I'm reading about JBuilder now. Lot's to learn. I recently saw a java program using SWT and JFace from IBM. That looked just like a windows program on windows and a Linux KDE program on Linux. But that's what was important. That program loaded fast and ran fast - very fast. It also had something called web start. The idea was the program was self updating. Web start of course solves the problem of updating a lot of computers.

Leland found QT Designer. I had a terrible time getting everything to work at first but I was able to get it done. BTW Leland I had to add the word 'thread' in the c++ tab to get it to compile. Anyway, my test program loaded very fast and ran fast. But I'm not to pleased about attempting to work in C++. So for now I'm going to continue my review on Java and Python. I'm using JBuilder which so far is straight forward. JBuilder uses swing (visual lib) and as a result my test programs don't look as nice as QT Designer nor do they start as fast. But they do appear to run as fast (after they load). I recently discovered that there is some sort of native Java compiler. I'm not sure what this is - but it sounds like it will create an "exe". As far Python is concerned I'll get to it next (after Java). I like the Python stuff because it reminds me of the VFP OOP. But it's sure not to run as fast as either QT or Java.

As you can see I'm not moving toward .Net. I believe that the Linux desktop is coming and will be a strong platform in terms of users very soon. If I'm wrong I'll still be able to run Java and Python on .Net platforms (longhorn?).

John