Seems Microsoft is trying to show a kinder, gentler side to Open Source and Java development communities. In the past they made overtures to improve PHP on Windows server. They also sat down and collaborated with JBoss and now they plan on supporting Eclipse.

Microsoft plans on assisting the Eclipse SWT team to enable Java developers to create applications that look and feel like Windows Vista. In addition, they plan on supporting Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) application development with Eclipse SWT.

Sam Ramji, the director of Microsoft's open-source software lab, thinks "It just makes sense to enable Java on Windows". (Flashbacks of J++ 6.0 come to mind).

This last Wednesday, Mr. Ramji made an announcement at the EclipseCon conference in Santa Clara, Calif. that Microsoft will work with Eclipse.

For more details check out these related links:

• Microsoft's Ramji Extends Olive Branch To Eclipse Users [1]
• Microsoft to work with Eclipse on Java [2]

What if any impact do you think this will make on GUI development with Java?

Will this increase the number of rich GUIs developed with Java?

Why would someone use Java to develop application that only runs on Vista?

How much of an impact will this be since SWT development is dwarfed by Swing [3]?

References

• Microsoft's Ramji Extends Olive Branch To Eclipse Users, [4] Charles Babcock, InformationWeek
• Microsoft to work with Eclipse on Java [5], Martin LaMonica, CNETNews.