Operating and window systems will never strike back or independence day for Java developers

With the use of Java and the JDK, independence of specific platforms (operating systems and window systems) becomes possible. For the development of commercial applications however, Java and the JDK are not enough, and tools such as a GUI-builder are needed. When employing a GUI-builder the new dependencies on the builder-generated code have to be considered. Independence is an important prerequisite for enabling portability and reusability. There are, on the one hand, many GUI-builders on the market and it is impossible to say which will end up being successful. On the other hand, the integration of existing programs designed with different GUI-builders is an ongoing problem. We have designed and implemented a Java framework which uses a GUI-builder independent format to store GUI resources. This framework can be combined with any GUI-builder that supports JavaBeans. * JDK = Java Development Kit. The actual version is JDK 1.1. The version of the JDK is also the version of the Java language Gosling, Joy, Steele (1997).