🚀 go-pugleaf

Many of you have posted messages complaining about the lack of support
for Swing in Internet Explorer and Netscape. Well, it's not too
difficult to get this to work. I'm now running an applet with the
latest release of Swing (1.1.1) in Internet Explorer (5.0) without
using the plug-in from Sun.

You still have to distribute Swing along with your applet, but if you
do this carefully you can reduce the size considerably.

Here's how:
---------------------------------
1. Extract the class files from swingall.jar. You can do this with
WinZip or with the jar tool (which can be downloaded from
http://developer.netscape.com/software/signedobj/jarpack.html).

2. For IE, build a cab-file with the cabarc.exe tool from Microsoft SDK
for Java (see http://www.microsoft.com/java/sdk/default.htm). For
Netscape, build a jar file with signtool.exe (see
http://developer.netscape.com/software/signedobj/jarpack.html) Include
the class files from your project, and add the extracted class files
from swingall.jar.

3. For IE, build a distribution unit cab-file with the dubuild.exe tool
from Microsoft SDK for Java.

4. Sign your applet if it's gonna read or write from disk, network,
print, or anything else outside the applet sandbox. For IE, use
singcode.exe from MS Java SDK. For Netscape use signtool.exe.

All your necessary class files are now compressed inside your
cab-file (or jar-file). You don't have to distribute anything else. The
size of the whole Swing library will add 1.2 MB to your file
(compressed). This is considerably less than the 5 MB for the plug-in.
But you can reduce it even more if you delete all the class files from
Swing that your applet doesn't use.

If you need a signed applet, you have to use cab-file for Internet
Explorer. It does not support signed jar files. Also, you can't combine
a cab- and a jar- (or zip-) file in one html-file for Internet
Explorer. If you don't need a singed applet, you can either use a cab-
or a jar-file.

Netscape does not support cab-files, there you have to use jar-files
(unsigned or signed). To build and sign a jar-file, use the Netscape
Signing Tool
(http://developer.netscape.com/software/signedobj/jarpack.html).

The latest release of Swing (1.1.1.) which contains the
swingall.jar library can be downloaded from:
http://java.sun.com/products/jfc/download.html

Your local html-file for Internet Explorer can look like this:

<html>
<body>
<applet
  code="your.packet.your.class"
  cabbase="yourcabfile.cab"
  align="top"
  width="800"
  height="600">
</applet>
</body>
</html>


The html file for Internet Explorer for a signed applet on a webserver can
look like this:
<html>
<body>
<applet
  code="your.packet.your.class"
  useslibrary="Your application name"
  useslibrarycodebase="yourcabfile.cab"
  useslibraryversion="1,0,0,0"
  align="top"
  width="800"
  height="600">
</applet>
</body>
</html>

For detailed information on how to build and deploy signed applets,
both for Internet Explorer and Nestscape, see http://www.sys-
con.com/java/archives/0503/jasnowski/index.html

Regards, Odd Vinje