Sun Offers Up JSE 1.5 Beta For Desktop Development

The software, code-named Project Tiger, focuses on easing development of rich Java clients. Some critics say that despite the success of Java (or J2EE) in the realm of enterprise servers, the technology has been underwhelming in the desktop world thus far.

This new release promises a shorter startup time, smaller footprint and JVM autotuning, the company said in a statement.

J2SE 1.5 continues to support rich application development so users of IDEs can take advantage of it. Sun's NetBeans Release 3.6 IDE is compatible with this new release and NetBeans 4.0 will be optimized for it, Sun said.

The announcement, probably not coincidentally, came during the Eclipsecon show in Anaheim, Calif. Sun has not joined the newly independent Eclipse Foundation, which is dedicated to fostering tools interoperability in the open-source world. IBM started up the Eclipse organization but relinquished control recently.