Multiple frames from a parent frame

[Sumit Mhatre]

Hi,
I want to open multiple frames from a parent frame. I am creating an application. In that I've one main frame along with menus. Using those menus I'm calling another frames in that frame. How to call other frames in the main parent frame ?
Any suggestion / code ...
[ July 27, 2005: Message edited by: Sumit Mhatre ]

[Gregg Bolinger]

JFrame frame = new JFrame();

You might want to be a little more specific with your question if you want a more specific answer.

[Gregg Bolinger]

How did you open your parent frame? Opening a second frame is no different really. In your event handler for whatever menu item, create a new instance of whatever frame you want and make it visible.

[Matthew Taylor]

If you're going to have one main frame of the application and the menu selections are just going to change what is going to be displayed in the frame, I suggest you only create one frame. Then you create custom panel classes to be displayed within that frame. When a menu item is chosen, call a method within the frame to reload with a different panel specified by the menu selection. If you create all the panels upon frame construction, you should be able to save their states even when they aren't being displayed.

Another simpler option might be to use a JTabbedPane and forget about using the menu to navigate the application.

[Scott Carlson]

^bump^

This is exactly what I am looking to do. I am new to Java but I am in a tight bind in learning how to do a GUI from Java by next week. I have been working with JBuilder and the way I want to do my GUI is to have a menu that will display the different panels the user chooses.

Does anyone have an example of this that I could see?

Any advice or tutorials someone might have that talks about calling multiple panels in a single Frame or Window would be great.

Thanks in advance,

Scott

[Michael Dunn]

> the way I want to do my GUI is to have a menu that will display the
> different panels the user chooses

CardLayout is perfect for this scenario.

[Scott Carlson]

I should of been more specific sorry. I want the user to open up new windows or panels when he or she selects a certain menubar option.

Scott

[Michael Dunn]

if you want multiple windows (frames) showing, reply #1 in this thread
is the start of what you have to do.

if you only want the one window (frame) showing, but the panel displayed is
dependent on user (menu) selection, CardLayout is your best option.

[Scott Carlson]

Thanks for the info. I will try and find something on how cardlayout works. If anyone can point me to a good tutorial on this or some advice as to how to set this up that would be great. Otherwise, thanks again.

Scott

[Michael Dunn]

you should get most of your info here

http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutorial/uiswing/layout/card.html


here's a simple demo

import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import javax.swing.*;
 
class Testing extends JFrame
{
  final int CARDS = 4;
  CardLayout cl = new CardLayout();
  public Testing()
  {
    setDefaultCloseOperation(EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
    setLocation(400,300);
    setSize(300,200);
    JMenu menu = new JMenu("Panels");
    final JPanel cardPanel = new JPanel(cl);
    for(int x = 0; x < CARDS; x++)
    {
      final String SELECTION = ""+x;
      JPanel jp = new JPanel();
      if(x == 0) jp.add(new JLabel("Panel 0"));
      else if(x == 1) jp.add(new JTextField("Panel 1",10));
      else if(x == 2) jp.add(new JButton("Panel 2"));
      else jp.add(new JComboBox(new String[]{"Panel 3"}));
      cardPanel.add(""+x,jp);
      JMenuItem menuItem = new JMenuItem("Show Panel "+x);
      menuItem.addActionListener(new ActionListener(){
        public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent ae){
          cl.show(cardPanel, SELECTION);}});
      menu.add(menuItem);
    }
    JMenuBar menuBar = new JMenuBar();
    menuBar.add(menu);
    setJMenuBar(menuBar);
    getContentPane().add(cardPanel);
 
  }
  public static void main(String[] args){new Testing().setVisible(true);}
}

[Boba Jeff]

I have try this demo and he dont work as on tutorial.