I'm working with a few people to design a game for a project in class. While making the main menu GUI, I searched all over for some way to get the design the way I wanted (here), but I couldn't figure it out. CardLayout, BoxLayout, BorderLayout, GridLayout, none of those have helped in what I'm trying to do, at least not the way I was implementing each layout. Is there some other layout that could help me with aligning the title text and 4 buttons to the left (horizontally) and aligned with each other vertically. Is it possible to use GridLayout with maybe 5 rows and 3 columns and just fill the 2nd and 3rd columns with nothing? I also want there to be sufficient padding between each object and from the bounds of the window.
This is what I've got so far, but this spreads the width of all the buttons across the entire window:
JLabel title = new JLabel("Inkball", JLabel.LEFT);
JPanel panel = new JPanel();
panel.setLayout(new GridLayout(5, 3, 0, 25));
panel.add(title);
panel.add(playNow);
panel.add(highScore);
panel.add(rules);
panel.add(exitGame);
Container c = this.getContentPane();
c.add(panel, BorderLayout.CENTER);
Start with a BorderLayout.
To this, add a JPanel that uses either a GridLayout or GridBagLayout, to the BorderLayout.WEST position of the parent container, this panel will be used to layout the options on the right
Add a JPanel with a CardLayout to the BorderLayout.CENTER position of the first container. This will will allow you to switch between views based on the selection of the user.
You will need to have the ability to obtain notification about user selection from the "menu pane" and update the "view pane". You simply use a ActionListener, registered to the "menu pane", which acts a proxy for the buttons actions and provide information about what the action menus via the actionCommand property of the JButtons and ActionEvent
Have a look at How to Use Buttons, Check Boxes, and Radio Buttons and Laying Out Components Within a Container for more details
Related
I have created a GridLayout for my GUI to show 6 rows and 4 columns. I am trying to get the two buttons I have "Calculate" and "Exit" to show in the 6th row. I only have two pane.add of four for row 5 (which is the weight label and textfield). I'm just trying to get the calculate and exit buttons to be on their own row. I tried to do pane.add(); to fill the gap and couldn't get it to work. What am I missing so that I can get the buttons on their own row?
basically I have
pane.setLayout(new GridLayout(6, 4));
pane.add(score1L);
pane.add(score1TF);
pane.add(weight1L);
pane.add(weight1TF);
pane.add(score2L);
pane.add(score2TF);
pane.add(weight2L);
pane.add(weight2TF);
pane.add(score3L);
pane.add(score3TF);
pane.add(weight3L);
pane.add(weight3TF);
pane.add(score4L);
pane.add(score4TF);
pane.add(weight4L);
pane.add(weight4TF);
pane.add(weightAvgL);
pane.add(weightAvgTF);
pane.add(calculateB);
pane.add(exitB);
Possible options:
Add empty JLabels to fill in any gaps.
Use mixed layouts -- nest JPanels, each using its own layout and add components to them. For example, the overall JPanel could use BorderLayout. The textfields/labels could be in a GridLayout or GridBagLayout using JPanel added BorderLayout.CENTER to the main JPanel. The JButtons could be held in their own GridLayout using JPanel that is then added BorderLayout.PAGE_END to the main JPanel.
Use a layout manager that allows for more complex layouts such as a GridBagLayout, or better perhaps, a 3rd party layout manager such as MigLayout.
Perhaps the best of all --use a JTable to hold your data grid, add it to a JScrollPane, and then place your buttons below the JScrollPane.
So I was trying to google how to set a default size to JButtons so that they don't grow as the JFrame is resized. I didn't see a setDefaultSize method but the closest one I could find that does a similar job is setMaximumSize(). However, it doesn't seem to work in my situation and I'm guessing it's because I'm using Grid Layout for positioning my buttons in the frame, here's a small piece of my code:
rightPanel.add(ButtonA);
rightPanel.add(ButtonB);
rightPanel.add(ButtonC);
outerPanel.add(leftPanel);
outerPanel.add(rightPanel);
getContentPane().add(outerPanel);
Here's a picture of what happens:
I would also like to have my buttons in the middle of the right panel when I'm resizing (just like they are now but a lot smaller). Any idea of how I can fix this? I'm assuming that I have to use another layout or something.
