Launching a desktop application from a web site - java

Is it feasible to launch an application via a browser / URL? What are the options for doing this?
I know the way to do it with IE and Windows (which usually doesn't work). Ideally, I would like this to be browser independent.
Our application is RCP, so in theory Java Web Start could work, we would just have to do some significant changes to how we deliver our application to users, which I would like to avoid. Our web server code is currently all Java if that makes a difference.
I pretty much gave up on this until I clicked a url on Apple's site, which in turn launched iTunes.
How does Apple do that?


iTunes registers itself as a protocol handler for custom itms:// and itmss:// protocols. When you hit a URL with that protocol - after a step of indirection on Apple's web servers, in this case - iTunes launches to handle it, much like your browser launches to handle http:// URLs or your email program launches to handle mailto: URLs.
This isn't "cross-platform", per se, but it does work on every platform out there, as URL handlers exist and do the same thing everywhere.
It has the disadvantage of only working if the application is already installed, which is why you may want to have a splash page that instructs people to install the application if necessary.


Silverlight 3 and Adobe Air will let you launch applications outside the browser.


If this is OS independent, then you can't rely on any specific program being available. What kind of program would you want to launch anyway?

Related

Launch an application on button click from a web page

In my web application I need to launch a Windows application installed on client machine when a button in the page is clicked.
I know there are security policies in browsers that avoid this by default, but I also know application that do this. An example could be online meeting, web conferencing applications like WebEx or GoToMeeting.
How they do that?
I'm working with Java, so I'm wondering if Java Applets are an option to achieve this.
Is there some other well known way to solve this issue?
NOTE application execution MUST be allowed by user

The best way to deploy a Java desktop application is using Java Web Start.
And forget applets. Soon Chrome won't be able to load them (along with a number of other plug-ins) at all.

you can achieve it with applet. but user must allow to run it. it is hard to run some extern application from button or link because this is potentially danger behaviour. Remember the applet can not get access to the files on user computer and other servers (unless it is digitally signed)

How to open desktop application inside a web browser

Is it possible to open an exe application (Not launch an application) inside a web browser. I want it to be like you have embeded the application in your browser. Is that posible in VB.NET or in JAVA? I have provided the launch application. but my boss wants it to be inside the web browser, not launched by the browser. Thanks in advance

The browser naturally prevents this capability because it would be an enormous security hole. The only way I could see you achieving this is to write some sort of browser plugin or browser extension which would allow you to achieve this but with all of the responsibilities and risks of writing this kind of code.

Use SWT Browser Widget to Write Desktop Application

I recently played around with the SWT browser widget (which is great). I am wondering if I could write a full desktop application with it (with java services behind - e.g. persistence) and what drawbacks I would have to consider. The advantage would be that people without java knowledge could work on the gui. Of course it depends on the requirements and I know that this is not a very specific question. But mabye someone already tried to build a bigger app this way and is willing to share insights.
Thanks
Marcel

I'm not sure I share your opinion of the SWT browser widget. AFAIK it's merely a shell into the default browser on your machine, merely with a few API access points. I've used it for minor things when I needed to show a web page from within the application. But writing a whole application? That doesn't make sense.
If you want to build a web-based application that runs in the browser against a Java based server framework, there are many AJAXian frameworks to do it. You'd still be doing JavaScript for your client code. And you'd still be dealing with all the complexities of different browsers. I'm not sure why you would want to host it inside an SWT application instead of just directly in the browser window.

What is "java web start" used for?

I was reading about java web start from wiki. Can someone please tell me
What is it used for?
A practical application of it; to make its use clearer.
Do other languages like C++ / C# have
anything similar?
Thanks,
Roger

Java Web Start is kind of like a successor to applets - it allows Java programs to be run from your browser (though unlike applets, they don't run within the browser). For a practical example, see the TopCoder Arena.
http://www.topcoder.com/contest/arena/ContestAppletProd.jnlp
Here, Java Network Launching Protocol (JNLP) is the protocol that defines how a Web Start application should be run (analogous to HTML telling a browser how a page should be rendered).
See the Oracle tutorials:
Lesson: Web Start
Deploying a Java Web Start Application
Java Network Launch Protocol

Java Web Start software provides the
power to launch full-featured
applications with a single click.
Users can download and launch
applications, such as a complete
spreadsheet program or an Internet
chat client, without going through
lengthy installation procedures.
With Java Web Start software, users
can launch a Java application by
clicking a link in a web page. The
link points to a Java Network Launch
Protocol (JNLP) file, which instructs
Java Web Start software to download,
cache, and run the application.
I'm quoting the Java Tutorial lesson on WebStart
For those of you who work with .Net something like Java Webstart is ClickOnce technology.

