IBM has donated code to form a "Visual Editor Project" to be housed by the Eclipse consortium. This tool is designed to sit on top of both Swing and SWT, abstracting those APIs. Currently Swing is supported, with SWT coming soon, with help from Advanced Systems Concepts, Instantiations, and Red Hat.
This is an interesting step, and could put to rest some of the "Swing vs. SWT" tension between IBM and Sun, and may pave the way for Sun to join Eclipse.
IBM donates code to open-source project
Eclipse boosting open source GUI-building
Press Release: Eclipse Launches Visual Editor Project
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IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse (29 messages)
- Posted by: Dion Almaer
- Posted on: November 19 2003 11:44 EST
Threaded Messages (29)
- Its about time... by Vineet Bhatia on November 19 2003 13:12 EST
- Re: Its about time... (SWT-Designer) by John Vance on November 20 2003 21:28 EST
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Re: Its about time... (SWT-Designer) by John Vance on November 20 2003 09:44 EST
- java gui builder racing.....begin..... by sang koak on November 21 2003 03:39 EST
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Re: Its about time... (SWT-Designer) by John Vance on November 20 2003 09:44 EST
- Re: Its about time... (SWT-Designer) by John Vance on November 20 2003 21:28 EST
- IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by hthjf fgfgfg on November 19 2003 13:39 EST
- re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by Steven Goldsmith on November 19 2003 13:45 EST
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re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by Sandeep Dath on November 19 2003 02:58 EST
- re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by Steven Goldsmith on November 19 2003 04:33 EST
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re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by hthjf fgfgfg on November 19 2003 03:35 EST
- re: OT: driving people out of businesses by Amanjit Singh Gill on November 20 2003 01:26 EST
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re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by Nils Winkler on November 20 2003 07:39 EST
- re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by ac0dr on November 20 2003 08:13 EST
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re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by Sandeep Dath on November 19 2003 02:58 EST
- It's not dumping -- it's called marketing and investing by Mark Wilcox on November 20 2003 02:26 EST
- re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by Steven Goldsmith on November 19 2003 13:45 EST
- This is not an API that sits on top of SWT and Swing. by Dave Johnson on November 19 2003 16:34 EST
- You are correct... I mean "tool" not "API" by Dion Almaer on November 19 2003 16:49 EST
- This is not an API that sits on top of SWT and Swing. by Robert Devi on November 20 2003 00:15 EST
- IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse by han theman on November 20 2003 08:25 EST
- You haven't a clue by Danny Foncke on November 25 2003 15:01 EST
- thanx by daniel cloutier on November 20 2003 09:57 EST
- If it is Visual Age Style .... by Harimohan Bawa on November 20 2003 11:29 EST
- If it is Visual Age Style .... by Mark N on November 20 2003 13:11 EST
- playing catch-up with Netbeans! by Manish Sharan on November 20 2003 11:37 EST
- playing catch-up with Netbeans! by Mark N on November 20 2003 13:16 EST
- Limitations of NetBeans by MICHAEL SPOONAUER on November 20 2003 14:53 EST
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Nope by John Vance on November 20 2003 09:23 EST
- Re: Nope by MICHAEL SPOONAUER on November 21 2003 10:34 EST
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Nope by John Vance on November 20 2003 09:23 EST
- great! by Gavin King on November 20 2003 21:07 EST
- Welcome news by Ken Krebs on November 22 2003 13:39 EST
- This news really does not matter. by Swapnonil Mukherjee on November 22 2003 14:35 EST
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Its about time...[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Vineet Bhatia
- Posted on: November 19 2003 13:12 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
A good quality and responsive UI designer is needed for SWT/Swing.
Now I will have no reason to use JBuilder :) -
Re: Its about time... (SWT-Designer)[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: John Vance
- Posted on: November 20 2003 21:28 EST
- in response to Vineet Bhatia
A good quality and responsive UI designer is needed for SWT/Swing.
>
> Now I will have no reason to use JBuilder :)
go to http://www.swt-designer.com/
It might be exactly what you want and it's free. If you need a Swing-based GUI builder, use NetBeans for the time being... -
Re: Its about time... (SWT-Designer)[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: John Vance
- Posted on: November 20 2003 21:44 EST
- in response to John Vance
I'm sorry. It's NOT FREE. It has been, previously, I think... my bad.
