Sun sheds light on GUI tool for mobiles

Tag : mobile phone tool

Sun has released a new development kit aimed at mobile softwaredevelopers.
The toolkit will allow developers to create user interfaces forJava-based mobile phone applications. The package is being madeavailable for download by the company under the title 'Light-weightUI Toolkit' or LWUIT.
The company hopes that the open-source LWUIT will make it easierfor Java developers to create applications for the Java ME mobilephone platform, further developing the growth of Java on mobilephones and smartphone handsets.
"By creating LWUIT, Sun is reaffirming its commitment to themobile development community and by open sourcing the LWUIT code weare enabling mobile developers to quickly and easily create rich,portable interfaces for their applications," declared CraigGering, Sun's senior director of embedded Java software.
"This software will also help address the mobile industry'sfragmentation issue by enabling developers to create a singleinterface that will work anywhere Java is found."
The toolkit had previously been available to developers as apre-release toolkit. The latest release, however, makes the kitavailable to developers under a variation of the GPLv2 licence.
The reasoning, said Sun senior technologist Terrence Barr, was tomake it easier to commercialise products that use the LWUIT.
"To further accelerate the adoption of the LWUIT framework itis important to provide access to the source code under a liberaland well-known open source licence," Barr said in a blog posting .
"This licence choice provides the benefits of open sourceinnovation and collaborative development while offering a risk-freepath to adoption by commercial products – a model everybodyshould feel very comfortable with."
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