Thanks
EDIT: I modified my code to use BoxLayout but it does not seem to put the buttons in the middle. The X Alignment is working but Y Alignment is not doing anything:
ButtonA.setAlignmentX(CENTER_ALIGNMENT);
ButtonA.setAlignmentY(CENTER_ALIGNMENT);
ButtonB.setAlignmentX(CENTER_ALIGNMENT);
ButtonB.setAlignmentY(CENTER_ALIGNMENT);
ButtonC.setAlignmentX(CENTER_ALIGNMENT);
ButtonC.setAlignmentY(CENTER_ALIGNMENT);
JPanel rightPanel = new JPanel();
rightPanel.setLayout(new BoxLayout(rightPanel, BoxLayout.Y_AXIS));
rightPanel.add(ButtonA);
rightPanel.add(ButtonB);
rightPanel.add(ButtonC);
outerPanel.add(leftPanel);
outerPanel.add(rightPanel);
getContentPane().add(outerPanel);
EDIT2: Fixed with vertical glue.
A GridLayout will always resize the components to fill the space available.
Try using a vertical BoxLayoutinstead. See the section from the Swing tutorial on How to Use Box Layout for more information and examples.
Encapsulate each JButton in a JPanel with a FlowLayout, and then add those FlowLayout JPanels to the rightPanel instead of the JButtons themselves. This will allow you to keep your evenly spaced buttons, but won't make them expand to take up the entire space that the parent container has available.
If you don't want them evenly spaced, but to be three consecutive buttons one after another top down, you can make the right panel have a BorderLayout, add a sub panel to the north area of the BorderLayout with the original GridLayout that the right panel had, and then add those FlowLayout panels containing the JButtons.
I'm working on panel which has four components: a label, a textfield that is uneditable, another label and a JTextArea. These components are aligned vertically one after the other and I am using Box Layout for this panel. What I have noticed is that when I type in the text area component, it shifts the labels character by character till it can't anymore. They labels initially are aligned to the left but as soon as I start typing they start moving to the right. I have tried so many other components but Box Layout seems to do what I want, I just have to fix this error. Any one ideas?
This is my panel code:
JPanel Panel = new JPanel();
Panel.setLayout(new BoxLayout(Panel,BoxLayout.Y_AXIS));
Panel.add(new JLabel("just a label here"));
Panel.add(textFieldComponent);
Panel.add(new JLabel("just a label here"));
Panel.add(textAreaComponent);
Use another LayoutManager e.g. GridBagLayout or
Place the JLabel in a panel with Horizontal BoxLayout (or BorderLayout) to actieve desired alignment.
another alternative:
add the textAreaComponent to a JScrollPane (set the scrollPane's alignmentX to 0.0f)
I had this issue as well and I added: textArea.setLineWrap(true). It prevented other objects from being pushed when you type in the field.
You should definitely use another Layout. One of my personal favorite is Forms from JGoodies. I've yet to see a Java Swing layout that comes anywhere close.
I am using WindowBuilder Pro for eclipse, and I would like to have two Jpanels that perfectly overlap each other. I would then be able to toggle their visibilty based on the selection of a combox box. When I try and acheive this in the gui builder, the first panel gets displaced by the second panel. And advice please?
It is possible using groupLayout, according to the tutorial .
What you must do is add the components to a mother JPanel , and set that panel to use GroupLayout.
Then add the components to the layout as a ParallelGroup in both the horizontal and vertical spacing. This means they will occupy the same X and Y space. Then disable/enable as needed, hiding the JPanels as well.
