Should I learn Swing before learning JavaFx ?

Question

Does it make sense to start learning JavaFx if I do not have any background in UI programming? Is it more advisable to learn Swing first and then move on to JavaFx ?

I tried the getting started tutorial on JavaFx website in Netbeans and the code looked extremely complicated to me. I am wondering if JavaFx is too advanced for a beginnner GUI developer.

Answer 1

I don't think knowing swing will give you much of an upper hand with JavaFX. JavaFX seems more like scripting rather than actual java programming. You can learn JavaFX fine without swing.

Answer 2

Looking at the JavaFX tutorial I would say that:

1. you don't need to know Swing to use JavaFX
2. if you find the JavaFX tutorial hard learning Swing won't be easier

If you have no programming background at all then starting in any language is going to be a challenge. If you know a little programming in a language then it is still going to be a challenge.

My advice is to dive in and work at it. A quick google search (JavaFX Hello World) has a number of hits... I took a quick look at this one and I'd say start with it.

Answer 3

From what I understand the JavaFX libraries do not have that many proper UI components but since JavaFX allows you to use any Swing component it might be useful to know Swing. This will probably be less true and less true as JavaFX matures.

Answer 4

Well, there is at least a fair amount of similarities... a Stage e.g. is the equivalent of a JFrame in Java, a scene is the equivalent to a JPanel... the binding mechanism is similar (well, sort of) to the listener concept in Java...

Oh, and JavaFX shouldn't be too complicated for programmers, as it is primarily targeted to web developers ^^.