How do you change the Dock Icon of a Java program?

Question

How can I change the Dock Icon of a program, in Java, on the Macintosh platform? I have heard about using Apple's Java library (that provides some sort of extra support on the Mac platform), but I have yet to find some actual examples.

Culprit

I am a Win person. But from what I see Dock on Mac is equivalent of Taskbar on Win. So it makes me wonder that maybe simply calling setIconImage(new ImageIcon("path/to/icon").getImage()); for your JFrame could sort your problem out? – Multifold

Answer 1

Apple eAWT provides the Application class that allows to change the dock icon of an application.

import com.apple.eawt.Application;
...
Application application = Application.getApplication();
Image image = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getImage("icon.png");
application.setDockIconImage(image);

Lettuce

Yeah, but the class is deprecated. – Culprit

I think only the public constructor and some methods have been deprecated, not the whole class. – Lettuce

I'll be surprised if this works with an .icns as well! So I think the -Xdock:icon is the better solution. – Waadt

Is there any specific place in the code base where this snippet should go? When you set the menubar to native OSX, it has to happen before any UI code (e.g. in a launcher wrapper). Is this similar here? – Epicure

@Waadt According to the API, for the Toolkit.getImage() method, the image can be either GIF, JPEG or PNG. So no, it doesn't sound like it would work for .icns. – Northington

It's possible that you need to add the AppleJavaExtensions-<version>.jar to your classpath. In my case, I just added the Maven dependency as follows: <dependency> <groupId>com.apple</groupId> <artifactId>AppleJavaExtensions</artifactId> <version>1.4</version> </dependency> – Haynes

This is not valid for JDK 9+ anymore. See my answer: Solution for JDK9+ – Boland

Answer 2

While I'm not sure how to change it at runtime, you can set at the command line your Dock icon using the -Xdock:icon option, like:

 >java -Xdock:icon=/path/myIcon.png myApp

This article has lots of useful little info about bringing java apps to Mac, and you may be interested looking at the utilities and tools for Mac listed here, as well as deployment options listed here (the last link is especially useful if you want to go down the Java Webstart route).

Sorbose

I've seen that code being used many times. What if I want the program to work on multiple platforms ... wouldn't that cause problems if I were to run the file on Windows or Linux? – Culprit

@Martin Tuskevicius Yes, this will only work for Mac, so you would want to have separate scripts/distributions for operating systems (like for Mac, you'd have that command line bundled in an applescript). It's hard to cater to each operating system's needs while remaining platform-agnostic. – Sorbose

Have you personally tried to do the Apple library approach? I've downloaded it at one point, and I did Application.setDockIcon(Image) but then the Dock Icon was just a blank area. – Culprit

I have not tried, admittedly. When I had some apps in Java for Mac, I noticed that JFrame.setIconImage did not set the Dock Icon. I bundled the above command line option, along with -Xdock:name, in an AppleScript, and life was pretty easy afterwards. But there are certainly utilities that can simplify the bundling process out there. – Sorbose

Any specific ones that you would recommend? – Culprit

@Martin Tuskevicius There are lots of tools here, most notably the JarBundler (I have not used it personally, so I can't give a whole-hearted recommendation, but it looks promising). Also, IDEs like Eclipse and Netbeans usually have either in-built or plugin-support for Mac distributions (I know JMonkeyEngine's SDK, a variant of Netbeans, supports distributing to Mac). – Sorbose

Here's an example that uses a JWS distributed JAR for for most platforms and adds an application bundle (.dmg) for Mac. – Chesterton

Mind you, for OS/X you should use an .icns as dock icon. – Waadt

Surely you code is incorrect, it should be >java -Xdock:icon=/path/myIcon.png -jar myApp.jar – Ardel

Answer 3

Solution for Java 9 and later

In JDK 9, internal APIs such as those in the Mac OS X com.apple.eawt package will no longer be accessible.

see: http://openjdk.java.net/jeps/272

package main;

import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JLabel;
import java.awt.Image;
import java.awt.Taskbar;
import java.awt.Toolkit;
import java.net.URL;

/**
 * author: flohall
 * date: 2019-07-07
 */
public final class Main {

    public static void main (String[] args){

        final JFrame jFrame = new JFrame();

        //loading an image from a file
        final Toolkit defaultToolkit = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit();
        final URL imageResource = Main.class.getClassLoader().getResource("resources/images/icon.gif");
        final Image image = defaultToolkit.getImage(imageResource);

