Welcome to JavaFX: A Beginner’s Guide. This book has been designed to give you
the best first step into the exciting new frontier of JavaFX development. JavaFX
is a rich environment tool, and learning JavaFX is a must for anyone who wants to create
immersive, interactive environments for users of any background.
This book takes you through JavaFX in a logical manner. It begins by explaining the
technology behind JavaFX. You will quickly move into installing the JavaFX development
environment and tools. Although multiple development environments are available for
JavaFX, the focus of this book is on teaching you the basics of NetBeans. NetBeans offers
a rich, full-featured product that is easy to learn and will get you up and running in JavaFX
in no time.
Most chapters also include a “Try This” section to help you practice what you have
learned. The “Try This” sections are structured like a textbook in that you will be presented
with tasks to complete on your own. In addition, each chapter has a “Self Test” section
that provides ten quiz-style questions to further enhance your learning experience. Taking
full advantage of the chapter questions and “Try This” exercises will give you a chance to
refine your newly acquired skills and create your own applications.
Although this book is not an advanced programmer’s reference, you should possess
certain skills to get the most from JavaFX: A Beginner’s Guide. Foremost of these is Java
programming fundamentals. Knowledge of Java classes and basic types will help you
understand some of the concepts in this book more easily. Although JavaFX environments are
written primarily in JavaFX Script, you can enhance the functionality of these environments
using Java.