Chapter 6 ■ Setting Up YoUr Java 9 iDe: an introDUCtion to netBeanS 9
Therefore, during the latter part of this chapter, you will be learning how to create your Java 9 and
JavaFX 9 project using NetBeans 9. This is so that you can start making solid progress toward and making
your Pro Java 9 Games Development a reality by creating a real-world i3D board game, which you will be
developing during the course of this book.
New NetBeans 9 Features: Java 9 Module Integration
NetBeans 9 is the next major revision of the software after the stable edition 8.2 and now features integration
of the Java 9 Module System, Java 9 Runtime Edition (JRE), and JUnit Java Testing Suite, so these do not have
to be downloaded separately. If you’re downloading NetBeans 9 for HTML5+CSS+JS, PHP, or C++, you no
longer have to download the JDK or JRE. This can be seen on the NetBeans IDE Download Bundles page,
shown in Figure 6-1, and is the reason why there are 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) precompiled NetBeans 9
versions for HTML5/JS, PHP, and C/C++.
That said, if you are using any of the other (Java SE, Java EE, or All) versions, as we are for this book,
the JRE is not included. This is because you’ll be downloading the JDK, as you did in Chapter 1 , to be able
to use these Java SE (or EE, for large corporations) versions, and the JRE is included in the download and
installation process, as you have already seen. NetBeans 9 also includes support for the latest revisions of the
Apache Ant and Maven repositories. I’ll cover some of the new features in NetBeans since version 8.0 came
out more than three years ago in the first quarter of 2014 during the rest of this section of the chapter. I’ll
classify these using subsections to organize them by relevant topic for readers.
Java 9 Support: Modules, Ant, Java Shell, Multirelease
NetBeans 9 will release around the same time as Java 9, so its main objective will be supporting the Java SE
9 release in all of its features and capabilities. This will include the new Java 9 modules feature, which will
improve security and give developers the capability of optimizing the data footprint of their Java 9 game
Figure 6-1. The Java SE Edition NetBeans download bundle contains the NetBeans platform, Java SE, and
JavaFX SDKs