The FavaBeans User Interface Framework

FavaBeans is a framework for developing object-oriented user interfaces (OOUIs) for Java using Swing.

[26-Nov-2001] Heavy development continues. Developer snapshot tarballs, on an "as-is" basis, are available in the download folder. The relevant files are favabeans and favabeans-ccgb.

[27-Aug-2001] The core "registry" functionality has been massively rewritten for usability and flexibility. We are now dual licensed, with the LGPL being an option. The Programmer's Guide is now available in PDF, and overheads from a recent presentation are available; see documentation.

[27-Jun-2001] We've got a new demo of the Palmtop Applications Window Manager (pawm) ready to download (see the screenshots). Go to SavaJe to see a platform that's just perfect for FavaBeans with pawm.

[23-Apr-2001] FavaBeans is now officially an open source project; full source and binaries are available!

[15-Mar-2001] Good news! We have worked through the licensing issues and are now able to distribute FavaBeans as open source. Watch this space for more!

[31-Jan-2001] NEW! You can now download a preliminary demo.

People familiar with OOUIs and related technologies should go directly to the Whitepaper section.

Be sure to check out who our sponsors are.

What's an OOUI?

In many applications, the user's model of interaction with the computer is based purely on visual landmarks such as windows, dialogs, etc., which do not necessarily make sense in terms of the user's application domain. Thus, users often entertain mythologies about their application -- the result of many frustrating interactions and ad hoc conclusions they draw from these interactions.

An OOUI aims to present to the user (and not just the developer) an object-oriented model with which to interact. Thus, the user sees things (represented as icons, among other ways), and interacts with them via the actions and properties they present. The user is also aware of collections of things, and of various uniform ways to search through and sort the collections based on the properties of their contents.