Welcome to JavaDesktop

Welcome to JavaDesktop, a gathering place for members of the Java™ platform's graphical user interface (GUI) community. Here you'll find news, discussions, technical articles, and open source projects that use the Java Platform, Standard Edition (Java SE™) APIs to produce applications with rich client interfaces. (If you're looking for information on the Sun Java Desktop System, you can find it at sun.com.)

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We want to hear from you! Please feel to contact us with comments, suggestions, product announcements, pretty much anything you have on your mind related to Java on the desktop:
       

   (currently:

Dieter Krachtus is running a poll asking what you'd like to see in the Consumer JRE Release. Please Vote!

Features

Shannon Hickey: Beans Binding 0.6 Release Available

In this release:

• Improved JTable support
• More default converters
• Name your Bindings
• Compile-time type safety for setting Parameters
• A handful of method renames

(Jun 21, 2007)

Kirill Grouchnikov: Support for SwingX components - part II

This is the second part in the ongoing series of providing support for SwingX components in Substance look and feel. The first part showed the support for JXTaskPaneContainer and JXTaskPane, and this part will show the support for JXStatusBar. (Jun 21, 2007)

Kirill Grouchnikov: Support for SwingX components - part I

The first part in this series will showcase the support for JXTaskPaneContainer and JXTaskPane. The test application itself can be found in the CVS repository of Substance SwingX plugin, and here are a few screenshots of this application under different Substance skins. (Jun 20, 2007)

John O'Conner: Managing resources in the Swing Application Framework (JSR 296)

Instead of loading and working with ResourceBundle files directly, you will use the ResourceManager and ResourceMap framework classes to manage resources. A ResourceMap contains the resources defined in a specific ResourceBundle implementation. A map also contains links to its parent... —  John O'Conner
  (Jun 20, 2007)

Kirill Grouchnikov: Substance module will not be supported in NetBeans 6.0

Substance module for NetBeans will not be supported in NetBeans 6.0. —  Kirill Grouchnikov
  (Jun 20, 2007)

David Gilbert has released JFreeChart 1.0.6.

David Gilbert has released JFreeChart 1.0.6. This release adds vector plots, faster time series charts, mouse-click support for legends, and it fixes bugs. JFreeChart is free software under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public Licence (LGPL), and requires Java version 1.3.1 or later. (Jun 20, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: Learning JavaFX : Four Examples - Images & Mouse Events

This weekend I started spending some time with JavaFX. I decided to take notes and track my learning curve. Here are for beginner's examples on how to manipulate images and catch events. More... (Jun 19, 2007)

Romain Guy: Source Code and Demos for Chapter 4 (Images)

I just uploaded the source code for the demos of the fourth chapter of our book. The source code of the demos are available in the CVS repository. Chapter 4 focuses on images and contains explanations on how to resize images efficiently. (Jun 19, 2007)

Sergey Groznyh: Removing elements from Swing HTMLDocument

this entry explains how to remove elements from the Swing HTML document. —  Sergey Groznyh
  (Jun 18, 2007)

Elie Levy: Fancy JTable Animations, or should I say "Extreme"

If you went to the Extreme Makeovers JavaOne presentation, you probably enjoyed as much as I did the fancy table sorting animations that were presented. I got impatient waiting for them to release their code, and went to write my own. —  Elie Levy
  (Jun 15, 2007)

Joshua Marinacci: A Response to GUI Building: tool vs hand coded

The debate of hand coding your GUI screens versus using a tool has come up again. I suspect that Stuart wasn't expecting quite the volume response that he got. For some of you this is old hat and I suspect...

(Jun 14, 2007)

ChetCast: Interview Posted

ITConversations has posted a podcast interview with me about all things Desktop. (Jun 13, 2007)

David Herron: Java on OS X, it's not dead...

