I remember it as Eclipse taking over from Forte 4 Java, then NetBeans trying to regain share with various gimmicks, culminating with a fancy GUI layout tool that would have been excellent if it hadn't been exclusive to NetBeans.
Then forte died of acquisition, forte for Java bombed and NetBeans took over some interesting "4gen" features, so like given a table he would go and create the whole crud in swing on top. For a while it seemed to grow strongly but then eclipse opening up rcp fagocitated all thick client projects and NetBeans was left to dry.
It was almost 20yr ago so the time line is fuzzy, but this is how I recall it.
It looks like ffj predates the NetBeans acquisition, but it's hard to tell without a definitive reference. I found the original URL above via the C2 wiki.
https://www.developer.com/java/ejb/sun-forte-for-java-and-ne...