Java Programming Tutorial - 68 - JComboBox Video Lecture - Java Programming

what is going on guys welcome to your
68th draft tutorial and in this story
I'm going to tell you guys how to make
something called J combo boxes now well
Jake combo boxes it's pretty much just a
drop down list but that's what Java
named it so you know they had to be
different so let's go ahead and enough
of the small talk let's get started
making it and I just want to tell you
guys what this combo box is going to do
is it's going to give you a list of
pictures to drop down in your drop down
list and depending on what picture you
select is what's going to appear on the
screen so that's a real quick overview
of the program so we need two variables
one is going to be the J combo box which
is going to be the drop down list itself
and I'm just going to name my box you
can name your list if you want but again
I'm going to name em box and the next
thing we need is the picture to appear
on the right hand side of it so I'm
going to make it private J label in the
picture is our name J label in Java and
I'm going to name my variable picture I
mean why not it's nice and easy now the
next thing we need to create is actually
two arrays now you see here I already
have two images be paying in X topping
and these are pretty much just an image
that says be an image that says X with a
little graphics on it so we need to
create two arrays the first array is
going to store the file name and the
second array is going to store the
picture itself so let's go ahead and put
grab it static we don't want it to
change string in remember this is going
to store the path and the path is just a
string and I'm going to name it file a
name and we'll set it equal to B duck
ping and make sure you're put in quotes
since it's a string so that's the first
element of the array and the second one
is X dot ping make sure I got PNG PNG in
so now we have an array called file name
and it has two elements in it beat-up
ping and x stopping simple enough now
let's go ahead and add it or excuse me
create a new array that is an icon array
and we do it like that and we'll name
this
one picks and this is going to store the
files there themselves so let's go ahead
and as the first element what we need to
do is put new image icon and for the
parameter of image icon put get class
and it's going to be this class itself
it's going to select and get resource
and the resource for this is going to be
the parameter it takes as a name and for
the name we can write beat-up ping but
let's go ahead and write file a name
with the index of zero so our first
element in this array is the file name
index of zero so let's see one to make
sure I got my parentheses there lot of
parentheses here yep that's right so now
let's go ahead and just copy this so the
first element in this pix array is
pretty much this B picture itself this
is just a file name this is the actual
image so let's go ahead and add the
second array by pasting that in the
second element is file name one remember
arrays start at zero and then the next
one is 1 so now we can go ahead and go
to our next line so now we got two
arrays one stores the file names and one
stores the pictures and we're actually
going to be using the file names later
so that's why I just didn't put the file
names right here you'll see why in a
little bit so now that we got all our
variables in arrays we can go ahead and
start building the constructor like we
always do
so public my class is named GUI and
let's go ahead and add a body of that
constructor and the first thing we're
going to want to add as always is the
title and I'm just going to write the
title not fancy and set layout su there
we go in the layout for this since we
don't learn layouts yet is new flow
layout just like that so now we have a
title in a layout on our window what
else can we do the first thing we're
going to want to do is create that
drop-down box with the file names is the
list options
so I'm going to take that box variable
that I created up here and set it equal
to nu J combo box if I can spell and the
parameter it takes here is an array of
options and since we want our options to
be beeping and X ping so the user knows
what's going on go ahead and write file
a name in here and what this will do is
automatically put all of these options
in a list for us how cool is that
so now let's go ahead and get my cursor
set up and go the next line and what can
we do after this well we have this box
this drop-down box just chilling here
right now what we want to do is add some
functionality to it and we do this by
adding adding an item listener so
actually I'm going to do this in next
tutorial since it's going to take a
while I know I'm going to run out of
time in this tutorial but an overview
right now we created a box we created
variable for the picture that we want to
appear on the right side of the
drop-down box we created an array of
file names and array of images of my two
images we added a title set the layout
for our window and we added a box to the
window then in the next tutorial we're
actually going to be adding some events
to this box so when you click one of the
options something actually happens but
for now that's it for this tutorial
thank you guys for watching don't forget
to subscribe and I'll see you next door