In the I'm not dead yet category we have Java on Mac OS X Leopard to be 64-bit, resolution independent talking about Java sessions at WWDC. He says the WWDC program guide has statements about the Java that's to be... —  David Herron
  (Jun 13, 2007)

Stuart Clements: Layout Management: Use an IDE or Code by Hand?

Have you seen this cool video about the frustrations of coding a GridBag layout manager? We on the Swing tutorial team think this is a pretty accurate portrayal of how frustrating hand-coding a GUI can be, which is why in the latest update of the Swing trails we've decide to encourage the use of NetBeans as much as possible, especially where layout management is concerned. So, do you agree with this approach? Have you used NetBeans, or any other IDE, to create GUIs, and if so, what do you think? For any hand-coding purists out there, what arguments do you make for NOT using an IDE? Please let us know your thoughts! (Jun 13, 2007)

Podcast: Java Posse #126 - Simulcast with Coté from Drunk and Retired

This is an informal chat and analysis recorded at JavaOne with Michael Coté from the DrunkAndRetired.com podcast. (Jun 13, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: JavaFX Morph, NetBeans' Ruby Express and Groovy Macros on OpenOffice

A few bits this morning. First, Ruby developers are seriously hopping on board the NetBeans' Ruby Express train. Second, a few examples of JavaFX Morph and finally a way to write OpenOffice Macros in Groovy. (Jun 12, 2007)

Java 3D to be open sourced under GPL

Kevin Rushforth writes: "We are pleased to announce that the source code for the j3d-core and vecmath projects will be made available under the same open-source license that OpenJDK is now using: GPLv2 plus CLASSPATH exception. This gives software vendors more flexibility is releasing their products. You will be able to choose to use the existing binary SLA license, which will still be available for each fcs release, or you will be able to use the GPLv2 + CLASSPATH license to release your product with a pre-released (daily, alpha, beta) version of Java 3D, or with a version that you modify and build. This will also allow you greater ability to use code that you contribute to Java 3D without having to wait for one of our releases. Unlike the JRL, there is no restriction on its use for commercial purposes" [more]

(Jun 12, 2007)

Romain Guy: Demos for Chapter 3 Available

I just uploaded the source code for the demos of the third chapter of our book. The demos are currently available only on the CVS repository. We'll try to offer zip archives by the time the book is published. In the meantime, you'll have to deal with CVS, which will help you get new demos... (Jun 12, 2007)

John O'Conner: Swing Application Framework: Lifecycle Events

Every application has a lifecycle of events determined by the framework. Override those event methods to define application behavior. —  John O'Conner
  (Jun 12, 2007)

Cay Horstmann: The Single Thread Rule in Swing

I am working on the 8th edition of Core Java, and one of my thoughtful reviewers (Brian Goetz) pointed out that the single threading rule for Swing has been tightened up recently. This blog discusses how code that used to be good is now bad, and it tries to elicit some answers from the experts about that badness. —  Cay Horstmann
  (Jun 12, 2007)

Simon Morris: A Rose By Any Other Name

What's in a name? The term 'Rich Internet Application' is rapidly becoming as meaningless as '.NET' (or indeed 'Java'). In this semi-serious (and occasionally even lucid) blog entry I want to break down the possible meanings to their underlying religions... and then have a jolly good rant. —  Simon Morris
  (Jun 12, 2007)

Java Posse #125 - Newscast for June 7th 2007

• Redhat forking Java? It's a good thing really
• Eclipse 3.3 RC3 (release candidate 3) has been released
• JSF - why hasn't it taken over the world
• Microsoft is just too busy to back up their threats
• More details on a new, small, consumer JRE to compete with Flash
• Google released Google Gears
• Mobile java app of the week - webaroo
• ... and lots more!

(Jun 11, 2007)

Michael Urban: NetBeans 6 Rocks!

