Linked by Andy Roberts on Thu 19th May 2005 19:33 UTC
Java Swing comes with "pluggable look-and-feel technology", which essentially boils down to the fact that interfaces can be "skinned" (although this is simplifying a tad) and is therefore, extremely flexible. By default, Java ships with a cross-platform look-and-feel (LAF), which means your apps can look consistent across all platforms, or LAFs that mimic the look of a specific platform, say Windows, for example. However, one of the chief complaints of Java desktop applications is its "look". It basically stems from two issues:
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Probably 90% of the problem has to do with the above. The text looks quite poor and it's really annoying that you can't change it easily globally, and the default theme really is atrocious (can't choose a strong enough word). Certainly developers can change the look and feel, but so many of the freely accessible applications that will give people a perception of java will not bother changing the default.
So I guess I'm in the camp that thinks it's ok to have different looks/toolkits, but it might be nice to be able to "fit in" as an indistinguishable application if that's what you want as a developer.
As several people have stated, providing an almost approximation of the graphics of a native application can sometimes do more harm than good.
All of this aside, take a look at how Mozilla Firefox has managed to distribute a cross platform application that has native look and feel with OS/desktop integration that performs quite well. Why Swing/SWT (Sun/IBM) have such a hard time with this I don't quite understand.