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Overlapping Swing Components

I have two AWT components in the frame, panel A and panel B. I would like panel A to be relative to the width of the frame height (and maintain that size when resizing the frame), but I would like panel B to overlap A. B will be in a fixed position (0,0 for simplicity) with a fixed height and width. I'm not sure which layout manager I need to make this work. If I'm using a zero layout I think I'll have to control the resizing of Panel A, but that will make it easier to size Panel B. Any thoughts on how to do this?

thank you jeff

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3 answers


Take a look at JLayeredPane

s . Here's a tutorial .

edit:

If panelA is an AWT component, it will be difficult for you to press panel B to overlap. From a Sun article entitled Mixing Heavy and Light Components :

Do not mix lightweight (Swing) and heavyweight (AWT) components in a container where the lightweight component is expected to overlap the heavyweight.

However, if you want to completely fill PanelA, why not add panelB as a component of PanelA?



Edit2:

If you can make panel B a heavyweight component, you can use JLayeredPane

.

Here's a quick mockup that shows you how:

public static void main(String[] args){
    new GUITest();
}

public GUITest() {
    frame = new JFrame("test");
    frame.setSize(300,300);
    addStuffToFrame();
    SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable(){
        public void run() {
            frame.setVisible(true);
        }
    });

}       

private void addStuffToFrame() {    
    Panel awtPanel = new Panel();
    awtPanel.setBackground(Color.blue);
    //here you can fool around with the pane:
    //first, you can see how the layered pane works by switching the 
    //DEFUALT_LAYER and PALLETTE_LAYER back and forth between the two panels
    //and re-compiling to see the results
    awtPanel.setSize(200,300);
    frame.getLayeredPane().add(awtPanel, JLayeredPane.DEFAULT_LAYER);
    //next you comment out the above two lines and 
    //uncomment the following line. this will give you the desired effect of
    //awtPanel filling in the entire frame, even on a resize. 
    //frame.add(awtPanel);

    Panel awtPanel2 = new Panel();
    awtPanel2.setBackground(Color.red);
    awtPanel2.setSize(300,200);
    frame.getLayeredPane().add(awtPanel2,JLayeredPane.PALETTE_LAYER);
}
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Your best bet is to have your own LayoutManager. The easiest way is probably a BorderLayout extension or proxy and the specific case for layout panel B.



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Maybe I missed something. If B is a fixed size and is at (0,0) and A runs through the entire width, what does B use to overlap A? You will never see anything under B.

I can't think of any of the default layout managers, but Orielly has one you can use: a relative layout manager (see source code link) with documentation . I haven't used it in a long time, but it has to manage the layout by itself.

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