After working with NetBeans 6 over the last week, I have to say I am very impressed. This is not simply a minor upgrade, as is so common in IDEs these days even when they are given a new major version number. Quite the contrary, NetBeans 6 is a major new release, and a major improvement over NetBeans 5.5. (Jun 11, 2007)

Podcast: Bunny Hunters & Project Darkstar

In this JavaOne 2007 Community Corner mini-talk, Project Darkstar founder and community leader Jeff Kesselman introduces Bunny Hunters, a demo game written to run on Darkstar. In his talk, he discusses the unique challenges of multiplayer online games, and how to implement the timing, turn-taking, and game-handling logic of an online game with the facilities provided by Darkstar. (Jun 11, 2007)

Scott Hommel: Chat, Anyone?

One of our readers posted a suggestion about including a chat applet (or something similar) into the pages of the The Java Tutorial. We are considering this possibility but would like to know what everyone else thinks. If we enable a live chat, would you use it? (Jun 11, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: OpenJFX Project - Most Popular Project on java.net

The OpenJFX project is taking top honors on java.net - it has become the most visited site in the community. More... (Jun 10, 2007)

Romain Guy: Demos for Filthy Rich Clients (Book + Talk)

Chet and I just started uploading the source code of the demos shown in our book. The source code is available at filthyrichclients.dev.java.net. We will release the source code incrementally until the printed version of the book comes out early August. Right now, you can download the demos of Chapter 2, Swing Rendering Fundamentals... (Jun 08, 2007)

Trolltech Releases Qt Jambi Toolkit for Java

Trolltech has announced the release of their Qt Jambi toolkit for Java, giving a nod of confidence to the future of Java on the desktop. Like the C++ version of Qt, Qt Jambi aims to make developing cross platform desktop applications that look and feel native, very easy and powerful. Qt Jambi makes it easy for Java developers who wish to port Swing applications by allowing you combine Swing top-level windows and Qt Jambi top-level windows. In addition, the Qt Jambi team is looking into the possibility of being able to combine on a widget basis, so that Swing widgets could be children of Qt Jambi widgets, and vice versa.

(Jun 08, 2007)

Andres Almiray: Testing Groovy UIs with FEST

Another announcement of the week is the release of FEST 0.3, a great milestone for Yvonne & Alex. I've exchanged information with them about adding Groovy support to FEST, so I decided to believe in my own words first and take FEST for a spin with Groovy UIs. There are a couple of articles out there that show how to use FEST (previously know as TestNG-Abbot), I picked the examples shown at Andy's In pursuit of code quality: Automate GUI testing with TestNG-Abbot, following the spirit of TDD, I started with the test and later moved to the real code. (Jun 08, 2007)

Andres Almiray: Fusing with Groovy II

This is a follow up of Fusing with Groovy. After a couple of tries to get a custom UI component annotated with Fuse coded in Groovy to work, I decided to talk to the pillow and let the issue aside. The next morning I noticed I was always running the tests with the Groovy interpreter (from 1.1-BETA-1 of course) and decided to try again, but with the Java interpreter instead. Lo and behold , it worked! (Jun 08, 2007)

Mark Reinhold: OpenJDK Community Cosmology

Every community needs a creation myth. Here’s ours.

(Jun 08, 2007)

Jan Erik Paulsen: Introducing Colorspace

Colorspace is a mashup (that is what the kids call it nowadays) of the Substance LAF initialization code, the Xoetrope color wheel, the Quaqua color picker and Teppefall Darkstar.

(Jun 08, 2007)

Kirill Grouchnikov: Java 6, Mac OS and Substance

So, what is missing in the last dev build of Apple VM 6.0 that is available? —  Kirill Grouchnikov
  (Jun 08, 2007)

John O'Conner: Swing Application Framework Architecture

The first of a brief series, this post summarizes the Swing Application Framework. —  John O'Conner
  (Jun 07, 2007)

Andres Almiray: Fusing with Groovy

Recently Daniel Spiewak announced the availability of Fuse 0.4, having worked on a custom solution for resource injection I decided to give Fuse a look, as I remembered that it was used in a little app that astonished everyone at last year's JavaOne, I'm talking of course about Aerith. (Jun 07, 2007)

Evan Summers: Chronicles of the Trough: Sneak Preview

Here is a sneak preview of a trivial feed reader app using the Java6 SystemTray. It checks a few preconfigured (Java) feeds every 10 minutes, popping up a message when a new article is spotted. The feedtray app itself is small (18k using pack200), but depends on ROME and AppFramework and their dependencies ie. jDOM and SwingWorker, so the total packed size is around 250k, and unpacked, well... much more!

