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I develop a number of desktop Java applications using Swing, and while Swing is quite powerful (once you get the hang of it), there are still a lot of cases where I wish some advanced component was available right out of the box.

For example, I'd really like to see easy-to-use components (without writing them myself, which I could do given enough time) like:

  • Multi-line label
  • Windows File Explorer-like Icons or Thumbnails view
  • Drop-down button (like Firefox's old Back button)
  • 5-star rating widget
  • Combo box with automatic history (like the text field on Google)
  • An Outlook-style accordion-style bar
  • and so on

I know of a couple of sources of free Swing components, like SwingLabs, home of JXTable, JXDatePicker, and a few others.

Where do you go for Swing components beyond those included with Java itself?

Michael Myers
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David Koelle
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  • Multi-line labels are built into Swing because you can use HTML in JLabels: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/685521/multiline-text-in-jlabel – lbalazscs Dec 15 '12 at 20:34

3 Answers3

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The following are worth a look:

johnstok
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As for: "Windows File Explorer-like Icons or Thumbnails view"

They are built in in swing.

File explorer icons are accessed through FileSystemView class ( it is used by JFileChooser ) when the L&F is Windows of course.

FileSystemView.getFileSystemView();
Icon driveIcon = fsv.getSystemIcon( new File("C:\\"));

And the Thumbnails icon can be retrieved with the sun.com class that are discouraged by Sun

sun.awt.shell.ShellFolder getIcon( boolean largeIcon )

But this one may not perform very well some times ( due to native resources handling I think ).

OscarRyz
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  • I realize that... I was thinking about lists that look like Explorer views, but aren't used for the file system. For example, a thumbnail list of photos, or some other type of icon. – David Koelle Oct 18 '08 at 03:18
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I know you can get an awesome wrapping labe and an accordion from javaswingcomponents, however they are not open source implementations.

Otherwise Jide and SwingX are great choices.

rhi
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