> > A good quality and responsive UI designer is needed for SWT/Swing.
> >
> > Now I will have no reason to use JBuilder :)
>
> go to http://www.swt-designer.com/
>
> It might be exactly what you want and it's free. If you need a Swing-based GUI builder, use NetBeans for the time being... -
java gui builder racing.....begin.....[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: sang koak
- Posted on: November 21 2003 03:39 EST
- in response to John Vance
jbuilder 10?
eclipse ?
intellij IDEA 4?.. -
IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: hthjf fgfgfg
- Posted on: November 19 2003 13:39 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
$40 Mil in grant from IBM to eclipse. Unbelievable. What is the difference between Microsoft giving away things for free and what IBM is doing? -
re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Steven Goldsmith
- Posted on: November 19 2003 13:45 EST
- in response to hthjf fgfgfg
Ummm, maybe because a MS OS is required to run "free" MS software. I can run Eclipse on Fedora, Windows, etc.
>Posted By: B K on November 19, 2003 @ 12:39 PM
>
>$40 Mil in grant from IBM to eclipse. Unbelievable. What is the difference >between Microsoft giving away things for free and what IBM is doing? -
re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Sandeep Dath
- Posted on: November 19 2003 14:58 EST
- in response to Steven Goldsmith
Ummm, maybe because a MS OS is required to run "free" MS software. I can run Eclipse on Fedora, Windows, etc.
Nice try. Not very convincing though. Try this on for good measure.
Not that I am complaining. I use Eclipse myself.
Sandeep. -
re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Steven Goldsmith
- Posted on: November 19 2003 16:33 EST
- in response to Sandeep Dath
The subjective data doesn't match the objective data in the referenced article. I'm supposed to look at a survey of 5372 aggregate respondents and extrapolate that Eclipse is taking over the Java IDE world. Sorry, not buying that one based on your reference data. Do I believe IBM is trying to undermine Sun, JBuilder, etc.? Sure I do.
The previous poster asked what the difference was between MS and IBM giving stuff away for free. The big difference is that Eclipse doesn't lock me into a desktop platform. That's the difference, I didn't say anything about ulterior motives.
>Nice try. Not very convincing though. Try this on for good measure.
>Not that I am complaining. I use Eclipse myself.
>Sandeep. -
re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: hthjf fgfgfg
- Posted on: November 19 2003 15:35 EST
- in response to Steven Goldsmith
MS drove netscape out of business with this kind of business practice and IBM is doing the same, driving out of business some smaller companies in the name of Open Source and Free software. Microsoft is termed monopoly because of this reason. IBM is doing same as microsoft expect that IBM is very legal in the way it is doing.
>Ummm, maybe because a MS OS is required to run "free" MS software. I can run >Eclipse on Fedora, Windows, etc. -
re: OT: driving people out of businesses[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Amanjit Singh Gill
- Posted on: November 20 2003 01:26 EST
- in response to hthjf fgfgfg
Hi,
> MS drove netscape out of business with this kind of business practice and IBM
Try this:
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000027.html
- Basically, waiting nearly 3 years for a release was "quite" unappropriate -
re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Nils Winkler
- Posted on: November 20 2003 07:39 EST
- in response to hthjf fgfgfg
I don't agree with your opinion. Donating a GUI builder won't drive other IDE vendors out of business, since a GUI builder is only one part of the IDE. I for one have never used a GUI builder, nor am I interested in using one.
The whole J2EE crowd doesn't care a lot for GUI builders, it will only appeal to a certain subset of Java community - people actually creating Swing or SWT interfaces.
In addition to that I doubt that a big company that has invested in something like IntelliJ or JBuilder will switch to Eclipse because of the free GUI builder.
On top of that there's still the discussion on whether a GUI builder can actually create useable, maintainable code.
Please note that I'm also using Eclipse... -
re: IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: ac0dr
- Posted on: November 20 2003 08:13 EST
- in response to Nils Winkler
still, almost all discussions about Eclipse vs Netbeans or jBuilder contain comments of people not willing to switch untill Eclipse it has a decent GUI builder. So that is one argument less. -
It's not dumping -- it's called marketing and investing[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Mark Wilcox
- Posted on: November 20 2003 02:26 EST
- in response to hthjf fgfgfg
Most companies give away things for free. It's part of marketing and building a brand.