(Jun 07, 2007)

Jeff Martin: Key Frame Animation in JFXBuilder/JavaFX

In the last week we've been adding animation support to JFXBuilder. Fortunately, JFXBuilder�s existing key frame animation model matches well with JavaFX - in particular, using the JavaFX �dur� statement....

(Jun 06, 2007)

Scott Hommel: Knowing the Audience

So my latest assignment is to update the custom painting section of the Swing tutorial. The version that's currently online is really a combination of two separate topics: custom painting, and guidelines for creating custom components. A while back I had posted a proposed outline to this blog about how to update that lesson. It sparked some discussion between myself and the Swing engineering team, resulting in a decision to break the material up even more into two separate lessons... (Jun 06, 2007)

Jasper Potts: Nimbus L&F; Update

So it has been a while since I blogged about Nimbus, Java One has come and gone and I am sure you are all wondering whats happening to it. Well things have changed for Nimbus since it was announced at Desktop Matters conference in March. The initial plan was for Nimbus to be a open source project jointly run by Ben Galbraith and myself. In early prototype I hacked together thats available from nimbus.dev.java.net was very well accepted both inside Sun and in the swing community. As a result a decision was made to bring the Nimbus L&F; into the JDK as part of the new Consumer JRE. (Jun 06, 2007)

John O'Conner: POJOs on the Desktop with the Java Persistence API

Reading the persistence portion of the EJB 3.0 specification, the best thing I discovered was that I could use plain ol' Java objects -- POJOs -- for both my application logic and persistence needs on the desktop. —  John O'Conner
  (Jun 05, 2007)

Romain Guy: Resource Injection with Fuse 0.4

Daniel Spiewak, editor for the EclipseZone, and I released Fuse 0.4 this weekend. Fuse is a resource injection library mainly thought for GUI programming. I presented Fuse several times in this blog already. The two major features in Fuse 0.4, at least to me, are the resource caching to improve performance and the auto injection facilities. [...] (Jun 04, 2007)

Chet Haase: Existence Proof

We're half-way through editing the "proof" pages. That must mean the book is nearly done, right? Please? (May 31, 2007)

John O'Conner: The Swing Application (Un)Framework

The Swing Application Framework (JSR 296) is hardly a framework at all, not in the typical sense anyway. The framework is probably the lightest, easiest to use one I've ever experienced. —  John O'Conner
  (Jun 04, 2007)

Kirill Grouchnikov: Removing functionality from a stable API

I'm considering removing a few pieces of functionality that have been in my library for a while. Read inside on the reasons why. —  Kirill Grouchnikov
  (Jun 02, 2007)

Chris Oliver: New JavaFX Script Build Posted To OpenJFX

We just posted a new build of JFX which contains the following fixes and features:

UI

1. Shape Morphing
2. JavaFXPad to search for dependent classes
3. Mouse Wheel support in Canvas
4. Baseline alignment of Text

Interpreter

1. Bind is now only allowed in initialization contexts
2. Fixed array assignment problem reported on openjfx forum
3. Fixed bug with while condition of dur expression reported on
   openjfx user list

JSR 223

1. Fixed problems reported on openjfx user list
   

(May 31, 2007)

David Shay: Minimal HTML from a JTextPane

If you want to edit formatted text and get an HTML output, the classes to use in Java are either JEditorPane or JTextPane, the second one being a subclass from the first one. However, when you call the getText() method to get the HTML output, you get the following... (May 31, 2007)

