I’ve been working on an application for work that is to be distributed by Java Web Start (JWS) and I can see what all the fuss is about. I have really gotten into it yet, I hardly know anything actually, but I do know that it makes it incredible easy to distribute an app.

Basically, JWS is a technology that allows you to bundle up a Java app in jars and then bundle it on a web server so that it can be downloaded as needed. Once you’ve downloaded it you can run it locally, but if there is a change to the code on the server JWS will grab the new package and update your app. It combines the mobility of Java applets with a feature rich, locally run Java application.

With all of the convenience of distribution I had a few problems getting it up and running. I’ll qualify that statement with this: I didn’t spend a lot of time reading up on JWS or how to debug it and ultimately it wasn’t really JWS fault that I was having trouble (a logic disconnect between the chair and the keyboard). To solve the problem I enabled the Java console which can be found (in Windows) under Control Panels>Java>Advanced> Enable Console and Enable debugging. My main problem was that the app would download and launch and then hang giving me no errors or wouldn’t display anything. I turned out that there was a problem loading one of the libraries.

To get the full benefit out of JWS I should probably do a lot more reading. What I’ve come across so far has been pretty good, but I’m sure there’s tons more information out there. I’d recommend reading up on JWS over at Sun’s page, there’s Wikipedia of course and there’s a pretty good article over at JavaWorld which gives a good overview of the history and its uses.