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Any job opportunities doing Java desktop apps?

 
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I have been working for just a little while with Netbeans, and especially with the Netbeans GUI builder. I like what I have seen and used so far, but feel a bit discouraged. It seems to me that there is not much work in doing Java Desktop apps. And it also seems to me that Java is not really thought of in a good light when it comes to the desktop. Is this changing? Do you think it will? Is the desktop dead? What do the rest of you think?

Thanks, Rich
 
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Java "began" on the desktop with "Write Once Run Anywhere" but quickly became more commonly used on servers. With the growth of the world wide web, more and more desktop applications have been web based and follow ASP (Application Service Provider) models. I don't have an answer to your question but certainly more and more jobs I've seen the past few years have been for web based applications rather than desk top.

--Mark
 
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Welcome to JavaRanch.

I would certainly not count on there being job opportunities for Java desktop development. While a number of desktop apps exist, very few of them are commercial; the only one I can think of is the IntelliJ IDE.

From following discussions here at JavaRanch it seems that a number of companies are building internal applications using Swing. But again, not nearly as many as are building web apps.

Of course, the picture could change in the long run - who knows where the recently released JavaFX will lead?
 
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Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:
Welcome to JavaRanch.

I would certainly not count on there being job opportunities for Java desktop development. While a number of desktop apps exist, very few of them are commercial; the only one I can think of is the IntelliJ IDE.



Also the Poseidon UML tool from Gentleware AG. Commercial-quality Java desktop programs that I regularly enjoy include ArgoUML (Poseidon is the commercial adaptation), Eclipse, Freemind and GanttProject.

Originally, programming for the desktop in Java was horrible. AWT wasn't very sophisticated - plus the first version of it didn't scale well. JVM's were horribly bloated things that didn't come bundled with the OS (Thanks, Microsoft! ), and the overhead for an interpreted language was punitive.

Now cheap, powerful hardware makes the "expense" of installing a JVM relatively light and JIT has helped to accelerate interpreted Java to the point where it sometimes outperforms compiled C code. It's no longer a trivial matter to dismiss Java apps on the desktop, though they're not common.

On the other hand, while Linux serves almost all my needs, one glaring omission has been a decent object-oriented shape-based graphics design tool a la Microsoft Visio. DIA is a sad second-best attempt. I tried to get a group of local people together to do a better product several years ago in C++, but never got anywhwere. More recently I've thought of reviving the effort, and after much careful thought, I think that if I can ever get anything going, it'll be Java-based. Not only the is the code more portable, but you don't get mired down in OS-specific windowing system issues.
[ August 03, 2007: Message edited by: Tim Holloway ]
 
richard hiltbrunn
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Thanks everyone for your input. Looks like Java desktop type stuff will have to be a quirky thing that I do on a personal basis. Who knows, maybe someday I'll find a job where they'll let me do in-house swing dev.

Thanks again for your opinions.

Rich
 
Don't get me started about those stupid light bulbs.
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