Few questions from beginner

Hello everybody!
At the beginning I'm sorry for all mistakes I'll made in my post, if something is unclear please write me, I'll explain it. I'm from Poland and I know that my english is not as good as I would like :)

I have many experience in programming web portals, I know PHP, JavaScript, Mysql database and few others. I have a knowledge about Pascal and C++. I have written few bigger projects in these languages, but I would like to try something else. Java looks nice and I would like to learn it. In my opinion beginners should learn by reading another and writing theirs own code (in this way I've learnt PHP and JavaScript). I decided to write a SMALL game in Java (like a football manager). But I would like to write it with graphic library Swing.

1) My first question is: application like my game should be written in clean Swing or using NetBeans Swing GUI Builder (I need to have in this game plenty of buttons, dialog boxes and many other) ? In my opinion beginners should learn programming by writing, not by locating elements and programming them, am I right ?
2) Second question is about storing data. For example I would like to have 5 teams with 11 players. Each playes should have few skills. How should I store that information? In XML files in hidden folder ? But what if somebody will find it and change values ? Is any method to code this files ? Or is another way to do this ?


I hope that I didn't make many mistakes :) and I'm sorry for chaotic style of my statement. I'm sure that somebody can replay for my questions. Thanks in advance !

1. My personal opinion is that code generated by GUI builders are the spawn of Satan. They produce a lot of incomprehensible code that is hard to read by experienced programmers, let alone learners. If you want to learn Swing then learn to write the code yourself.

2. Database or look into Serialization.

Thank you for your reply :)

1. So it works like a WYSIWYG editors in HTML? I expected that... Ok, so I'll learn Swing without any GUI builders.
2. Database like a MySQL or PostgreSQL? But it requires access to internet or install SQL database on client's computer, doesn't it?