This document discusses productive desktop development with the NetBeans IDE. It covers using the NetBeans GUI builder to easily design Swing UIs via drag and drop. It also discusses Swing frameworks that provide common services to large Swing applications, and the NetBeans Platform for modular and pluggable applications. The document demonstrates scripting Swing and JavaFX applications using Groovy in NetBeans. Overall, it promotes NetBeans IDE as a free, full-featured environment for building desktop Java applications with tools for UI design, frameworks, and scripting.

1. Productive Desktop
Development with NetBeans IDE
Geertjan Wielenga, NetBeans Team
1

2. Goal of the Talk
Learn about:
● Swing UI Design with NetBeans IDE
● Swing Frameworks with NetBeans IDE
- Swing Application Framework
- NetBeans Platform
● Swing Scripting with NetBeans IDE
- Groovy
- JavaFX
2

3. Swing UI Design with NetBeans IDE
• “Matisse” GUI Builder
3

4. Problem Statement
• Creating/Designing Swing UI is hard
• Swing LayoutManagers are difficult to use
• Consistency of layouts is difficult
4

5. Problem Statement
• Creating/Designing Swing UI is hard
• Swing LayoutManagers are difficult to use
• Consistency of layouts is difficult
Solution
• Drag & Drop / Point & Click
• Remove the need to interact with LayoutManager
• Resize, Align, Automatic Growth of components
• Free!
5

6. Demo!
6

7. Swing
Frameworks
(Part 1)
7

8. Problem Statement
• Applications become larger
• Typical parts are created over & over again
• Need to work quickly & efficiently
8

9. Problem Statement
• Applications become larger
• Typical parts are created over & over again
• Need to work quickly & efficiently
Solution
• Action system
• Task system
• Resource system
• Some other services
9

10. Demo!
10

11. Swing
Frameworks
(Part 2)
11

12. Problem Statement
• Applications become even larger!
• Teams become distributed
• Updates/Exclusions needed between releases
12

13. Problem Statement
• Applications become even larger!
• Teams become distributed
• Updates/Exclusions needed between releases
Solution
• Modularity
• Window system
• Pluggability
• Many other services
13

14. Demo!
14

15. Groovy
• Many tasks in Java are overly complex
> File processing
> XML processing
> Web service handling
• Scripting languages don't integrate well with
Java
> Ruby
> Python
• Groovy does both of the above!
15

16. Demo!
16

17. JavaFX
• New & Hot
• Aim: Rapid GUI development
• Declarative language
• Focused on: Animation, Graphic, Media, Effect
• Special scripting language: Integrates Java
• Cool features: data binding, media
• Tooling: NetBeans IDE & Eclipse
• Currently supported on: Windows & Mac
17

18. 18

19. 19

20. JavaFX
20

21. Demo!
21

22. Learning about JavaFX
• Samples
• Tutorials
• Books
22

23. Documentation
• Learning Trails & Tutorials for All Technologies
> Java SE
> Java EE
> Java ME
> Ruby
> PHP
> JavaFX
> NetBeans Platform
> ...
> ...
• Free NetBeans Platform Training Course!
23

24. Also...
• Java ME
24

25. Summary : NetBeans IDE
• Free
• Award winning IDE
• Great for Swing UI prototyping & design
• Great for building advanced applications
> Swing Application Framework
> NetBeans Platform
• Great for JavaFX Script Language
• Includes many features – all for Free!
• Many 3rd party plugins are also available
25

26. References
• http://www.netbeans.org/
• http://platform.netbeans.org
• http://netbeans.dzone.com
• http://blogs.sun.com/geertjan
• nbusers@netbeans.org
• dev@openide.netbeans.org
• geertjan.wielenga@sun.com
26