Erka blog

Several days ago I talked with my friend about a problem with using system tray in java. He develops a desktop application and needs a crossplatform (Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and Linux) solution for system tray. Of course, you could say: “What the problem? Just use java 6″. Yep, you are right but we have one big problem — jdk 1.6 has not been implemented yet for Mac OS X. I hope when Leopard will be released I would be able to use it.

If you would look into this problem you would find two solutions. The first one is an SWT, and the second one — JDIC. These libraries have a API and native implementations for system tray. I have never worked with tray early and decided to try. I have developed small classes and run them on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux Ubuntu (with Gnome as Desktop Manager). So, here are my results.

First OS is Microsoft Windows XP.

Native tray	Java 6 tray
SWT tray	JDIC tray

As you could see Java 6 and SWT have native look and feel. JDIC has a problem with popup menu position.

Second one is Mac OS X.

	Not implemented yet
Native tray	Java 6 tray
SWT tray	JDIC tray

SWT has the same problem on Mac OS X as JDIC on Windows. Popup menu position is wrong. JDIC shows menu without any defects, but it has problems with separator. I can not see it at all.

Third one is Linux.

Native tray	Java 6 tray
SWT tray	JDIC tray

Java 6 has a big problem with look and feel at Linux. That is really a bad news. Another problem is an icon size: Ubuntu has not resized my one (which is 200×152). All my examples have wrong popup menu position.

So, all implementations have problems. Enjoy it!

Download the source.