amount going for it, with Eclipse JDT, PDE, DSL, CSS and FXML support included. JRE, OSGi and RCP runtimes are all supported.

Key developer of the project Tom Schindl was delighted to reveal the latest release, complete with brand new features and important bug fixes.

From the outset, the biggest change is the dropping of Java FX 2.0, in favour of the newer 2.2, and 2.1 as the minimum entry level. Consequently, this has allowed the array of new JavaFX features to arrive for the Eclipse offshoot, most notably SceneBuilder and the native packaging options.

Advances have been made to FXML and FXGraph, such as the aforementioned Scenebuilder interoperation but also support for fx:root, support for polyline and imageSVG-Element types (meaning some nice looking JavaFX controls) and a new syntax to define static properties. It’s not just the newest intricacies of JavaFX that get an outing but also parts of the Eclipse Juno release train, with a new wizard provided that details how to bootstrap a Java FX application on Eclipse’s brand new platform, e4.

It’s another step towards a full version for this JavaFX rethinking for Eclipse – perhaps this might give it momentum  to see some people picking it up. It is bleeding edge technology though, so expect plenty of bugs along the way. Download here.

Also well worth checking out, if you’re a fan of JavaFX, is the latest and sixth beta of Scenic View 1.1, an application designed to help make it far easier to understand the state of your JavaFX application.