Hi John,
nice to get your answers !
but strange is that when I use the code below
for creating a popup-frame - the frameset is shown and works
correct. I didn't implement the HTMLEditorKit.

I use it for j3d, when a 3d object is picked the
frame pop up and show the html file corresponding
to that 3dobject. And it works without any problems,
neither the heavy-lightweight problem is present,
when my JFrame pops in front of my canvas 3d
(I believe that the final container of the JFrame is heavyweight..
but I am unsure to this...just lucky that it seems to be working)
anyway here's the code to display a Frameset HTML inside a JFrame,
which worked with 1.4.2_++ and j3d 1.3.1 (I didn't try older ones)
on win2k - winxp - win98

best regards
Rolf

<code to show a Frameset-HTML>

import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import javax.swing.text.*;
import javax.swing.text.html.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
import javax.swing.colorchooser.*;
import javax.swing.filechooser.*;
import javax.accessibility.*;
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.beans.*;
import java.util.*;
import java.io.*;
import java.applet.*;
import java.net.*;

public class HTMLframe extends JFrame{

JEditorPane html;
public static void main(String[] args) {
 HTMLframe demo = new HTMLframe(args[0]);
 demo.getContentPane().setLayout(new BorderLayout());
 demo.setSize(640,480);
 demo.setVisible(true);
 }
 public HTMLframe(String path) {
 try {
  URL url = null;
   try {
    url = getClass().getResource(path);
   } catch (Exception e) {
     System.err.println("Pfad falsch oder Datei existiert nicht " + path);
     url = null;
   }
   if(url != null) {
      html = new JEditorPane(url);
      html.setEditable(false);
      html.addHyperlinkListener(createHyperLinkListener());
      JScrollPane scroller = new JScrollPane();
      JViewport vp = scroller.getViewport();
      vp.add(html);
      getContentPane().add(scroller, BorderLayout.CENTER);
   }
   } catch (MalformedURLException e) {
     System.out.println("Malformed URL: " + e);
   } catch (IOException e) {
     System.out.println("IOException: " + e);
   }
   }

   public HyperlinkListener createHyperLinkListener() {
     return new HyperlinkListener() {
    public void hyperlinkUpdate(HyperlinkEvent e) {
    if (e.getEventType() == HyperlinkEvent.EventType.ACTIVATED) {
         if (e instanceof HTMLFrameHyperlinkEvent) {           
     ((HTMLDocument)html.getDocument()).processHTMLFrameHyperlinkEvent(
       (HTMLFrameHyperlinkEvent)e);
     } else {
       try {
        html.setPage(e.getURL());
     } catch (IOException ioe) {
       System.out.println("InpuOutputError " + ioe);
    }
    }
    }
    }
    };
   }
   
}

..

Hi Thomas,
there wasn't anything more special about why
that kind of link is working using HTMLFrameHyperlinkEvent
and why it isn't working using the HyperlinkEvent
...should be anything to do with the parser that
is used by those events...
so if you got further hints I am very interested
to solve this.
btw. that HTML View is ONLY for displaying
selfmade simple HTML, refer to my last posting
to realize the whole problem.
best regards
rolf