I noticed today, while browsing through Eclipse Plug-in Central (EPIC), that CloudGarden has released a new version of their Jigloo SWT/Swing GUI Builder. Jigloo, which can be easily added to your Eclipse-based IDE via update site, provides support for building user interfaces in SWT or Swing. It supports the construction of Eclipse views and editors, and Swing Application Framework components. It also supports the relatively new GroupLayout layout (which requires Java 6). Of course it also supports round-tripping (so that when you make changes in the source code, those changes are immediately reflected in the visual editor).
I’ve been playing with it all morning, and it has been very robust. I’m not currently working on any projects that require complicated user interfaces, so I haven’t been able to put it to a real test, but my initial experience has been positive. I came across two features that I find interesting. The first allows you to select one or more components, and insert a container under them. You can, for example, move existing buttons onto a panel/composite, or wedge a JScrollPane under an existing JList. The other feature I found was a tool that will convert a Swing component into an SWT equivalent. I’ve had mixed success with this feature, but it does look promising.
Jigloo is free for non-commercial use.
