Java desktop links of the week, March 30

Here we go again! A huge number of links this week, but plenty of interesting news, so be sure to check it all out! Thanks to everyone in the community for creating all the news! :-) If there is anything you want me to include, email me or contact me on twitter - my contact details are to the right.

General

• Want to go to JavaOne? Don't have the cash to fly to San Francisco and buy the JavaOne tickets? You may be in luck, Sun and CodeProject have a competition going where the first prize is tickets (up to $1500USD worth), and a JavaOne conference pass. All you need to do is write an article about Java (including JavaFX I'm sure), and be the top-rated article (judged by both your peers and Sun) . And if anyone wins and doesn't need the tickets, I'd gladly appreciate them ;-)
• Fabrizio Giudici posts that he has forked the Beans Binding project .

Swing

• Jan Haderka has announced that SwingX 0.9.6 has been released , which should be the last release before the 1.0 release. There are a number of bug fixes and code cleanups in this release, and even includes my first contribution to the project :-) If you are not using SwingX , I seriously recommend that you explore the various components offered by the project.

• Ken Orr posts about an application developed by Dirk Lemmermann which looks very polished . It makes use of the Mac Widgets for Java project , and the post includes a number of screenshots which should serve as inspiration for many UI developers out there.
• Christopher Deckers got in touch with me to let me know that a new version of DJ Native Swing has been released . DJ Native Swing allows for easy integration between some native components and Swing applications, and provides native utilities to enhance Swing's APIs.
• Alexander Potochkin (the current leader of the Swing Application Framework project) posts that the project is on the lookout for people to help contribute to it . I have a feeling this request has fallen on deaf ears - the SAF mailing list has been very quiet recently. If you think you can help, please, get in touch with Alexander and/or get on to the SAF mailing list. Perhaps it's just me, but I feel like the SAF project is lacking a vision, so it would be good to have that clarified.
• The Swing JavaBuilder project has had it's final 0.3 release . This project attempts to make it possible to build Swing user interfaces with a declarative markup language.

JavaFX

• JavaFX 1.1.1 has been released, prompting many to believe that the JavaFX versioning scheme is based on binary arithmetic. Despite this, Danny Coward has posted a quick summary with all the relevant links .
• Drew posts about his thoughts on JavaFX, and whether it is right for you .
• Wanting to do 3D in JavaFX? Following on from last weeks link, I have a direct link to the people behind the code . On their site is a few demos that you can run as webstart applications/applets.
• Richard Bair posts to show how he formats his JavaFX code . This is an odd discussion to have, but given how new the language is, best practises have yet to be worked out.
• JavaWorld has a tutorial on how to use a Swing spinner component in JavaFX . Following this tutorial, you should understand how to use other Swing components in JavaFX.
• Having never used db4o , I can't offer much insight to the next post. However, according to the db4o developers, JavaFX plays nicely with it, allowing for <insert whatever db4o does> to work .
• James Connell posts about how he made a JavaFX game using the JavaFX production suite . I haven't had a chance to read this indepth yet, but he appears to go into a lot of detail that'll no doubt be invaluable to other JavaFX developers/designers.
• James Weaver , as per usual, has been busy promoting JavaFX. He has a puzzler for people to try to develop (solutions are in the comments) and a link to a very sad looking JavaFX petstore demo (at least align the components!).

Griffon

• Last week Andres Almiray's (@aalmiray ) website was down, so I held back some of his links until this post. In one post, he talks about assorted Griffon 0.1.0 features . In another post, he discusses various builders offered that make building Swing-based user interfaces easier .
• James Williams (@ecspike ) has a post containing a video from his presentation in Sydney regarding Griffon and how it relates to Swing . You need to click the 'On Demand' button and select his video from the list.

That's it - have a great week everyone!