Java GUIs

Through some strange turn, I suddenly found myself reading about Java GUI programming. I’ve been considering writing a small, fun program and debating about doing it in Java or Python. Python has some advantages: smaller memory footprint and runtime size, faster development time, more fun :), wxPython provides native look and feel. Java has some advantages over Python: huge collections of libraries that are fairly well structured, Eclipse IDE, GCJ to compile to native executable (apparently not for Windows yet). It’s that last one that’s the kicker. Generally, I’m a fan of native widgets, because I want my programs to look like Windows programs if they’re running under Windows. Swing does this to an extent, but SWT/JFace actually uses native widgets, just like wxPython. GCJ cannot compile Swing apps yet, but you can compile SWT apps using GCJ.

Some interesting related links:

A biased comparison of Swing and SWT by a Sun employee. Though it may be biased, there are some good points.

IBM DeveloperWorks also has an article about using GCJ to compile Java apps to native code