IDE for Swing [closed]

Answer 1

Abeille is very good and is based on the JGoodies FormLayout. Unlike almost every other Java GUI builder, Abeille does not generate code by default. In the project I used it on, it was wonderful to avoid reading or scrolling through the layout code (because that code no longer existed). Most of our hand-written code concerned itself with connecting events to actions, simply asking the layout for the relevant controls.

It's a crime that code generation is the default way to layout code in Java because better ways of doing GUIs have been around for decades. I have used Matisse, the NetBeans GUI code generator. While Matisse (now known as "Swing GUI Builder") makes it pleasant to layout components, it is similar to all other code generation tools because when you use Matisse you must live in constant fear that someone else edited the "you cannot edit this in NetBeans" GUI sections outside of NetBeans. As soon as you touch the layout builder again it could destroy their work and then you have a broken GUI. There might be some simple task like re-ordering a variable initialization and its use or re-naming a variable (this was especially a problem when using Matisse's database feature). You know how to do this by editing the un-editable source code but may waste time trying to figure out how to do the same thing in the GUI builder. Like most code generation tools, it might get you started, but eventually you will have to maintain the generated code yourself.

Answer 2

I have not used anything other than NetBeans for Swing, but I have been extremely happy with it. I used it for 18 months on a $25M application and to develop an prototype application to replace a Windows Forms app.

Up and until Microsoft came out with WPF, in my opinion, there was not a better tool kit for traditional desktop applications. (I always found Windows Forms too limiting).

Answer 3

We have been doing Swing development for nearly the past 10 years. There are some nice GUI builders available (e.g. JFormDesigner), but all restrict us too much in different kinds.

For example, we have a lot of components without public no-arg constructor (e.g. a JTable subclass which requires the model in the constructor) or we have component factories.

Desktop applications usually have to be obfuscated. Obfuscation very easily breaks user interfaces created with a GUI designer or requires much work to avoid obfuscating such classes.

Another often happening case is that, for example, a panel should only contain some components depending on some condition. Simply hiding them would make the GUI look bad; they rather should not be added instead. I never found a GUI editor which provides this flexibility and even if there would be one, it would be so hard to use, that I definitely would be faster with good old Java code.

Answer 4

I think the best editor that can exist is Visual editor for Eclipse.

The only drawback is the fact that we can't re-edit the visual part when we modified the source code. I hope one day we will have a tool that rivals Visual Studio in this aspect.

Answer 5

Frankly, I've never seen an editor which comes even close to what I can do manually in a text editor. All the visual editors are nice if you only have very simple needs like putting a few buttons in a window. When things become more complex, visual editors quickly loose their competitive edge.

I usually use a bunch of high-level classes built from more basic widgets and wire my UI from that. This also allows me to easily test my UI with automated JUnit tests (because I can control what the source looks like).

Lastly, changes to the UI won't generate unnecessary noise in the version control system.

Answer 6

I used to use MyEclipse quite a bit. It had a decent IDE for making Swing forms and such. I assume it has improved in the past year - they seem to add features in gobs and heaps, quite often.

http://www.myeclipseide.com/