Chapter 13
• Swing and AWT
– AWT is too primitive for modern work
– It is also possible to use WFC – Windows
Foundation Classes, but our author doesn’t talk
about that, and you loose platform-independence.
• SWT Simple Widgets Toolkit – an open-source
toolkit often used in Eclipse.
Swing Goodies
• Read-only text fields
– use setEditable(False) to turn off editiability
– How is it different from a label? Just appearance.
• Lists
– JList takes an array of objects (usually Strings) as
its argument.
– Allows the user to select from a list of items.
List Selection Modes
• Selection modes
– listName.SetSelectionMode(…)
• The modes are:
– ListSelectionModel.SINGLE_SELECTION
User can only select one.
– ListSelectionModel.INTERVAL_SELECTION
User can select an interval with a shift-click
– ListSelectionModel.MULTIPLE_INTERVAL_SELECTION
Use can use control-clicks, I presume
List Events
• Must implement ListSelectionListener
interface
• Must have a method named valueChanged,
which takes an argument of ListSelectionEvent
type.
• .getSelectedValue () often cast to (String)
• .getSelectedIndex() is -1 if no selection
Other List considerations
• May want a border
– Use .setBorder and BorderFactory…
• Scroll Bars (Not the most convenient interface)
1. Use .setVisibleRowCount(int n)
2. JScrollPane name = new JScrollPane(nameList)
3. Add the JScrollPane to your panel or other
container.
• Void setListData(Object [] data)
Getting the results of other
selection modes
• Object[] getSelectedValues() gets selections
• Int[] getSelectedIndices() gets indices of
selections. Not indexes – is this Java or Latin?

Chapter 13 part 2
• Combo Boxes
– This lets a user select an item from a drop-down
list.
– The constructor takes an array of objects, usually
strings.
Dealing with Combo Box results
• You can, if you want, respond to events
• Usually, you wait until some other button is
pressed and retrieve the user’s selection.
• object getSelectedItem() often cast to (String)
• int getSelectedIndex() can be more useful
Editable Combo Boxes
• For “Have it your way” user interfaces 
• nameBox.setEditable(true)
• This makes getSelectedIndex() a bit less useful
(If the user puts something in, it returns -1)
Images in labels and buttons
• For labels, use ImageIcon class to get objects:
ImageIcon myImage = new ImageIcon(thePath);
JLabel myLabel = new JLabel(myImage);
(or)
JLabel myLabel = new JLabel(“Rock On!”);
myLabel.setIcon(MyImage);
• For Buttons, same drill with JButton.
Mnemonics
• Mnemonics are also called “keyboard
shortcuts” or “hot keys”.
• Uses Alt-letter (Apple-Letter??)
• Jbutton exitButton = new Jbutton(“Exit”);
exitButton.setMnemonic(KeyEvent.VK_X);
• Constants take form KeyEvent.VK_letter
• If the letter chosen is in the component’s text,
the first occurrence of that letter will appear
underlined.
Tool Tips
• Another nice recent user interface innovation.
• As the user “hovers” the mouse over a
control, a pop-up text “tool tip” explains in a
little more detail what that control does.
• myControl.setToolTipText(String myString);
Chapter 13 part 3
• Choosers (We’ve been using file choosers for
some time)
• JFileChooser constructors:
– No-arg starts the choice process in “My
Documents” or equivalent folder
– 1-arg (String) sets the default folder in which to
start
JFileChooser methods
• int showOpenDialog(Component parent)
– Use null unless you really want to specify where the
dialog box initially appears
• int showSaveDialog(component parent)
– Return variable is one of:
• JFileChooser.CANCEL_OPTION user hit ‘cancel’
• JFileChooser.APPROVE_OPTION user picked a file/folder
• JFileChooser.ERROR_OPTION something ‘went south’
• void setFileSelectionMode(mode)
– JFileChooser.DIRECTORIES_ONLY
– JFileChooser.FILES_AND_DIRECTORIES
– JFileChooser.FILES_ONLY (default)
Menus
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•
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•
•
•
•
Menu bar
Menu
Menu item
Check box menu item
Radio button menu item
Submenu (fly-out)
Separator bar (visual/logical grouping)
Menu Classes
•
•
•
•
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JMenuItem (action event when clicked)
JCheckBoxMenuItem isSelected() method
JRadioButtonMenuItem also has isSelected()
JMenu contains above classes
JMenuBar contains Jmenu classes
JTextArea
• Two constructors:
– JTextArea(int rows, int columns)
– JTextArea(String text, int rows, int columns)
• Methods:
– Void setText(String toDisplay)
– String getText()
– Void setLineWrap(boolean wrapIt)
– Void setFont(Font myFont)
• Frequently embedded in JScrollPane
Controlling Scrolling
• setHorizontalScrollbarPolicy(…)
– JScrollPane.HORIZONTAL.SCROLLBAR_AS_NEEDED
– JScrollPane.HORIZONTAL.SCROLLBAR_NEVER
– JScrollPane.HORIZONTAL.SCROLLBAR_ALWAYS
• setVerticalScrollbarPolicy(…)
– JScrollPane.VERTICAL.SCROLLBAR_AS_NEEDED
– JScrollPane.VERTICAL.SCROLLBAR_NEVER
– JScrollPane.VERTICAL.SCROLLBAR_ALWAYS
• Window Builder makes this a lot easier!
Chapter 13 part 4
• Sliders – A component that allows the user to
adjust a number graphically within a range of
values.
• JSlider constructor
JSlider(int orientation, int minvalue, int maxvalue,
int initialvalue)
• Use – as usual, you can hook events (use a
method named stateChanged, or you use
getValue() method.
• Hooking events is nice for interactive graphics
displays.
Sliders
• setMajorTickSpacing(int howFar) get numbers
but only if you setPaintLabels(true)
• setMinorTickSpacing(int howFar) just tics
but only if you setPaintTicks(true)
Look and Feel
• Call UIManager.setLookAndFeel with a fully
qualified path to a class.
• Then invoke
SwingUtilities.updateComponentTreeUI(this);
• The author shows three example LookAndFeel
classes: Metal, Motif and Windows.
• Regretfully, this doesn’t give access to
Windows chooser goodies.