And there are good (for consumer) reasons to give away things for free and bad (for consumer) reasons to give away things for free.
And you can't paint any company with a large brush with its tactics.
First - Eclipse is not IBM. It's a seperate foundation that delivers a software platform with a true open-source license and who just happened to get started by IBM. But it's made up of lots of different companies and lots of other people are involed with its development.
That alone makes it completely incomparable to something like integrating IE and similar products into Windows.
Second -- You can't really market an IDE to success in the same way you might be able to market a car, a word processor or even an operating system. An IDE is sold to a highly creative, highly opinionated crowd. Who often spend more time picking their IDE than they do in choosing spouses. Or at least can spout out more minute details on their IDE than they can about their signifgant others. And more than a few would not want to be in the position of having to choose -- keep your IDE or your signifigant other.
So an IDE has to deliver. It has to make the developer more productive -- make their lives easier so that they can focus on doing code.
And it's pretty obvious in the Java world that others have come before and not succeeded in capturing the developer mindshare that Eclipse has.
And you only do that if you really do deliver. Sun had at least 2 years to do that with Netbeans and for whatever reason. Couldn't do it. I honestly believe there were fundamental things wrong that forced IBM to go their route. IBM is a busines and they definitely get open-source (IBM helped the Apache Software Foundation get of the ground, their stamp of approval made Linux 'safe'. Their lawyers are the only reason why there's not a complete mass-panic on the SCO lawsuits).
Also it's not like the other IDEs are standing still. Or that they can't take their knowledge of what they do well and build on top of Eclipse's framework.
Finally -- I think it speaks volumes that the first edition of the eclipse GUI builder does SWING and not SWT. I don't buy that IBM couldn't have made it do SWT right now. They did it to help keep the Java community together.
Summary -- IBM is doing this to help the Java community and keep Java a viable alternative to MS. -
This is not an API that sits on top of SWT and Swing.[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Dave Johnson
- Posted on: November 19 2003 16:34 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
I think Dion's interpretation of this news is incorrect. Scanning the three URLs posted, I can't find any indication of the creation of a third API that sits on top of SWT and Swing and abstracts away the differences.
My interpretation is that IBM is donating to Eclipse the code for a Swing GUI builder (the one that already exists in WSAD). The Eclipse guys will then enhance this GUI builder so that it can generate code for either SWT or Swing. Users of this GUI builded will then be able to build a GUI and generate either SWT or Swing code.
I believe that the "system of interoperability between Swing and SWT" mentioned in the ZDNet article means that Sun will enhance Swing so that SWT components may be hosted in Swing GUIs and IBM will enhance SWT so that Swing components may be hosted in SWT GUIs. -
You are correct... I mean "tool" not "API"[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Dion Almaer
- Posted on: November 19 2003 16:49 EST
- in response to Dave Johnson
Thanks Dave. I used the wrong word. I meant to say that the builder tool will sit on top of the API, and you will be allowed to generate to either.
Thanks. -
This is not an API that sits on top of SWT and Swing.[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Robert Devi
- Posted on: November 20 2003 00:15 EST
- in response to Dave Johnson
I believe that the "system of interoperability between Swing and SWT" mentioned
> in the ZDNet article means that Sun will enhance Swing so that SWT components
> may be hosted in Swing
Definitely a possibility. SwingWT ( http://swingwt.sourceforge.net/ ), has already implemented the bulk of Swing in terms of the SWT. It's not complete, but it's good enough to run Netbeans using native widgets. -
IBM Donates Visual Editor Project to Eclipse[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: han theman
- Posted on: November 20 2003 08:25 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
"IBM has donated code to form a "Visual Editor Project"
Oh no! If it's anything like the Visual Editor's IBM has produced in the past, we're in for a nasty surprise. They ALWAYS suck. -
You haven't a clue[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Danny Foncke
- Posted on: November 25 2003 15:01 EST
- in response to han theman
As in the title, clueless -
thanx[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: daniel cloutier
- Posted on: November 20 2003 09:57 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
thanx ibm. i'll wear a blue t-shirt tonite. :)
greetings
dan -
If it is Visual Age Style ....[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Harimohan Bawa
- Posted on: November 20 2003 11:29 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
Well, If it is Visual Age Style then it is no use.
