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Java for the Webmaster: All Gain No Pain

One of the most popular types of applets is text applets

There are many applets that don't fall into any single category. They may be educational applets designed for those into esoteric subjects such as artificial life, or audio applets for musicians that can be used to tune a guitar. Those types of applets are best used on Web sites devoted to those particular topics.

Finally, one of the most popular types of applets is text applets--applets that manipulate text in one fashion or another. One of the good things about text applets is the fact that most are small in size and load up fast. They can provide great banners, headlines, logos, attention getters or general introductions to your site. Here are a few of the Java Boutique's most popular text applets:

• AnimText
• CircleBanner
• Minnal
• NewsScroller
• TextScroll

If you need additional functionality that is not included in the free applets, there are also many commercial applets available. Many of them are byte-sized, and have great functionality. Of course this added functionality also comes with a larger cost, although the file size may not be much greater than those free applets we showed you.

One of the main benefits of using commercial applets is the product support you get with the license. Although most applet authors are glad to help out, they are often short of the time necessary to provide much assistance, so you are often left on your own to work out problems.

Adding the Applet to Your Site

Now that you've selected the applet or applets you'd like to use, it's time to dig into the code and actually add them to your site.

The first thing you must do is to download each of the files that the Web browser "executes," called class files, along with the appropriate image and audio files, if applicable. Those of you using early 4.0 versions of Netscape Communicator must hold down the shift key and then click the link to download class files, otherwise the file will be displayed in your browser rather than saved to your disk. They may be available as a single class file, or they may be zipped or otherwise compressed into a single file.

NEXT

This article first appeared in October, 1998

How to Add Java Applets to Your Site

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