JDeveloper plug-in

This plug-in integrates JFormDesigner into Oracle JDeveloper.

Benefits

Using this plug-in has following benefits compared to JFormDesigner stand-alone edition:

User interface

The screenshot below shows the JDeveloper main window editing a JFormDesigner form.

JDeveloper main window

A JFormDesigner editor consists of:

Creating new forms

You can create new forms using JDeveloper's New command. In the category Swing/AWT choose JFormDesigner Form and click OK to proceed.

New Form Dialog

In the Create JFormDesigner Form dialog, enter the form name (which is also used as class name), choose a superclass, a layout manager and set localization options.

Open forms for editing

You can open existing forms the same way as opening any other file in JDeveloper. Locate it in JDeveloper's Application Navigator view and double-click it.

Go to Java code / Go to form

JFormDesigner adds a button to JDeveloper's main toolbar that enables you to switch quickly from a JFormDesigner form editor to its Java editor and vice versa. If a form editor is active, then the button is named Go to Java code (Go to Java code). If a Java editor is active, then it is named Go to JFormDesigner form (Go to JFormDesigner form).

Go to Java code   Go to form

Convert JDeveloper 12c, NetBeans and IntelliJ IDEA forms

You can convert existing JDeveloper 12c forms (which are actually NetBeans forms), NetBeans and IntelliJ IDEA to JFormDesigner forms. Right-click on the form file (or any container) and select Convert to JFormDesigner Form.

Convert forms

When converting an IntelliJ IDEA form, JFormDesigner inserts its own generated GUI code into the existing Java class and removes IntelliJ IDEA's GUI code.

Preferences

The JFormDesigner preferences are fully integrated into the JDeveloper preferences dialog. Select Tools > Preferences from the menu to open it and then expand the node "JFormDesigner" in the tree. See Preferences for details.

Unsupported features

Following features from other editions are not supported by the JDeveloper plug-in: