Hi all! I'm interested in seeing Brown Shoes move forward, and while I don't really have time myself to help, I'm willing to answer questions and point you toward others who can help more. I know one question that's come up is whether to use SWT or Swing. I don't have a strong opinion, nor am I an expert on either, but I'll enumerate some key benefits of each. SWT: PRO: * Native-looking widgets * Native-feeling UX...even on more limited systems * Additional native platform integration (system tray, unusual UI elements, etc) CON: * Requires shipping appropriate native bindings for each platform Swing: PRO: * Built into any full JDK * Works across a wider range of platforms (though both support the "key" platforms well) * No need to ship any additional native libraries * Pluggable L&F with native-looking by default CON: * Sometimes sluggish, especially if you don't know what you're doing * Native L&F often differ in annoying ways form real native * Bigger in memory? There are lots of successful apps using both toolkits: Eclipse is the obvious one for SWT, but also the Redcar text editor (written in Ruby wrapping SWT...see the "swt" gem for a few shortcuts). On the Swing side there's other IDEs like NetBeans and IntelliJ. That's all I have for now :) - Charlie
Hey, thanks for the input! JRuby is awesome and imo very easy to get started with (I had an integration exercise with JRuby in the mendicant core skills course). I found the following guide really helpful: https://github.com/jruby/jruby/wiki/CallingJavaFromJRuby - so I f you want to see how to interact with Java from JRuby this is a good place to get started. One of my favorites is that you can call Java getters/setters as if they were Ruby setters/getters. And you can use snake_case instead of CamelCase. Well thanks to the JRuby team - just my 2 cents, Tobi On 01/05/2012 02:24 AM, Charles Oliver Nutter wrote: > Hi all! I'm interested in seeing Brown Shoes move forward, and while I > don't really have time myself to help, I'm willing to answer questions > and point you toward others who can help more. > > I know one question that's come up is whether to use SWT or Swing. I > don't have a strong opinion, nor am I an expert on either, but I'll > enumerate some key benefits of each. > > SWT: > > PRO: > * Native-looking widgets > * Native-feeling UX...even on more limited systems > * Additional native platform integration (system tray, unusual UI elements, etc) > > CON: > * Requires shipping appropriate native bindings for each platform > > Swing: > > PRO: > * Built into any full JDK > * Works across a wider range of platforms (though both support the > "key" platforms well) > * No need to ship any additional native libraries > * Pluggable L&F with native-looking by default > > CON: > * Sometimes sluggish, especially if you don't know what you're doing > * Native L&F often differ in annoying ways form real native > * Bigger in memory? > > There are lots of successful apps using both toolkits: Eclipse is the > obvious one for SWT, but also the Redcar text editor (written in Ruby > wrapping SWT...see the "swt" gem for a few shortcuts). On the Swing > side there's other IDEs like NetBeans and IntelliJ. > > That's all I have for now :) > > - Charlie
Good to have you, Charlie. One of the best features of shoes is packaging; with the native stuff, you get a .exe, .app, or .run file, with a Ruby, all the libraries, and everything. Rawr would help out with that, right? Is one or the other easier in that regard? -Steve
FWIW, Vuze or Azerus http://www.vuze.com/ is a multi platform java app that uses SWT. I do remember a hitch in the get along when installing on my linux box several years ago (su stuff, apt-get swt ?) It updates it's jar when new versions are available (spooky that) and worked during all the wacky sun/oracle/openjdk/ubuntu thrashing. It's seriously heavy in MVC GUI but it's impressive for a Java app (after it gets running) On Wed, 2012-01-04 at 22:31 -0500, Steve Klabnik wrote: > Good to have you, Charlie. > > One of the best features of shoes is packaging; with the native stuff, > you get a .exe, .app, or .run file, with a Ruby, all the libraries, > and everything. Rawr would help out with that, right? Is one or the > other easier in that regard? > > -Steve