See:
Description

Packages

usb.core	This package provides a USB Host Driver Interface, letting Java programs access USB Devices from USB Hosts.
usb.devices	This package collects Java-only code to access devices.
usb.linux	This package has a Linux implementation of a usb.core.Host object, bootstrapping support, and other classes leveraging Linux USB support.
usb.remote	This holds remoted versions of the usb.core APIs, including an RMI proxy and a basic daemon.
usb.util	This holds a tool to dump USB contents in XML, and utility classes.
usb.view	This holds a simple Swing-based USB tree browser; an example program.
usb.windows	This package has a partial Windows implementation of a usb.core.Host object, bootstrapping support, and other classes leveraging Windows USB support.

This usb.* package is a Free Software (and Open Source) library of Java code for working with USB devices in Java. It is distributed under the GNU "Lesser" GPL (LGPL), meaning that you can use it in proprietary software (if you release any modifications under LGPL or GPL). It currently supports Linux 2.4 through use of the prototype "usbdevfs", or remote access to an implementation through RMI, and includes some basic application code.

Look at www.usb.org for information about USB. Briefly, the Universal Serial Bus is intended to eventually replace RS-232 and parallel ports. USB handles more types of communication than those older technologies, supports multi-device hierarchical networks built using hubs, and data rates are much higher than RS-232. USB 1.1 support is available on most current computers, and in 2001 USB 2.0 support is beginning to roll out. So there are distinct advantages to USB.

The current distribution site for this software is http://jusb.sourceforge.net and you should provide code updates (ports, bugfixes, etc) as described there.