Threads - JavaTech: An Introduction to Scientific and Technical Computing with Java - page 284

8.7.2 javax.swing.Timer
Although it has fewer options, the javax.swing.Timer can do some of the
same basic timing tasks as java.util.Timer . Below we show another version
of the digital clock except that it uses javax.swing.Timer . This timer con-
tacts an ActionListener after every time period rather than a TimerTask
object. Here the applet implements the ActionListener interface. The con-
structor for the timer takes as arguments the update period value and the reference
to the applet. The timer is then started and after every second the actionPer-
formed() method will be invoked and the clock panel repainted. The applet's
stop() method stops the timer.

import javax.swing.*;
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.util.*;

/** This applet implements Runnable and uses a thread
*tocreate a digital clock. **/
public class ClockTimer2 extends JApplet
implements ActionListener

{

javax.swing.Timer fTimer;

// Need panel reference in run().
DateFormatPanel fClockPanel;

public void init () {
Container content - pane = getContentPane ();

// Create an instance of DrawingPanel
fClockPanel = new DateFormatPanel ();

// Add the DrawingPanel to the contentPane.
content - pane.add (fClockPanel);

}

public void start () {
// Send events very 1000ms.
fTimer = new javax.swing.Timer (1000, this);

// Then start the timer.
fTimer.start ();

}