Java Web Start is used to write sandboxed desktop applications similar to Java Applets. Like applets they can be launched from a web browser, but they run in their own window - not inside the browser.
It runs just like a normal application, but started from clicking a web page instead of having to download and run an installer. An advantage is that it's very easy to get people who are afraid of all the security warnings to try your application. Another advantage is that you don't need to keep the browser open while you run your application. You can even install a shortcut to your application onto the user's desktop so they don't need to touch the browser at all once they have run it the first time.
The .NET equivalent is Click Once.

What is it used for?
To roll out and keep updated an application to clients. Clients need "only" a Java Runtime installed. This may be more interesting to read.

Java webstart is used to deploy/install Java applications over the network.
The alternative is to send an application (MyApp.jar) to the users who will run that directly. But if it is out-of-date, they could have collisions when the application talks to the server (for example, or other such badness).
It also allows you to package all of the required libraries. This is a HUGE benefit.
http://java.sun.com/javase/technologies/desktop/javawebstart/index.jsp

As mentioned above, it's a technology to allow you to 'push' an always up to date Java app to users. It's not often used on a consumer level, but has some adoption in a corporate atmosphere.
It's best used in somewhat controlled environments, and is especially useful to push a specific version of client software to control a server.

Do other languages like C++ / C# have anything similar?
Yes. Microsoft provides something called ClickOnce that provides a web-based installer.

Today i am looking for the same example about the Java web start...
I thing this link will work for you,i have used as a beginner.
Click Here
As mention With Java Web Start software, users can launch a Java application by clicking a link in a web page. The link points to a Java Network Launch Protocol (JNLP) file, which instructs Java Web Start software to download, cache, and run the application.

We had a project, a plugin for Protégé, which is an ontology editor.
Installing the plugin isn't that hard, but to give the user a quick impression how the plugin worked, we supplied a Java Web Start application on our site. The page is still active, the plugin may have some rough edges, since it hasn't been updated for a while ... http://dac.icore.at/one/solutions.
I'm currently not aware of similar products for C/++/#.

Java web start is the 0-install solution in the java world.
An application built to use Java web start (JWS) will be available as a link in a web site. This site will have the .jnlp extension.
When a user clicks this link (and clicks the "execute" button of his browser) , the javaws.exe runtime will be launched. This executable will download the application and dependencies (libraries, images, and so on) and launch the application using the provided main-class of the .jnlp file).
An extensive reference of JNLP content can be found at http://lopica.sourceforge.net/ref.html
Examples of Java web start applications can be found at Swing sightings.
Notice that, depending upon the chosen configuration, these applciations can also be automatically installed in start menu.

Java and Silverlight together forever

I want to display a silverlight web page inside my java desktop application.
Does anyone know of a plugin or browser control that I can use to do this?

Embed an appropriate browser window into the Java app and it can load the SL - there will not be any interaction / communication between the two without some hacky code. Multiple browsers support SL but you are better off using the an IE based one at present, the chrome support is not official as I remember.

How about an iFrame? In the nutshell... Alternatively you can make a request to .Net app from within your java server code using something like HttpClient and then serve markup that way - would be relatively easy thing to do (relatively since if there authentication involved things can get complicated fast. And if you want (willing) to get "sophisticated" and you are using portlet technology there is WSRP
For the desktop app I would go with HttpClient suggestion: get the content, parse it then do with it what you please unless that Silverlite app is also running as webservice then you have some additional options by utilizing components that can consume services

Eclipse's SWT provides out of the box web browser component based on IE and/or Mozilla engine. For swing application you can use one of ActiveX bridges, such as J-Integra or JDIC or EZ JCOM.

Use JDIC WebBrowser component

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