A DESCRIPTION OF THE REQUEST :
It would be nice to be able to set an application-wide cursor, which overrides all other cursor settings.
In this way it will be easier to show a wait cursor when a long operation is going on. It is now a lot of work with glasspanes to achieve that, and it's not even possible to show a wait cursor on a window which has a modal child.

JUSTIFICATION :
Giving users feedback about progress is very important to give a good UI experience. The wait cursor is a very recognizable way of showing the user the program is busy. Therefore, showing a wait cursor should be a matter of one statement.

EXPECTED VERSUS ACTUAL BEHAVIOR :
EXPECTED -
One function, like Toolkit.setApplicationCursor(Cursor.WAIT_CURSOR) that overrides all component specific cursors.

---------- BEGIN SOURCE ----------

Toolkit.getCurrentToolkit().setApplicationCursor(Cursor.WAIT_CURSOR);

Runnable task = new VeryLongTask();

Thread taskThread = new Thread(new Runnable()
{ public void run () {
  task.run();
  SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() { public void run()
{ Toolkit.getCurrentToolkit().setApplicationCursor(null); }
}});
taskThread.start();
---------- END SOURCE ----------

CUSTOMER SUBMITTED WORKAROUND :
Right now, it is not possible to show a busy cursor on frames that have modal children.
For other frames, something like

JFrame[] frames = all_frames;
for(int i = 0;i<frames.length;i++)
{
   Component gp = frames[i].getGlassPane();
   gp.setVisible(true);
  gp.setCursor(waitcursor);
}

Runnable task = new VeryLongTask();

Thread taskThread = new Thread(new Runnable()
{ public void run () {
  task.run();
  SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() { public void run()
{
for(int i = 0;i<frames.length;i++)
{
   Component gp = frames[i].getGlassPane();
   gp.setVisible(false);
  gp.setCursor(defaultcursor);
}
 }
}});
taskThread.start();
###@###.### 2004-12-14 22:15:52 GMT