javaswingjpanelsetbackground

Background color won't change in panel


The following code produces a window with buttons, but an error message pops up when I run i and actally press the button. According to the Spring tooltip:

Cannot make a static reference to the non-static method setBackground(Color) from the type JComponent

This program is literally entered from my Java textbook line for line, as far as I can tell. It's an older book, so there might be incompatibility, but it doesn't seem likely.

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

public class ButtonTest
{
    public static void main(String[] args)
    {
        final ButtonFrame frame = new ButtonFrame();
        frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
        frame.show();
}
}

class ButtonFrame extends JFrame
{
    public ButtonFrame()
    {
    setTitle("Button Test");
    setSize(Default_width, Default_height);

        //panel
        ButtonPanel panel = new ButtonPanel();
        Container contentPane=getContentPane();
        contentPane.add(panel);
    }

    public static final int Default_width = 300;
public static final int Default_height = 200;
}

class ButtonPanel extends JPanel
{
public ButtonPanel()
{
    JButton yellowButton = new JButton("Yellow");
    JButton blueButton = new JButton("Blue");
    JButton redButton = new JButton("Red");

    add(yellowButton);
    add(blueButton);
    add(redButton);

    ColorAction yellowAction= new ColorAction(Color.YELLOW);
    ColorAction redAction = new ColorAction(Color.RED);
    ColorAction blueAction = new ColorAction(Color.BLUE);

    yellowButton.addActionListener(yellowAction);
    blueButton.addActionListener(blueAction);
    redButton.addActionListener(redAction);
    }
}

    class ColorAction implements ActionListener
    {
        public ColorAction(Color c)
    {
        backgroundColor=c;
    }

    public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent event)
    {
    ButtonPanel.setBackground(backgroundColor);
    }

        private Color backgroundColor;
}

Solution

  • One approach is to nest ColorAction as an inner class in ButtonPanel, where it has implicit access to the enclosing panel.

    Addendum: As noted in comments by @Andrew Thompson and @nachokk, the implicit accessibility can be made explicit by qualifying this using the enclosing class name. See JLS §15.8.4. Qualified this for details. In this example, these two invocations are equivalent:

     setBackground(backgroundColor);
     ButtonPanel.this.setBackground(backgroundColor);
    

    As an more general alternative, consider encapsulating the target panel and color in an Action, as outlined here.

    image

    class ButtonPanel extends JPanel {
    
        public ButtonPanel() {
            JButton yellowButton = new JButton("Yellow");
            JButton blueButton = new JButton("Blue");
            JButton redButton = new JButton("Red");
    
            add(yellowButton);
            add(blueButton);
            add(redButton);
    
            ColorAction yellowAction = new ColorAction(Color.YELLOW);
            ColorAction redAction = new ColorAction(Color.RED);
            ColorAction blueAction = new ColorAction(Color.BLUE);
    
            yellowButton.addActionListener(yellowAction);
            blueButton.addActionListener(blueAction);
            redButton.addActionListener(redAction);
        }
    
        private class ColorAction implements ActionListener {
    
            public ColorAction(Color c) {
                backgroundColor = c;
            }
    
             @Override
             public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent event) {
                setBackground(backgroundColor);
            }
            private Color backgroundColor;
        }
    }