On The Mark development update in light of JavaFX 2.0

On The Mark and its sister application, Spreadshift, have been undergoing a developmental transition as we navigate the new waters of JavaFX 2.0. Oracle has been clear and open in its documentation that this new version of JavaFX, the programming platform in which the On The Mark behavioral suite has been written, is largely incompatible with the old version.

The downside is that we'll have to completely rework the original application to continue active development, and the video function no longer appears to work on Windows (it works just fine on the Mac, however). The upside is that the new version of JavaFX offers a ton of new features that should not only bring new functionality to the software, but also make development itself easier to maintain and extend.

As we look ahead to the next stage of development, we're excited for a couple reasons. First, we'll be able to rework the software from the ground up based on feedback on making On The Mark more useful to the scientific community. Second, we can continue to use many of the existing technologies, including the cloud connectivity via Google Docs, with mere refinements in the upcoming versions. Finally, we'll be able to leverage many of the new technologies in JavaFX 2.0 to expand the reach of the suite to new platforms and simply work better on even existing platforms.

Most importantly, this is a time when we can use your feedback the most to impact the direction of the next stage of development. Please let us know your thoughts--we welcome you to our team at any level.