Extreme GUI Makeover 2007

"one of the most enjoyable session in all of JavaOne"... (May 31, 2007)

Apple has posts a QuickTime for Java Security Update

An implementation issue exists in QuickTime for Java, which may allow instantiation or manipulation of objects outside the bounds of the allocated heap. By enticing a user to visit a web page containing a maliciously crafted Java applet, an attacker can trigger the issue which may lead to arbitrary code execution. This update addresses the issue by performing additional validation of Java applets. (May 31, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: JavaOne 2007 : Extreme Swing (video of Iris, video from Makeover)

I missed alot at JavaOne because I was in the Hands-on-Labs. So I am going back and trying to see the tons of Swing stuff in keynotes and demos. Swing is back and hot. Check out the 2 videos - Iris in the keynote and Extreme Makeover session. (May 31, 2007)

Java Posse #124 - Interviews on Java FX Mobile and OpenJDK

Interviews on Java FX Mobile and OpenJDK Fully formatted shownotes can always be found at http://javaposse.com This is a pair of interviews we conducted at Java one. The first is with Jacob Lehrbaum and John Mulner about Java FX mobile (the new Java on L (May 30, 2007)

Julian Doherty: Java 6 on Mac OS X - When?

Developing Java apps on Mac OS X is pretty nice in general: The tools are as good, if not better than other platforms (having a proper command line beats Windows any day); compiling and execution runs fast enough; and the hardware and the OS itself is a pleasure to use. (May 31, 2007)

IBM Developerworks: Test GUI accessibility the Eclipse RAVEN way

The IBM Rule-based Accessibility Validation Environment (RAVEN) is an Eclipse plug-in that provides runtime checking of GUI components to ensure consistent use of Java� accessibility features. This article reviews the RAVEN tool and provides examples of its use in validating a Java Swing application. (May 30, 2007)

Simple java ftp upload and resize pics droplet & applet

I've created a "droplet" that uploads and resizes pictures and folders with FTP. Why? Since I was looking for a simple and opensource "droplet" application, and I hadn't found one.

The requisites where simple:

• upload files of some Mbs
• resize large pictures to speed upload
• SIMPLE: use drag&drop;
• upload folders too

(May 30, 2007)

Binding Java classes to JavaFX elements - Part II

As the discussion over JavaFX grows both in the forums and wiki I start to get a better sense of what binding requires from the Java objects. The problem with the simple case (of getters and setters) is not much different than the Java/Swing binding problem. That problem was solved by creating the JavaBeans standard, which in turn was so complex to implement that people started forgetting what it was and regarded it as a standard for properties alone, which is obviously not true. (May 30, 2007)

Synthetica: How to create a Firefox JTabbedPane!

Sometimes its necessary to customize your Look and Feel or to add an additional style for special components. Synth based Look and Feels like Synthetica have the ability to bind a different style/look to a named component. Unfortunately Synth doesn't completely provide this feature for a JTabbedPane. Anyway - Synthetica supports customization for JTabbedPanes through 'named default properties' and some internal enhancements. (May 30, 2007)

Chris Duckett: JavaFX sends Sun back to the future? (Interview with Bob Brewin)

Can Java�s new eye candy engine -- JavaFX -- be the tonic to revive Java�s flagging fortunes client-side? Sun's chief technology officer for software, Bob Brewin, certainly thinks so as he discusses the issues facing Sun with JavaFX, will it put Java back on the desktop and if the GPL licensing of Java warrants a re-license for CDDL projects. BuilderAU caught up with Brewin at the recent JavaOne conference. (May 30, 2007)

Synthetica SkyMetallic Look and Feel

The 'SkyMetallic Look and Feel' can not be used standalone (without Synthetica) and is distributed under a commercial license. For licensees of Synthetica the 'SkyMetallic Look and Feel' is completely free. Distribution with non-commercial applications is not allowed!

