Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

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asimes

Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

in General Discussion • Other • 11 months ago

I started school this semester and am working in Java and C++, both of which are completely new to me. I had used Processing for a while (~4 years) and am accustomed to learning programming visually. In C++ I am using OpenGL to work visually by modifying class projects but do not know where to start for Java.

Does anyone know of a good place to learn how to make a window that can be drawn to like Processing? I have seen examples that create an applet for web but I would prefer to find something that could run in a terminal (if that is possible).

Replies(8)

Jesse Sco..

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

You want to draw to a terminal screen ?!?

Like Ascii art ?

Or are you asking about how to set up a graphics context/buffer in 'vanilla' Java ?

You could try looking at the source to see how Processing does it...

Otherwise, there's this language comparison on the Wiki...

(sorry if I am misunderstanding your question... )

asimes

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

Wow, that's long. I'll try to read through it at some point.

What I meant was creating a window. All of my non-Processing Java experience has been compiled and run in terminal but it was non-visual. I assumed that if C++ and OpenGL could make a window (not drawing in the terminal) then there is probably a way to do it in Java.

EDIT: What exactly is 'vanilla' Java?

Jesse Sco..

Re: Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

EDIT: What exactly is 'vanilla' Java?

I mean just plain 'ol Java... (sorry, the Pure Data community uses that term a lot vis-a-vis 'extended' (meaning replete with libraries), so I tend to use it for other programming languages... )

Jesse Sco..

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

I'm not an expert in traditional Java by any means, but I think that Swing and AWT are the main graphics frameworks you would use... there's bound to be hundreds of tutorials out there...

PhiLho

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

Also look at the Using Processing with Eclipse tutorial in the Learning section of the site, it can be an intermediate step.
Some people successfully integrated Processing in a Swing application, so it can be done.

Jo Wood

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

Assuming you want to be able to draw to Java applications instead of using Processing, rather than combining with Processing...

Personally, I would not use Swing (quite old now) or AWT (very old now), but go for JavaFX. This is now distributed with most Java builds and is a much cleaner and more modern graphical library. It uses the 'scene-graph' model which becomes especially powerful when building more complex graphical applications.

For an example of simple drawing to a Canvas, see this tutorial page. For a more general introduction to JavaFX, see the JavaFX pages from Oracle.

Personally though I find Processing much more powerful a graphics development environment than Java, despite having a long history of Java programming. If it is just standard user-interface widgets you want to be able to use (menus, buttons, drop-down lists etc.), Java may be the better alternative.

asimes

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

PhiLho, I'm trying to see how to use a minimal amount of code to create a window mostly to see how to do it. I may look into that over winter break though.

Jo Wood, that looks pretty good. Would I have direct control over pixels (something like get(x, y) and set(x, y, color))?

PhiLho

Re: Transitioning from Processing to plain Java

11 months ago

In JavaFX 1, you had not such pixel-level control, despite being often asked by coders (but there was tricks to do it).
I never had time to check JavaFX 2, so I can't tell for sure. But globally, it aims at being a higher level graphics library, more like Flash than like Processing: it is about GUI, moving stuffs in a scenegraph and such.

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