SuperWaba
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SuperWaba is an exceptionally portable subset of Java that has been optimised for use on devices with small screens. It is extendable and written under the LGPL open source licence. Development can be done under any JDK supporting Java 1.2 or greater, and it is compatible with development environments such as Eclipse, JBuilder etc.
It works on the following platforms:
- Windows CE 3.0 and above
- PocketPC - iPaq, Axim etc.
- PalmOS 2.0 and above
- Windows 98, XP, ME, 2000
- Java 1.1 or higher
- Browser-based Java applets
The resulting code runs at 1/3 to 1/2 the speed of a pure 'C' application on a Palm platform, and on a Windows 32 platform is approximately 3-4 times faster than a JIT-compiled Java due partly to its integer-only implementation.
Future releases will be based on the SDL library, and so will be far more portable. Version 5.0 (in pre-alpha at the time of writing) uses SDL and additionally runs natively on the Symbian and Linux platforms. The authors had to write a Palm SDL library to accomplish the desired cross-platform compatibility.
Applications and libraries (from barcode scanners to complex maths) written for SuperWaba may be sold, but the majority appear to be available free from the main website. A Wiki site is available for developers and users to contribute to the project.
SuperWaba evolved from the Waba project which was an independent forerunner of J2ME. It split off the Ewe project which catered for Windows CE devices, but was fortunately persuaded to merge again to provide the basis for the current cross-platform code base.
External links
- SuperWaba (http://superwaba.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/twiki/view)
- Official site (http://www.superwaba.com.br)
- Wiki Site (http://superwaba.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/twiki/view)
- Waba Project (http://www.wabasoft.com/)