A DESCRIPTION OF THE REQUEST :
The tray-icon has little use for end-users of Java applets. The main purpose of the tray-icon seems to be to open the Java Console but the vast majority of end-users will never want to open it. If they encounter a broken applet they simply move on to another website.

It seems to me that the Java Console is aimed at developers and end-users want a clean non-intrusive UI similar to that provided by Flash.

The key is to figure out who the target audience is for the tray icon and then ask ourselves whether the current UI meets our goals.

I am proposing that the tray icon should be hidden by default and allow developers to enable it using the control panel when they are debugging their applications. Furthermore developers or end-users can still use Tools | Java Console instead of the tray icon.

http://forums.java.net/jive/thread.jspa?messageID=271619 discusses this in more detail.

JUSTIFICATION :
Tray-icon clutters UI without adding any value to end-users.
Posted Date : 2008-04-28 09:15:45.0

N/A

Currently with the new java plugin, tray icon is the only way to bring up java console on windows. We are in the plan to restore java console menu in browsers. Until then, tray icon will not be hidden by default.
Posted Date : 2009-01-13 23:57:07.0

Its irritating to see a link to console from the tray and it clutters the list. Please remove it. Thanks

Its definitely superfluous, developers know where to find the Java Console though and "normal" users do not care about what technology is used. So please hide the tray icon.

I'd like to cast my support of this RFE as well.  In new installs of the JRE, please hide the tray icon by default and allow the user to opt to show the icon using the Java Control Panel.  

Giving the plugin the ability to spawn multiple VM's now means multiple tray icons can appear - this looks odd as most applications do not spawn more than one tray icon.  This is another good reason to disable the tray icons by default.

The tray should be removed as soon as possible in order to have a compelling user experience for applets. It is unacceptable to have Java tray icons it just kills the user experience.

I believe that the tray icon should be removed. When a "normal" user uses a Java application, he / she doesn't need to know that Java is behind. The user just want a nice, clean UI and experience.

We should also open an RFE asking Sun to remove the infamous Yahoo Toolbar from the installer.

please get rid of this craplet

FireFox uses Tools -> Error Console for debugging Javascript. The same non-intrusive mechanism is used by all other plugins so Java should use it as well.

Please get rid of this!!! It's intrusive, doesn't add value to the Java brand and annoys everyone!!!

I truly think that making it less obvious that Java is being used will make it more acceptable for websites.  Please get rid of the tray icon.

The last thing we need is another icon in the tray. Really.

The tray icon should be disabled by default, while still being able to be displayed through an option in the applet tag. This course of action should please everybody.

This is unacceptable. I just went to http://java.sun.com/developer/technicalArticles/javase/6u10_applets/ and I had 2 tray icons in my tray. Is that acceptable? It doesn't make sense at all. Imagine Flash doing the same we would have 4-5 icons in the tray

Ok, here's how to handle it -- put a menu item in the tools menu that says "Java Console"  

Then for each JVM that is running -- PUT A SUB MENU ITEM WITH THE NAME OF THE APPLET THAT IS RUNNING 

DUH!!!!