NetBeans forms supported?

[soni789]

Hi,

I would like to know if Netbeans forms are supported by Swing Designer? We have moved from NetBeans to Eclipse and would like to edit the .form files created in netbeans using Swing Designer. If its supported, how do I do it ? I tried to open the .form file by selecting Designer Editor but that didn't show me the .form file in design view.

Thanks
Soni

[Eric Clayberg]

I would like to know if Netbeans forms are supported by Swing Designer? We have moved from NetBeans to Eclipse and would like to edit the .form files created in netbeans using Swing Designer. If its supported, how do I do it ? I tried to open the .form file by selecting Designer Editor but that didn't show me the .form file in design view.

Swing Designer handles the NetBeans-generated GUI code better than NetBeans does because Swing Deisgner can actually read and parse the generated .java code. There is no need for the dangerous and redundant .form file. Swing Designer is far superior to the NetBeans GUI builder when it comes to code generation and parsing for many reasons:

Swing Designer is a true bi-directional code generating tool that allows editing of generated code; NetBeans does not allow generated code to be edited.

Swing Designer reads and writes multiple coding styles (JBuilder, NetBeans, VA Java, etc.); NetBeans does not read any style (even its own) and only writes its own style.

Swing Designer supports refactoring generated code; NetBeans does not allow generated code to be edited in any way.

Swing Designer can reverse engineer hand-written code using any Swing layout manager; NetBeans can not reverse engineer any code (even its own).

Swing Designer does not require a separate XML-based meta-data file to maintain GUI data; Matisse requires a separate file due to its limited parsing abilities.