(May 30, 2007)

Anthony Scotney: Browser Wars and Swing on the Desktop

The WebRenderer Swing Edition changes the face of Java Swing applications and the rendering of Web content within Java (May 30, 2007)

Marco Slot: Arithmetic Layout Manager

ArithmeticLayoutManager is a layout manager which can be used to specify the bounds of a component as a series of mathematical expressions which are re-evaluated every time the parent is resized. The expressions can consist of simple calculations and references to fields of the parent component, the component itself and other named components within the same parent. Through this simple scheme it can solve most problems GUI programmers are faced with without having to learn an intricate interface. (May 30, 2007)

The Java Tutorial Blog: Swing, Web 2.0 and JavaFX

I've been helping to document Swing classes for about six months now. I'm delighted to see that Swing today is much more flexible and powerful than it was three years ago; the last time I wrote a Swing application... (May 30, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: NetBeans Visual Library : Huge Features With Ease-of-Use (Screencast)

Wow. I didn't see it until today and the new 18 minute screencast highlights how far and how advanced the NetBeans Visual Library has come. Huge features are provided with ease-of-use. Very nice tutorials. More... (May 30, 2007)

Romain Guy: The Book Exists, I've Seen It (Almost)

We're late, we're late! And yet we are still working on Filthy Rich Clients, the book based on the presentation based on the draft of the book based on the presentation based on a previous presentation. And there's a proof below, the first page of the book, as it will probably look like when printed. (May 30, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: Good Reading : Java 3D, JOGL and more.

If you are interested in 3D and Java - there are some nice chapters and code from Pro Java 6 3D Game Development - Java 3D, JOGL, JInput and JOAL API available. (May 30, 2007)

Java Posse #123 - Interviews with Robert Brewin, Greg Bollella and Dave Hofert

This is a combination of two interviews conducted at the 2007 JavaOne conference. The first is with Bob Brewin - CTO of Sun Software (the bit that covers Java), and the second is with Dave Hofert and Greg Bollella, a fairly technical discussion about the Java Real Time System 2.0 and real time garbage collection. (May 29, 2007)

Jan Erik Paulsen: on Java FX

There has been a lot of broo-ha about Sun's new Java FX platform. Personally I see Java FX as an attempt to move forward on the mobile platform and to replace Java ME with a more powerful Java SE stack, but a lot of people see this as a Flash/Flex/WPF competitor and therefore po-po it as such. Maybe the people at Sun didn't get or read the memo. Or maybe the memo raised an ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException when reading it backwards. Who knows... (May 29, 2007)

EFrontEnd 1.0 (File uploader queue for the jClientUpload applet)

EFrontEnd allows adding files/folders to a queue before uploading with jClientUpload Applet. It supports drag & drop, paste from clipboard, file chooser, pop-ups to manage selection, tooltip and sortable columns. The UI can be customized (time remaining, transfer speed, colors, buttons, alignment, columns, messages).

(May 29, 2007)

Chris Oliver: A Real DryerFox

When I ran across this Apollo example it occurred to me that I could pretty easily create a close Java equivalent of Apollo by combining JavaFX with WebRenderer...

(May 29, 2007)

Matthew Schmidt : JMonkeyEngine: Bringing 3D Java to the Masses?

Lately, one 3D engine written in Java has been getting a lot of exposure. With slick graphics and tons of features, it's actually starting to be used in several games. That engine is JMonkeyEngine (JME)... (May 29, 2007)

Charles Ditzel: JavaFX PDF Viewer

I forgot all about this and I shouldn't have - at Chris Oliver's talk on JavaFX Script at JavaOne he showed a very elegant application for viewing PDF files. The way he showed it was quite interesting, he went through a number of slides and then showed a demo of the Swing PDF version - then everyone expected him to show the JavaFX Script version and he surprised everyone by pointing out that the elegant app he was using for his presentation was the JavaFX PDF viewer... (May 29, 2007)

Ethan Nicholas Walks the Walk

Ethan Nicholas and the Consumer JRE team are not just talking, but delivering. —  David Van Couvering
  (May 25, 2007)

Chet Haase: Media Frenzy

Chet discusses plans for making Java a player in the media space.