I believe the way it would work is so:
JPanel panel1, panel2, panel3;
//initialize panel3, etc
panel1=new JPanel();
panel2 = new JPanel();
panel1.add(new JTextField("Panel1"));
panel2.add(new JTextField("PANEL2"));
groupLayout = new GroupLayout(panel3);
panel3.setLayout(groupLayout);
groupLayout.setHorizontalGroup(
groupLayout.createParallelGroup(GroupLayout.Alignment.LEADING)
.addComponent(panel1)
.addComponent(panel2)
);
groupLayout.setVerticalGroup(
groupLayout.createParallelGroup(GroupLayout.Alignment.LEADING)
.addComponent(panel1)
.addComponent(panel2)
);
panel1.setEnabled(false);
panel1.setVisible(false);
then add a jCheckBox with an ActionPerformed method containing:
if(panel1.isEnabled()) {
panel1.setEnabled(false);
panel1.setVisible(false);
panel2.setEnabled(true);
panel2.setVisible(true);
}else
if(panel2.isEnabled()) {
panel2.setEnabled(false);
panel2.setVisible(false);
panel1.setEnabled(true);
panel1.setVisible(true);
}
That produced the desired behaviour for me. You should be able to switch the JComboBox for the JCheckBox fairly easily.
EDIT: Removed the necessity of having "Jpanel of their own". That should not be the case, and the above method allows you to get the benefits of both GroupLayout and CardLayout.
I would like to have two Jpanels that perfectly overlap each other. I would then be able to toggle their visibilty based on the selection of a combox box
See: How to Use Card Layout for an example that does exactly this.
I would like to have two Jpanels that perfectly overlap each other.
I believe the CardLayout is there exactly for that reason.
Basically, you can nest different panels or 'Cards' using the CardLayout and set the appropriate card to be displayed programmatically (on some event).
My current problem is that I have a JFrame with a 2x2 GridLayout. And inside one of the squares, I have a JPanel that is to display a grid. I am having a field day with the java swing library... take a look
Image
Java is automatically expanding each JLabel to fit the screen. I want it to just be those blue squares (water) and the black border and not that gray space. Is there a way I can just set the size of that JPanel permanently so that I don't have to go through changing the size of the JFrame a million times before I get the exact dimension so that the gray space disappears?
I also would like to set the size of those buttons so they are not so huge (BorderLayout is being used for the buttons and TextField)
GridBagLayout is what you really want to use. The GridLayout will force the same size for each component in the layout no matter what size constraints you put on them. GridBagLayout is a lot more powerful and a lot more complicated. Study up on the API page for it. Using GridBagLayout, the components won't fill the whole grid space if you don't want them to and can even stay the size that you ask it to be. To keep a component's size from changing, I would set all three available size constraints:
water.setPreferredSize(new Dimension(20, 20));
water.setMinimumSize(new Dimension(20, 20));
water.setMaximumSize(new Dimension(20, 20));
For your buttons, I would definitely use an inner panel as Bryan mentions. You could use either a GridLayout like he suggests or a FlowLayout if you don't want all the buttons to be the same size. Add all your buttons to that inner panel instead of the main one.
If you want the two checkerboards to stay the same size, then you'll need to have them each contained in their own JPanel. Set each of those parent JPanel's to have a layout type of GridBagLayout. Set the preferedSize for each checkerboard component and then add them to their respective containers. GridBagLayout should by default lay each board out in the center of the parent JPanel. So as the window is resized, the JPanel parent area will get larger or smaller, but the checkerboard components inside will remain the same size.
Alternatively, you could have your blue squares scale to the right size as the window is resized by having each checkboard square be a JPanel with a BorderLayout layout manager and adding the JLabel (with a blue background color) to its BorderLayout.CENTER location.
As for your buttons, try something like this:
JPanel theButtonPanel = new JPanel(new BorderLayout());
JButton button1 = new JButton("Fire");
JButton button2 = new JButton("Pass");
JButton button3 = new JButton("Forfiet");
JPanel innerButtonContainer = new JPanel(new Grid(1, 3, 8, 8));
innerButtonContainer.add(button1);
innerButtonContainer.add(button2);
innerButtonContainer.add(button3);
theButtonPanel.add(innterButtonContainer);
Lastly, consider using a design tool for your Swing user interface. Netbeans has an excellent UI designer built into it. Download Netbeans here.
If you can setResizeable( false ) on the top level frame you can then set your layout manager to null and hard code each location and size via setBounds. This is how I would do it (contingent on resizing of course).
I have had success solving problems like these using TableLayout which is a third party layout manager. You will need to download it and read the tutorial but the key would be to set the justification to CENTER when adding the JButtons to their positions in the layout.