GUI BASICS - Introduction to Java Programming - page 463

You can set a border for any object of the JComponent class. Swing has several types of
borders. To create a titled border, use new TitledBorder(String title) . To create a
line border, use new LineBorder(Color color, int width) , where width specifies
the thickness of the line.
Listing 12.7 is an example to demonstrate Swing common features. The example creates a
panel p1 to hold three buttons (line 8) and a panel p2 to hold two labels (line 26), as shown in
Figure 12.12. The background of the button jbtLeft is set to white (line 12) and the fore-
ground of the button jbtCenter is set to green (line 13). The tool tip of the button jbtRight
is set in line 14. Titled borders are set on panels p1 and p2 (lines 18, 37) and line borders are
set on the labels (lines 33-34).

border

Cross-hair cursor

Titled border

Having the mouse cursor
over the Right button
displays the tool tip text

Titled border
Line border

F IGURE 12.12

The font, color, border, and tool tip text are set in the message panel.

The mouse cursor is set to the cross-hair shape in p1 (line 19). The Cursor class contains
the constants for specifying the cursor shape such as DEFAULT_CURSOR ( ),
CROSSHAIR_CURSOR ( ), HAND_CURSOR ( ), MOVE_CURSOR ( ), TEXT_CURSOR ( ,
and so on. A Cursor object for the cross-hair cursor is created using new
Cursor(Cursor.CROSSHAIR_CURSOR) (line 19) and this cursor is set for p1 . Note that the
default mouse cursor is still used in p2 , because the program does not explicitly set a mouse
cursor for p2 .

mouse cursor

L ISTING 12.7 TestSwingCommonFeatures.java
1 import java.awt.*;

2 import javax.swing.*;

3 import javax.swing.border.*;

4
5 public class TestSwingCommonFeatures extends JFrame {
6 public TestSwingCommonFeatures() {
7 // Create a panel to group three buttons
8 JPanel p1 = new JPanel( new FlowLayout(FlowLayout.LEFT, 2 , 2 ));
9 JButton jbtLeft = new JButton( "Left" );
10 JButton jbtCenter = new JButton( "Center" );
11 JButton jbtRight = new JButton( "Right" );
12
13
14
15 p1.add(jbtLeft);
16 p1.add(jbtCenter);
17 p1.add(jbtRight);
18
19
20
21

jbtLeft.setBackground(Color.WHITE);

set background
set foreground
set tool tip text

jbtCenter.setForeground(Color.GREEN);

jbtRight.setToolTipText( "This is the Right button" );

p1.setBorder( new TitledBorder( "Three Buttons" ));

set titled border
set mouse cursor

p1.setCursor( new Cursor(Cursor.CROSSHAIR_CURSOR));

// Create a font and a line border

22
23

Font largeFont = new Font( "TimesRoman" , Font.BOLD, 20 );

create a font
create a border

Border lineBorder = new LineBorder(Color.BLACK, 2 );