        //this is new since JDK 9
        final Taskbar taskbar = Taskbar.getTaskbar();

        try {
            //set icon for mac os (and other systems which do support this method)
            taskbar.setIconImage(image);
        } catch (final UnsupportedOperationException e) {
            System.out.println("The os does not support: 'taskbar.setIconImage'");
        } catch (final SecurityException e) {
            System.out.println("There was a security exception for: 'taskbar.setIconImage'");
        }

        //set icon for windows os (and other systems which do support this method)
        jFrame.setIconImage(image);

        //adding something to the window so it does show up
        jFrame.getContentPane().add(new JLabel("Hello World"));

        //some default JFrame things
        jFrame.setDefaultCloseOperation(jFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
        jFrame.pack();
        jFrame.setVisible(true);
    }
}

This code can be used as is. Just change the path of the image.
This new implemented way (in JDK 9+) of setting the icon for mac os dock is better then before because you won't run into any problem when building your application. Also there is no problem to use this code on a windows computer. Reflection which is not recommended since Java 9 is not needed either.

Boland

This is for Swing only, how would you do this on JavaFX? – Ardel

@Ardel Refer to Zach L's Answer – Derisible

@Rishon J That's a command line workaround which is not practical in all cases, if it can be done in code in Swing then it should be possible in JavaFX. That would be the ideal solution. – Ardel

Is it possible to set up the Dock name to replace java too? – Misjoinder

Answer 4

If your using Eclipse, you can export a project as a Mac OS X Application Bundle and specify an .icns file to use as an icon.
In Eclipse, go to File>Export and choose the 'Mac OS X Application Bundle' option inside the 'Other' directory.

Click the next button.
Then you'll be presented with the 'Application Bundle Export Menu'.
The last option on this menu is 'Icon'. This is where you specify the .icns file to use as the dock icon.

Picture of the 2 Eclipse Export Menus

As far as creating the .icns file is concerned, you can use Apple's Icon Composer to create a .icns file from an image file. Here is a good tutorial on making mac icons.

Buckingham

@Buckingham Is this option available only on the Mac OS X version of Eclipse? I installed Eclipse for Windows and there's no Mac OS X Application bundle option. – Feathery

@Feathery According to one of the answers to this question installing the Eclipse Delta pack will allow you to export your application to any target platform. – Buckingham

@Buckingham have you used delta pack before? Can it create a .app file for Mac and a .exe setup file for windows? – Feathery

Answer 5

For Microsoft Windows

setIconImage(new ImageIcon("Football.png").getImage());

For Mac OS X

import com.apple.eawt.Application;
Application.getApplication().setDockIconImage(new ImageIcon("Football.png").getImage());

Calvinism

What about if the application can run on Mac and Windows? How do you make it compatible for both? – Rilda

then you need condition to check for OS. – Calvinism

The problem is that you can't import com.apple.eawt.Application; on a Windows computer since it is Mac specific. I ended up using a solution based on this answer, yet that solution seems to be a very messy workaround. – Rilda

@TotZam I'm with you. I faced this problem too. Let me see if I can come up with something else. – Calvinism

That would be great! In the meantime, I've added an answer here, explaining the method I currently used to get code to work on both Mac and Windows. – Rilda

How do you do this on macOS 10.12 and Java 1.8 ? The com.apple.eawt.Application no longer exists :/ – Norvun

Answer 6

If you have XCode installed, you can use JarBundler to create a Mac App using a Jar file. If you don't have XCode, you can use this JarBundler:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/jarbundler/

During the creation of the bundler, you can choose an icon in the .icns extension. That will be your Dock Icon.

Geraldgeralda

This project is no longer there – Dogleg

Answer 7

Fix for java 17 : with javafx

final Toolkit defaultToolkit = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit();
java.awt.Image image = defaultToolkit.getImage(getClass().getResource("/resources/images/YOURICON.png"));
final Taskbar taskbar = Taskbar.getTaskbar();

taskbar.setIconImage(image);

Enticement

Answer 8

If you use jpackage to package your java application into a .app file for mac, you can use the --icon option to specify the mac icon. This will display the icon on the dock after launch and also for the .app file.

JAVA_HOME/bin/jpackage --type "app-image"
--verbose
--input files
--dest output
--name "$APPNAME"
--main-jar "$JARNAME"
--runtime-image $JRE
--icon files/Resources/Images/AppIcon_512.icns
--app-version $VER
--mac-package-name "$PKGNAME"

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