[news.eclipse.platform.swt] Building SWT widget hierarchy from native ap

[Hallvard Trætteberg <hal@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,

I am trying to let the user of my application link to/control a native
application (on Windows) and the most elegant way I can think of is
creating a mirror of the native GUI hierarchy within SWT. So instead
of creating an SWT widget hierarchy using all the constructors with
Composite and (int) style, I would like to write something like
SWT.buildFromNativeGUI(Object) where the Object in some way refers
to/names a native widget within an existing running application. Of
course, this reference need to know how the application's GUI is
structured. The SWT.buildFromNativeGUI method would usually return a
Composite and from there on, I would receive events from (including
life-cycle events) and could control the native GUI widget in the
other application, as if I had constructed them myself.

Such a mechanism opens up a lot of possiblities for integration
between SWT-based applications in a more Java-friendy manner (e.g.
without having to rely on OLE support). Does such a mechanism exist,
is it possible and desirable, and if not, why?

Hallvard