Hi Andy, I think the opaqueness of JavaFX controls is one of the greatest shortcomings of the framework, so I welcome an enhancement.
Some thoughts: 1. It seems that the behavior implementation is still hard-coded into the skin implementation. For example, TextFieldSkin uses TextFieldBehavior; it doesn't seem like I can have a TextFieldSkin that uses my custom behavior. Do you plan on changing that? 2. The InputMap can have a lot of mappings that are set on each individual control. However, in almost all cases, the input mappings are semantically equivalent for all instances of a control. Wouldn't it make sense to associate input mappings with the control class, instead of the control instance? Aside from more closely conveying the semantics of a "default mapping", this should also cut down on the number of object instances we need to keep around. Of course, it should still be possible to override a default mapping with a per-instance mapping. 3. Why are FunctionTags defined on the control class, yet they don't seem to match the functionality offered by the control class? For example, there's TextInputControl.DELETE_NEXT_WORD, but there's no corresponding functionality in TextInputControl. The functionality is actually implemented in TextInputControlBehavior. But if the implementation is only available in this particular behavior, why is the FunctionTag defined on the control class? 4. I'm missing a clear delineation between controls and their behaviors. For example, there's TextInputControl.selectNextWord(), but no TextInputControl.deleteNextWord(). The latter is implemented in TextInputControlBehavior. Why is selectNextWord() implemented in the control, but deleteNextWord() in the behavior? This is just one example of lots of peculiarities. 5. More generally, we should start by clearly defining concepts. Up until now, behaviors were just an implementation detail, so this wasn't necessary. But what is a behavior? What is the relationship between a control, its skin and behavior? How would a control author decide what needs to be put into the control class, and what needs to be put into the behavior class (cf. selectNextWord/deleteNextWord)? On Sat, Sep 30, 2023 at 1:18 AM Andy Goryachev <andy.goryac...@oracle.com> wrote: > > Dear fellow JavaFX developers: > > > > For some time now, we’ve been working to identify missing features in JavaFX > that hinder application development. We’ve been working on adding some of > the missing features (for which we’ll have a separate announcement), but I > feel that engaging wider community is a rather important part of the process. > > > > I would like to share with you one such missing feature - ability to extend > behavior of the existing components (and make the task of creating new > components easier) by adding a public InputMap and BehaviorBase. > > > > Please find the actual proposal here > > https://gist.github.com/andy-goryachev-oracle/294d8e4b3094fe16f8d55f6dd8b21c09 > > > > We are very much interested in your feedback. Thank you in advance. > > > > -andy > >
