Java GUI Libraries

Question

I understand that this question was asked before , but it was in 2008, and everything changed. I tried looking for Swing, but JFC is now deprecated, and I cannot find Swing anywhere else.

I would like to know what are the best modern java graphics libraries.

Answer 1

Looking at the question you're referring to ( Which GUI library is the best in Java? ), The answers there are still relevant.

Short version:

There are two serious contenders for the graphical interface: Swing and SWT .

Swing is more mature (possibly), is part of the standard JDK (no deployment problems), very flexible and well-documented.

SWT makes it easier to behave like a native application on different operating systems (but it also means a much bigger portability problem). It is reported that it also works better in some scenarios (but it depends a lot on what you are doing).

Some other considerations:

I would consider creating a web application when creating a new application these days. In this case, the SWT evaluates the additional point, because it has an Eclipse RAP , which (more or less) allows you to convert the desktop client to the network client, simply recompiling for different libraries, because it uses the same API as the SWT.

In addition, you might consider creating on top of the client environment instead of writing from scratch. In this case, if you use Eclipse as your structure, you will have to use SWT. Or use Netbeans, which is based on Swing ...

Answer 2

SWT is good for me. It provides a natural look using built-in controls when available.

You can optionally use it and JFace in the Eclipse Rich-Client Platform , which provides the foundation for applications built on top of the plug-in community. It has a high learning curve, but provides a mature, powerful structure that you don't need to create.