(
Abstract
Windowing
Toolkit) A class library from Sun that provides an application framework and graphical user interface (GUI) routines for Java programmers. AWT was the first user interface development system included in the Java Foundation Classes (JFC). In 1997, Swing was introduced, which provides more capability and is written entirely in Java. See
JFC,
AFC and
IFC.
AWT vs. Swing
AWT calls the operating system at a higher level than Swing, and the AWT routines use native code. Swing was written entirely in Java and is platform independent.