GUI Programming in Java
Tim McKenna Seneca@York
GUI Programming Concepts
conventional programming:
sequence of operations is determined by the program what you want to happen, happens when you want it
event-driven programming:
sequence of operations is determined by the users interaction with the applications interface anything that can happen, happens at any time
GUI Design Concepts
a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention - Herbert Simon Principles of good GUI Design IBM's Design concepts Saul Greenberg's HCI pages Tim's HCI notes
GUI Programming Concepts in Java
Java GUI ("Swing") has components Windows GUI has controls Unix GUI has widgets examples: labels, buttons, check boxes, radio buttons, text input boxes, pull down lists Java Swing components: JLabel, JButton,
JCheckBox, JRadioButton, JTextField, JTextArea, JComboBox
Java GUI history: the AWT
AWT(JDK 1.0, 1.1): Abstract Window Toolkit package: java.awt, java.awt.event heavyweight components using native GUI system elements used for applets until most browsers supported JRE 1.2
Swing in Java
Swing(Java 2, JDK 1.2+) lightweight components that do not rely on the native GUI or OS look and feel of Swing components are identical on different platforms can be customized Swing inherits from AWT AWT still used for events, layouts
Swing Components in Java
advanced GUI support. e.g. drag-and-drop package names: javax.swing, javax.swing.event components inherit from JComponent components are added to a top-level container: JFrame, JDialog, or JApplet.
running a Swing application
java -Dswing.aatext=true MySwingClass
the option sets the system property "swing.aatext" to "true" to enable antialiasing for every JComponent
javaw runs a GUI without the console window e.g. HelloWorldSwing.java
Basic GUI Programming Steps in Java
declare a container and components add components to one or more containers using a layout manager register event listener(s) with the components create event listener method(s)
Basic GUI Programming Concepts in Java
Example: JFrameDemoTM.java,
JFrameDemoTM2.java, JFrameDemo.java container : a screen window/applet window/panel that groups and arranges GUI components GUI component: an object with visual representation Swing containers: JFrame, JApplet, JPanel
AWT containers: Frame, Applet, Panel
GUI Programming: The Java Approach
event-driven programming
a piece of code (i.e. event handler) is attached to a GUI component an event handler is called when an event (e.g. a mouse click) is activated / fired
The Delegation Event Model in Java
processing of an event is delegated to an object (the listener) in the program
Event-driven Programming in Java
event source: a GUI component that
generates / fires an event
event: a user interaction
(e.g. a click on the button)
event listener: an object that has implemented event handlers to react to an event
Event Handling in Java
the delegation event model
- event listeners must be registered with an event source in order to receive notification
Event Handling in Java
registration of an event listener
- write a class that implements an
[event type]Listener interface
- create an instance of that class (i.e. an event listener) - register the listener with a GUI component: add[event type]Listener ( <an event listener> )
Event Handling in Java
a listener interface has a list of standard event handlers (i.e. methods) API documentation - java.awt.event - event classes - listener interfaces - adapter classes
Event Handling in Java
different ways of coding the event listeners
JFrameDemoTM.java uses named inner classes. JFrameDemoTM2.java uses named inner classes and shows how to consolidate window closing from two different events. JFrameDemo.java does not use inner classes.
