JAVAFX UI CONTROLS AND MULTIMEDIA - Introduction to Java Programming: Comprehensive Version - page 630

16.1 Introduction
JavaFX provides many UI controls for developing a comprehensive user interface.

Key
Point

A graphical user interface (GUI) makes a system user-friendly and easy to use. Creating a
GUI requires creativity and knowledge of how UI controls work. Since the UI controls in
JavaFX are very flexible and versatile, you can create a wide assortment of useful user inter-
faces for rich Internet applications.
Oracle provides tools for visually designing and developing GUIs. This enables the program-
mer to rapidly assemble the elements of a GUI with minimum coding. Tools, however, cannot
do everything. You have to modify the programs they produce. Consequently, before you begin
to use the visual tools, you must understand the basic concepts of JavaFX GUI programming.
Previous chapters used UI controls such as Button , Label , and TextField . This chapter
introduces the frequently used UI controls in detail (see Figure 16.1).

GUI

Button

Node Parent Control Labeled ButtonBase

CheckBox

Covered in
Chapter 14

ScrollBar Label

ImageView

ToggleButton

RadioButton

Slider

MediaView

TextArea

TextInputControl

TextField PasswordField

ListView

ComboBoxBase ComboBox

F IGURE 16.1

These UI controls are frequently used to create user interfaces.

Note
Throughout this topic, the prefixes lbl , bt , chk , rb , tf , pf , ta , cbo , lv , scb ,
sld , and mp are used to name reference variables for Label , Button , CheckBox ,
RadioButton , TextField , PasswordField , TextArea , ComboBox , ListView ,
ScrollBar , Slider , and MediaPlayer .

naming convention
for controls

16.2 Labeled and Label
A label is a display area for a short text, a node, or both. It is often used to label other controls
(usually text fields). Labels and buttons share many common properties. These common prop-
erties are defined in the Labeled class, as shown in Figure 16.2.
A Label can be constructed using one of the three constructors as shown in Figure 16.3.
The graphic property can be any node such as a shape, an image, or a control. Listing 16.1
gives an example that displays several labels with text and images in the label, as shown in
Figure 16.4.

L ISTING 16.1

LabelWithGraphic.java
1 import javafx.application.Application;
2 import javafx.stage.Stage;
3 import javafx.scene.Scene;
4 import javafx.scene.control.ContentDisplay;
5 import javafx.scene.control.Label;