I'm tired of JButtons, how can I make a nicer GUI in java?

Question

So far I\'ve only built \"small\" graphical applications, using swing and JComponents as I learned at school. Yet I can\'t bear ugly JButtons anymore. I\'ve tried to play wi

Answer 1

I am using SWT. Try it , it is really very nice java gui framework, eclipse is build around it. You can use also this plugin for eclipse to create your forms Instantiations.

Answer 2

Have you at least tried with nimbus look'n'feel? that is a little bit better than the others..

UIManager.setLookAndFeel("com.sun.java.swing.plaf.nimbus.NimbusLookAndFeel");

only downside is that it requires at least Java6 update 10.

Answer 3

Swing supports changing the Look & feel.

This tutorial explains how:

UIManager.setLookAndFeel(lookAndFeelClassName);

Another way is to start your app with the L&F:

java -Dswing.defaultlaf=com.sun.java.swing.plaf.windows.WindowsLookAndFeel MyApp

Here is a list of 10 very nice look and feels.

Answer 4

The easiest is to stay with Swing and use a different look and feel.

What CAN be done easily is shown at http://www.jgoodies.com/freeware/metamorphosis/index.html (Use this this web start linkto see it in action)

Either bundle a L&F with your program, or choose one of the built in. I like Nimbus but it must be explicitly selected in your code.