Want to see what the guys at Sun are doing with Swing to push the limits of Swing to the max? SwingLabs is a collection of projects to produce a collection of Swing Components and related frameworks that enhance Swing and enable you to produce some very slick looking UIs for your Java applications.
Head over to their site at swinglabs.org and check out the current projects and screenshots. There are some very interesting screenshots of very cool looking UI widgets that will make you say ‘wow, I can do that with Swing?’…
One of the subprojects looks particularly interesting – the Java Desktop Integration Components project (JDIC) – they are working on APIs to enhance Java’s ability to interact with the operating system’s desktop. Some of the APIs they currently have enable desktop wallpaper manipulation, SysTray integration (available now in SE 6.0 beta), access to System Info, and native music player access. Check out their introductory page here at javadesktop.org.