(May 24, 2007)

Ethan Nicholas: Java Kernel Unmasked

A complete overview of what Java Kernel is, how it works, and what sort of results you can expect to see. —  Ethan Nicholas
  (May 24, 2007)

From the "Well that didn't take very long" Department: Introducing JFXBuilder

Key Features:

• JFX Page Layout
• Drag and Drop Components
• Don't expect much yet...
• Draw boxes, lines, polygons, text
• Drag and drop a Button, Text, Slider
• Then just hit "Preview JFX"!

(May 24, 2007)

Applet of the Day: Big Faceless Organization's Java PDF Viewer

The BFO PDF Viewer is a Swing component that can display PDF documents and offers many advanced features like form completion, bookmarks, thumbnails, the ability to print PDFs and more. It's easily customized or extended and can be embedded in a Java application, run as a standalone application or as an applet - which we're demonstrating here.

(May 24, 2007)

Simon Morris: Making JavaFX Sing

The goal was simple: develop from scratch a JavaFX based MP3 player. Along the way learn something of this much hyped technology. Is it really the future of the RIA? Can it really compete with Adobe and Microsoft?

 —  Simon Morris
  (May 23, 2007)

JavaOne Desktop slides are available for download

... as are all the tracks from JavaOne, in the form of downloadable PDF files. Audio (and video!) for some of the sessions will also be available soon. (May 24, 2007)

A perspective on Apollo vs Silverlight vs JavaFX vs Flash/Flex

In the last few weeks, quite a few RIA framework announcements and/or rebrandings were announced... (May 24, 2007)

Screencast: Running your first JavaFX program in Eclipse

You can get you first JavaFX program up and running in Eclipse SDK easily. Just follow these steps... (May 24, 2007)

Nelson King: Sun JavaFX: And Now We Have Three

Something about Sun JavaFX in a moment, but first a short preliminary expectoration: Rich Internet Applications (RIA) matter. [...] We have three major players in the running. At the last JavaOne conference in the beginning of May, Sun officially announced an alpha version of JavaFX Script and a future family of JavaFX products. Most of the hype surrounding the announcement immediately put JavaFX in the context of competition with Microsoft Silverlight and Adobe Flash/Flex... (May 23, 2007)

Daniel Schneller: Linux EventQueue Problem

As a part of an ongoing project I had to write a little on-screen keyboard. It is a very simple thing: Just a panel consisting of a series of JButtons that - when clicked - insert KeyEvents into the EventQueue to enable any Swing text component to be used... (May 23, 2007)

Swing Sourcery: Swing vs. Groovy

Stumbled upon a simple example demonstrating the use of GroovyJ with GUI building. Agile Developer Venkat. The swing version there seemed to have some artificial (accidental?) lines and it really didn't do it justice. Here's my take on the subject... (May 23, 2007)

PCMag.com's Site of the Week: Meez

Three-dimensional avatars seem to be coming of age. Meez.com, a site that lets you create a 3D animated representation of yourself for the Web, recently celebrated the creation of the millionth Meez avatar. No surprise - the site is fun and easy to use. Anyone with a browser running a rela-tively new version of Java can create a Meez (your avatar) in short order. After picking a gender, you customize a generic Meez by selecting from a huge collection of stuff that's sorted according to categories such as piercings (yes, piercings), accessories, animations (which give your Meez a set of moves from dance to tai chi), backgrounds, clothing, eye color, hairstyles, head shape, skin tone, and tattoos.

(May 23, 2007)

Fabrizio Giudici: Amazingly good APIs

Paul Buchheit criticized Java imaging APIs as they require "closer to 100 lines of Java" just to do a simple image resizing, that in Python can be done in three lines... —  Fabrizio Giudici
  (May 22, 2007)