I remember Karsten Lentzch working in this space on the JGoodies project. I used some of his custom look-and-feels in a couple of projects... I think the had some tools to make layout easier as well.

http://www.jgoodies.com/home/about/

Bingo! Thank you.

> I guess what I'm alluding to is something like CSS for desktop apps.

JavaFX supports CSS styling.

Right you are. Wiki says since 1.2. It looks pretty good.

I just spotted JavaFX Script. Huh. This is almost directionally correct. So of course it got killed.

If you're curious what The Correct Answer™ is, imagine VRML-97 reimplemented using JavaFX Script like syntax.

Its wiki has a link to the Curl (programming language). That syntax is also directionally correct. But is also missing most of VRML's semantics.

There's also a link to the F3 programming language, aka "form fits function". Great slogan. Alas. Looks like a misunderstanding of Conal Elliot's Fran functional reactive programming language.

Oh well.

Thanks for the tip. JavaFX's Script w/ CSS was about 1/2 the solution. Maybe someday someone will loop back and harvest the good bits.

Didn't they introduce something like that with the Synth look and feel[1] in Java 7? Although with more XML.

[1] https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/uiswing/lookandfeel/...