JBuilder has better GUI building tool and develops code without any proprietary tags (in on e method) and user can modify the code any time manually and Form will reflect that change or show error.
Eclipse is an excellent IDE and JBuilder is adding lot of similar stuff even in personal edition. (Though Eclipse has lot of enhanced features compared to JB Personal including excellent XML and Ant support).
Eclipse should really come with neat GUI builder to compete with JBuilder.
Cheers
Harimohan -
If it is Visual Age Style ....[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Mark N
- Posted on: November 20 2003 13:11 EST
- in response to Harimohan Bawa
Having used both (VAJ/WDSAD) - They aren't the same. But it can pull in VAJ GUI code as a basis (might not be 100%).
And you can modify code and it be reflected in GUI builder.
Download the code and try it out. -
playing catch-up with Netbeans![ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Manish Sharan
- Posted on: November 20 2003 11:37 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
Whats the big deal, Netbeans has had a Visual GUI builder for years! -
playing catch-up with Netbeans![ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Mark N
- Posted on: November 20 2003 13:16 EST
- in response to Manish Sharan
I personally think that that, in addition to the recent changes to Netbeans, was part of the reason for IBM doing so. And then it being the basis for a SWT builder also means that the Eclipse Project would build the SWT piece and not IBM (directly). No proof. Just putting pieces together. I wouldn't doubt if more plugins make their way to the Eclipse Project. -
Limitations of NetBeans[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: MICHAEL SPOONAUER
- Posted on: November 20 2003 14:53 EST
- in response to Manish Sharan
Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but I have been told by some of my development peers that an issue with NetBean's GUI builder is that, unlike Eclipse's Visual Editor, it prevents developers from manually updating any code that is generated by the GUI builder. This is where I see Eclipse's Visual Editor having an advantage over NetBeans. -
Nope[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: John Vance
- Posted on: November 20 2003 21:23 EST
- in response to MICHAEL SPOONAUER
This is wrong. Changes are perfectly replicated both ways (ie change the code -> change graphical representation).
Works beautifully. -
Re: Nope[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: MICHAEL SPOONAUER
- Posted on: November 21 2003 10:34 EST
- in response to John Vance
This is wrong. Changes are perfectly replicated both ways (ie change the code -> change graphical representation).
>
> Works beautifully.
Aren't there, though, some blocks of code that are considered "guarded" and thus cannot be edited unless you copy and paste your class into a generic class template, after which point the form editor cannot be used to edit the results of your changes?
Please see the following NetBeans FAQ item for a description of what I am talking about:
http://www.netbeans.org/kb/faqs/gui_editing.html#FAQ_0
Thanks,
Mike -
great![ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Gavin King
- Posted on: November 20 2003 21:07 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
This is fantastic news :) -
Welcome news[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Ken Krebs
- Posted on: November 22 2003 13:39 EST
- in response to Dion Almaer
I'm glad to see it. I started with NetBeans (Sun version) and was initially reluctant to switch to Eclipse because it didn't have a GUI builder. The refactoring support in Eclipse won out however and I did make the switch with no regrets. I hope the GUI builder is better than what was in NetBeans as that was quite primitive (but still free) compared to others I've worked with.
kktec -
This news really does not matter.[ Go to top ]
- Posted by: Swapnonil Mukherjee
- Posted on: November 22 2003 14:35 EST
- in response to Ken Krebs
I have been using for both Netbeans and Eclipse for the past 1&1/2 years, and let me tell you that it perfectly possible for someone to build the gui with Netbeans and do the controller and model with Eclipse. I take this approach as Eclipse's code editor is far superior to that of Netbean's. I always checkout code from the CVS(which both of them support) and mount them in both Eclipse and Netbeans. If I modify the code with one, I can always ask the other to re-load that damn code.
Bottom Line : Both Eclipse and Netbeans are free. But both lack that something extra which we all need. The solution-> try using them together,it's an awesome combination, it's like having Thierry Henry and Ronaldo on the same side. Put in some nice plugins like PMD, MyEclipse Enterprise Workbench,Jalopy and what you get is a complete IDE at almost 1/10 to 1/100 th the price of the others (if you do purchase some plugins i.e)