LWUIT is out in the open!

Just a quick follow-up post: LWUIT, Sun's new UI toolkit for J2ME has been released as an open source project . I wrote about LWUIT before - it was announced on Sun's JavaOne conference and was destined to become open-sourced, but it actually did just last week.

The toolkit has picked up a lot of interest from the developers community, and several companies are using it, or exploring the option of using it. I have been involved in a UI project in one of the companies I am consulting to, and I've digged deep inside LWUIT, and I must say it is really an upgrade for the J2ME world, coming probably not a moment too soon to give some weight to the Android/iPhone attack...

In addition, the LWUIT team is very responsive and listens to the community, and this can be seen by the vast number of (releavant) features that were added to it since it was launched. They also keep in touch via a Shai's Java & LWUIT Blog and the LWUIT Forum (And since their offices are close very close to one of my clients, I've had the chance to meet them several times and give them some feedback, and I hope I helped and contributed to the later versions).

I can also see the level of interest in a personal level - the term lwuit is one of the most popular search terms that lead to this blog, and up until now there was only one post about it...

So if you're in the J2ME world (or looking to enter to it) and still didn't saw LWUIT first hand, download it here and you'll see what I'm talking about...

World's most ancient cameraphone...

Hmmm... Not what you expected, right?... This image here is not a photoshop work, it is an actual physical "cameraphone". I took this picture in my visit to the graduates exhibition held in the Bezalel Academy of Arts here in Jerusalem.

I doubt if it actually works (In fact I'm sure it doesn't...), but the concept which was displayed in the art department is interesting and surprising... I didn't get the artist name, if this is yours let me know and I'll credit you here.

Anyway, I had to share it with you - quite hilarious... There were other neat exhibits (not necessarily mobile realted...) from the Animation, Industrial Design and other departments, if you're in the area in July, this exhibition is very recommended.

Also, on an unrelated matter, my post The battle of the mobile platforms which raised a lot of interest in the mobile community was published in the Carnival of Mobilists (CotM) #135 hosted this week at Paul Rupert's Mobile Point View. This is the third time at the CotM, so I hope to host one myself sometime in the following months. Till then...