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Alternatives To Applets On The Client Side?

Posted by Cliff on from the should-we-try-something-other-than-Java? dept.

Choron asks: "Anybody will agree that Java Appplets are great for developing complex applications for the client side, with good (but not perfect) portability. Now apart from Tcl/Tk or esoteric technology such as embedded Inferno or developing a plugin (so much for the portability), are there other solutions for developing both portable and advanced GUI applications embedded in a browser?" Currently, I think Java applets are the only way to do client-side applets with any degree of portability, but who is to say that this will always be the case. What may the future hold for applets, and will Java be the sole driving force behind the technology?

2 of 21 comments (clear)

  1. WebStart by The+Mayor · · Score: 3

    First, I'd like to take issue with your comment about portability. Applets suck from a portability standpoint because Netscape has a stuffed implementation of the JVM. Use Sun's Java Plug-In. It works nice. And Java on almost every platform (even Mac, with MacOS X, but not yet BeOS) is pretty good. However...

    Take a look at Sun's Java WebStart. It looks to be Sun's successor to applet technology.

    The idea is basically to create a web-enabled application. It allows you to create full blown Java applications. Every time you run a WebStart application, it checks to see if there are updates for the .jar files on the web. If you're not connected, no problem--you just use the older .jar files. If you don't want to upgrade, find--you just click "no" when it asks you if you want the latest .jar files. Since the .jar files are cached locally, there's no horrendous download every time you run the application (as with applets). It's extremely easy to set up your application to be WebStart-enabled. And, I believe (but don't quote me on this one) that you can make your applets WebStart-enabled, too (adding caching to applets).

    --
    --Be human.
    1. Re:WebStart by The+Mayor · · Score: 3

      I just checked further into WebStart's capabilities for applets. Here it is, available from the developer's guide for WebStart:

      The Applet-Desc Element
      Java Web Start has support for launching Java Applets. This support provides easy migration of existing code to Java Web Start. An Applet is launched using the applet-desc element instead of the application-desc element. For example:

      The JAR files that make up the Applet are described using the resources element as for applications. The documentBase must be provided explicitly since a JNLP file is not embedded in an HTML page. The rest of the attributes correspond to the respective HTML applet tag elements.

      The main-class attribute is used instead of the code attribute. The main-class attribute is assigned the name of the Applet class (without the .class extension). This attribute can be omitted if the Applet class can be found from the Main-Class manifest entry in the main JAR file.

      Note: Applets must be packaged in JAR files in order to work with Java Web Start.

      I hope that helps. My original suspicions (that WebStart does support applets) is now confirmed.

      Cheers!

      --
      --Be human.