NetBeans - How to show all Swing components in a JFrame? - java

I'm making a Swing GUI with NetBeans, using the built-in form maker, which works quite well.
However, if I accidentally put the wrong panel on a form, I have no way to delete it, or select it again.
Likewise, if I want a button to open a new window, say, a file chooser, I don't know how to add that file chooser to the form, but not have it appear until the button is pressed.
Does anyone have any experience with the NetBeans Swing form builder? This seems like a common thing to have to do, but I don't see how to do it. Am I missing something?

Yay a netbeans user!Yea there should be a navigator window in the bottom left corner. There it displays all of the components on the form. Im not too sure what you mean by a file chooser, but to open a new window,ie another Jform, you create another form class. Then you create that form and setVisible.
So lets say you have
a form mainProgram
And form helpMenu
In the mainProgram
public mainProgram(){
InitComponents();//or something on the lines of that
helpMenu helpMenuWindow = new helpMenuWindow();
helpMenu.setVisible(true);
}
This will allow you to be able to open new windows, but if you click on the red X to close the window, it closes your whole program. In properties for the helpMenu pane you can select the option for what the window should do on exit.
Exit
Hide
Do nothing
In the code above is the code that is run before the Jpane displays, if you want to show or hide items, just code
Object.setVisible(boolean);
I hope I answered your question Tetramputechture.

Related

Java Eclipse, how to make Windowbuilder show all Panels after execution?

I am working with WindowBuilder at the moment but have a problem making it display all panels in the program in the "Components" Window. I have a "StartPanel" for example with a button which when clicked causes the program to switch from "startPanel" to "nextPanel". Everything fine but in this case, "nextPanel" isnt shown in the "components" window, why?
When I however copy all the code which creates the "nextPanel" and write it outside of the "ActionListener" so that I do not have to click a button to create it, it appears in the "components" window. Is there a way to make every panel appear in "Components"? At the moment I have a frame with a getContentPane which has the 2 Panels in it, but only 1 is shown if I add the second one with a button..
I suggest you to create the next panel as a separate component (separate class file) so that you can edit it using window builder any time, and then instantiate it in the action listener.

How to display a custom dialog in netbeans JFrame editor?

I am using the JFrame feature in NetBeans in order to make it simpler to customize and edit. In my program, clicking a button calls an action that displays a dialog box. I want to have an image inside of that dialog box. In NetBeans along with its JFrame editor you can add boxes and customize them, along with a dialog box. Which means it will be easier to edit that dialog box.
How to I call that custom dialog box to display when the button is clicked?
To put it more simply without the need for puting code. I have created a cusome dialog box in netbeans GUI builder. Now, how to I call/use that custome dialog box inside of my actual JFrame, which was also coded inside the netbeans GUI editor, and is located inside the same package and all.
First Drag and drop Swing Windows >> Dialog.
Then inside your code write this line to show it
jDialog1.setVisible (true);
After that double click on the Dialog design and add as many components as you like
Best Wishes

New window inside a main window?

I am a beginner and I am trying to make a text editor and I want to create a pop up window for text format when I press a menu button where I can put all things like font face, font size , font style etc. Can you tell me how I can make this new window? Thanks for your patience!
For example Notepad:
I think what you're after is a dialog of some kind.
Take a look at How to Make Dialogs for more details.
What I would do is design the basic UI onto a JPanel. I would then add this JPanel to an instance of a JDialog (possibly even using a JOptionPane) and show this dialog, making sure to make it modal, so you can easily retrieve the values set by the user.
This means that you can decide how best to show the user interface or even show it in a number of different ways as it's not constrained to a single top level container
You can simply create a brand spanking new JFrame and it will still be counted as the same application.
Tip: Use Eclipse Window Builder

How do you add Background Image in JPanel (NetBeans GUI Builder)

I have JTabbedPane with five tabs and each have Jpanel i want add different images for each panel in NetBeans IDE
Right click on your project and add a new package, name it resources. This will need to be done so Netbeans imports your picture into that folder
Add a JLabel to the Panel
Hightlight the JLabel and go to the Properties pane on the right
In the property that says icon click the ... button. That will take you to a dialog
Choose External Image radio button
Click the ... next to the file text field
Pick your Image and click OK.
Click Import to Project
Click OK, You should see the image in your graphic layout
Note this will only give you an Image, but doesn't really act as a background, because the JLabel is it's own component. I'm not really sure how to achieve a backgroud with GUI Builder. I'm not too familiar with the technology. Though if you were to write your own code, there are numerous answers here on SO that I'm sure you'll find useful. The only tricky thing about GUI Builder is that they have auto-generated code that you really can't play around with, which circumvents what I know about creating a background image.
NOTE : this only works for JLabels as JPanels don't use Icon. An alternative would be to hand write your own JPanel code in the constructor and draw the image, overriding the paintComponent method.
Change the layout of your Jframe to null.
Create a jlabel and cover whole jframe with it.
Add your image to the icon property of the inserted jlabel.
Change the layout of jframe back to free layout.
You are done 👍👍
It worked for me
May be you'll find this link useful.
This tutorial shows you how to use the IDE's GUI Builder to generate the code to include images (and other resources) in your application. In addition, you will learn how to customize the way the IDE generates image handling code.
Handling Images in a Java GUI Application
Basically, following are the steps.
Drag a Label to the JFrame
Add a new package (for the image to be stored)
Select Label and go to the Properties category
Select the Icon property and click 'Import to Project...'
Select the image and then the newly created package
In Properties window of Label, select text property and delete it.

on click add dynamic text area -like object in Java

The title is a bit confusing, but I will be using Java and Jframe. Basically, I want to be able to click anywhere on the form and have a "text area/box" show up (maybe use a JTextField or JTextArea ?). I want the user to be able to edit, delete and move this string around as well.
I am thinking I need an actionlistener to listen for clicks on the form. Each click will call for a new text"box" to be created. I am not sure how to make this "box" editable, deleteable, or moveable by the user though.
I need a way to store the string and co-ordinate data too. Would it be a good idea to simply extend the JTextField or JTextArea to add co-ordinate information to them? I see that swing is event based, so I need some kind of trigger to "save" the text (was thinking the enter key, but I realize I'd like the user to be able to enter multi-line strings).
Any thoughts would be appreciated. I am familiar with Java but only have a bit of experience with the UI portion.
Instead of an ActionListener you will need a MouseListener to track clicks.
Sounds like you need an undecorated JInternalFrame with a text box in it on JDesktopPane. However, I don't think you can create an undecorated JInternalFrame, maybe start with a normal JInternalFrame with a TextBox in it and create new frames on mouse clicks on the Desktop Pane. Then see if you can make the JInternalFrame more like a Window.
Another route is a custom component that does everything you need. This is possible, just a lot more custom code.

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