diff -r e6026e9752ae openide.explorer/src/org/openide/explorer/view/VisualizerChildren.java
--- a/openide.explorer/src/org/openide/explorer/view/VisualizerChildren.java	Tue Aug 05 14:06:00 2008 +0200
+++ b/openide.explorer/src/org/openide/explorer/view/VisualizerChildren.java	Thu Aug 07 14:18:55 2008 +0200
@@ -75,6 +75,11 @@
     * and fires info to all listeners.
     */
     public void added(VisualizerEvent.Added ev) {
+        if (this != parent.getVisChildren()) {
+            // children were replaced (e.g. VisualizerNode.naturalOrder()), quit processing event
+            return;
+        }
+
         ListIterator<VisualizerNode> it = list.listIterator();
         boolean empty = !it.hasNext();
 
@@ -125,6 +130,11 @@
     * and fires info to all listeners.
     */
     public void removed(VisualizerEvent.Removed ev) {
+        if (this != parent.getVisChildren()) {
+            // children were replaced (e.g. VisualizerNode.naturalOrder()), quit processing event
+            return;
+        }
+
         List remList = Arrays.asList(ev.getRemovedNodes());
 
         Iterator it = list.iterator();
@@ -199,6 +209,11 @@
     * and fires info to all listeners.
     */
     public void reordered(VisualizerEvent.Reordered ev) {
+        if (this != parent.getVisChildren()) {
+            // children were replaced (e.g. VisualizerNode.naturalOrder()), quit processing event
+            return;
+        }
+
         if (ev.getComparator() != null) {
             //#37802
             ev.array = reorderByComparator(ev.getComparator());
diff -r e6026e9752ae openide.explorer/src/org/openide/explorer/view/VisualizerNode.java
--- a/openide.explorer/src/org/openide/explorer/view/VisualizerNode.java	Tue Aug 05 14:06:00 2008 +0200
+++ b/openide.explorer/src/org/openide/explorer/view/VisualizerNode.java	Thu Aug 07 14:18:55 2008 +0200
@@ -236,6 +236,11 @@
     * @return list of VisualizerNode objects
     */
     public List<VisualizerNode> getChildren() {
+        VisualizerChildren ch = getVisChildren();
+        return (ch == null) ? Collections.<VisualizerNode>emptyList() : ch.list;
+    }
+
+    VisualizerChildren getVisChildren() {
         VisualizerChildren ch = children.get();
 
         if ((ch == null) && !node.isLeaf()) {
@@ -263,8 +268,7 @@
             // this assert is too expensive during the performance tests:
             assert (ch == null) || !ch.list.contains(null) : ch.list + " from " + node; 
         }
-
-        return (ch == null) ? Collections.<VisualizerNode>emptyList() : ch.list;
+        return ch;
     }
 
     //