Sun Opens Java ME Tools To Developers

While Java ME has been become the most widely adopted mobile application platform, there can still be some difficulties in creating programs for multiple devices because of differences in things like fonts, menus, and layouts.

Sun Microsystems is hoping to enable developers to create a single interface that will work anywhere Java ME is found. To do this, the company released Thursday an open source development toolkit dubbed "Light-Weight UI Toolkit," or LWUIT.

"By creating LWUIT, Sun is reaffirming its commitment to the mobile development community and by open-sourcing the LWUIT code, we are enabling mobile developers to quickly and easily create rich, portable interfaces for their applications -- functionality that they have been requesting for some time," said Craig Gering, Sun's senior director of embedded Java software, in a statement.

The LWUIT was announced at the JavaOne conference in April, and it includes a host of fonts, animations, touch-screen support, 3-D integration, rich widgets, and graphical components.

The LWUIT will be offered under the GPLv2 license, and Gering said this type of license was chosen because it can foster open source innovation while offering a "risk-free path to adoption" in commercial products.

Additionally, Sun is urging developers to provide feedback and to sign up for its LWUIT Incubator Project.

"The best product in the world is worthless without its users, they make or break the product," wrote Shai Almog, an LWUIT developer, in a blog post. "One of the ways in which you can help us is by advocating and informing other developers about LWUIT, this is something we can't do on our own."While Java ME has been become the most widely adopted mobile application platform, there can still be some difficulties in creating programs for multiple devices because of differences in things like fonts, menus, and layouts.

Sun Microsystems is hoping to enable developers to create a single interface that will work anywhere Java ME is found. To do this, the company released Thursday an open source development toolkit dubbed Lightweight UI Toolkit, or LWUIT.

"By creating LWUIT, Sun is reaffirming its commitment to the mobile development community and by open-sourcing the LWUIT code, we are enabling mobile developers to quickly and easily create rich, portable interfaces for their applications -- functionality that they have been requesting for some time," said Craig Gering, Sun's senior director of embedded Java software, in a statement.

The LWUIT was announced at the JavaOne conference in April, and it includes a host of fonts, animations, touch-screen support, 3-D integration, rich widgets, and graphical components.

The LWUIT will be offered under the GPLv2 license, and Gering said this type of license was chosen because it can foster open source innovation while offering a "risk-free path to adoption" in commercial products.

Additionally, Sun is urging developers to provide feedback and to sign up for its LWUIT Incubator Project.

"The best product in the world is worthless without its users, they make or break the product," wrote Shai Almog, an LWUIT developer, in a blog post. "One of the ways in which you can help us is by advocating and informing other developers about LWUIT, this is something we can't do on our own."