Eclipse RCP allows easily create an application. Additional advantage of the platform is a native launcher of the application which allows it to behave more like “native” application. It much better to have a process called your_application.exe running instead of another java.exe process.  You will probably also want to have some nice icon attached to *.exe file of your application. This can be done easily in Eclipse 3.4. First you need to create *.ico file (containing all necassary images inside) – one of the generators available on the web can be used for this (for example).

Next step is configuration in *.product file:

 <launcher name="caracal">
      <solaris>
      <win useico="true">
         <ico path="/pl.edu.agh.caracal.application/icons/caracal.ico"></ico>
         <bmp></bmp>
      </win>
   </solaris>
</launcher>

You can also use product file editor for this (a lot of enhancements were added in Eclipse 3.4):

After building the application based on product file launcher will have your custom icon. No resource hacking, nor recompiling native C code is required!