Linked by Andy Roberts on Thu 16th Jun 2005 19:50 UTC
I've been fortunate enough recently to be in contact with Steve Northover. Despite him being very busy with SWT and the forthcoming release of Eclipse, I've managed to grab some of his time to answer some of my questions. To clarify from the outset, the views expressed by Steve are his own and not those of his employer.
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SWT on its own is mostly okay. The widgets are not the best, but they do work. And they are better than anything that can be done via "pure" Java.
I think it is hypocritical to say SWT is good (and it is largely native code) but other native code would be bad. If Java had native COM, native Win32, native .NET on Windows, writing stuff far better than SWT would be simple and enjoyable. Maybe I want to use Java/Eclipse/SWT and I don't care about running on Linux? Why should I be locked out of making a good app?
Scaling up -- in terms of application size and complexity -- from SWT, the application model breaks down rapidly. The payoff vs. complexity curve is not pretty. Essentially all the madness of EJB has been ported to the desktop.
I believe this is mostly due to IBM's influence although Eclipse came from a UK shop and the Brits always produce massive frameworks that are overengineered on the outside and underengineered on the inside.
IBM due to their size and is getting traction with Eclipse. However, the current Sun version of Java is for servers. It is not a good foundation for any kind of client application. I think this point is lost on IBM and many of the Java jockers who are still drinking the dotcom Java koolaid.
Thus looking at Eclipse and client applications, it is a big ship headed out to sea, headed for oblivion. These big ships are good for IBM server space and the big iron world, but not appropriate for modern client apps.
When the day comes that I find an Eclipse RCP application that is useful, simple to installl, and easy to use, then maybe I will take another look. For today, there are better options for most developers who are not contractually or economically tied to IBM/Java.