Layout Manager

Layout refers to the arrangement of components within the container. The task of laying out the controls is done automatically by the Layout Manager.

The following are the layout managers:

• FlowLayout
• BorderLayout
• CardLayout
• BoxLayout
• GridLayout
• GridBagLayout
• GroupLayout
• SpringLayout

Ø  Java BorderLayout

The BorderLayout is used to arrange the components in five regions: north, south, east, west, and center. Each region (area) may contain one component only. It is the default layout of a frame or window. The BorderLayout provides five constants for each region:

1. public static final int NORTH
2. public static final int SOUTH
3. public static final int EAST
4. public static final int WEST
5. public static final int CENTER

Constructors of BorderLayout class:

• BorderLayout(): creates a border layout but with no gaps between the components.
• BorderLayout(int hgap, int vgap): creates a border layout with the given horizontal and vertical gaps between the components.

Ex:

import java.awt.*;   

import javax.swing.*;   

   

public class Border  

{   

JFrame f;   

Border() 

{   

    f = new JFrame();   

       

     // creating buttons 

    JButton b1 = new JButton("NORTH");; // the button will be labeled as NORTH  

    JButton b2 = new JButton("SOUTH");; // the button will be labeled as SOUTH 

    JButton b3 = new JButton("EAST");; // the button will be labeled as EAST 

    JButton b4 = new JButton("WEST");; // the button will be labeled as WEST 

    JButton b5 = new JButton("CENTER");; // the button will be labeled as CENTER 

       

    f.add(b1, BorderLayout.NORTH); // b1 will be placed in the North Direction   

    f.add(b2, BorderLayout.SOUTH);  // b2 will be placed in the South Direction   

    f.add(b3, BorderLayout.EAST);  // b2 will be placed in the East Direction   

    f.add(b4, BorderLayout.WEST);  // b2 will be placed in the West Direction   

    f.add(b5, BorderLayout.CENTER);  // b2 will be placed in the Center   

    f.setSize(300, 300);   

    f.setVisible(true);   

}   

public static void main(String[] args) {   

    new Border();   

}   

}   

Ø  Java GridLayout

The Java GridLayout class is used to arrange the components in a rectangular grid. One component is displayed in each rectangle.

Constructors of GridLayout class

1. GridLayout(): creates a grid layout with one column per component in a row.
2. GridLayout(int rows, int columns): creates a grid layout with the given rows and columns but no gaps between the components.
3. GridLayout(int rows, int columns, int hgap, int vgap): creates a grid layout with the given rows and columns along with given horizontal and vertical gaps.

Ex:

import java.awt.*;   

import javax.swing.*;   

public class GridLayoutExample 

{   

JFrame frameObj;   

GridLayoutExample() 

{   

frameObj = new JFrame();   

// creating 9 buttons 

JButton btn1 = new JButton("1");   

JButton btn2 = new JButton("2");   

JButton btn3 = new JButton("3");   

JButton btn4 = new JButton("4");   

JButton btn5 = new JButton("5");   

JButton btn6 = new JButton("6");   

JButton btn7 = new JButton("7");   

JButton btn8 = new JButton("8");    

JButton btn9 = new JButton("9");   

   

// adding buttons to the frame 

// since, we are using the parameterless constructor, therfore;  

// the number of columns is equal to the number of buttons we  

// are adding to the frame. The row count remains one. 

frameObj.add(btn1); frameObj.add(btn2); frameObj.add(btn3); 

frameObj.add(btn4); frameObj.add(btn5); frameObj.add(btn6); 

frameObj.add(btn7); frameObj.add(btn8); frameObj.add(btn9);   

 

// setting the grid layout using the parameterless constructor   

frameObj.setLayout(new GridLayout());   

  

frameObj.setSize(300, 300);   

frameObj.setVisible(true);   

} 

 

// main method 

public static void main(String argvs[])  

{   

new GridLayoutExample();   

}   

}   

Ø  Java FlowLayout

The Java FlowLayout class is used to arrange the components in a line, one after another (in a flow). It is the default layout of the applet or panel.

Fields of FlowLayout class

1. public static final int LEFT
2. public static final int RIGHT
3. public static final int CENTER
4. public static final int LEADING
5. public static final int TRAILING

Constructors of FlowLayout class

1. FlowLayout(): creates a flow layout with centered alignment and a default 5 unit horizontal and vertical gap.
2. FlowLayout(int align): creates a flow layout with the given alignment and a default 5 unit horizontal and vertical gap.
3. FlowLayout(int align, int hgap, int vgap): creates a flow layout with the given alignment and the given horizontal and vertical gap.

Ex:

// import statements 

import java.awt.*;   

import javax.swing.*;   

public class FlowLayoutExample 

{  

JFrame frameObj; 

// constructor   

FlowLayoutExample() 

{   

    // creating a frame object 

    frameObj = new JFrame();   

       

     // creating the buttons 

    JButton b1 = new JButton("1");   

    JButton b2 = new JButton("2");   

    JButton b3 = new JButton("3");   

    JButton b4 = new JButton("4");   

    JButton b5 = new JButton("5"); 

    JButton b6 = new JButton("6");   

    JButton b7 = new JButton("7");   

    JButton b8 = new JButton("8");   

    JButton b9 = new JButton("9");   

    JButton b10 = new JButton("10");   

            

    // adding the buttons to frame       

    frameObj.add(b1); frameObj.add(b2); frameObj.add(b3); frameObj.add(b4);     

    frameObj.add(b5); frameObj.add(b6);  frameObj.add(b7);  frameObj.add(b8);   

    frameObj.add(b9);  frameObj.add(b10);     

      

    // parameter less constructor is used therefore, alignment is center  

    // horizontal as well as the vertical gap is 5 units. 

    frameObj.setLayout(new FlowLayout());   

       

    frameObj.setSize(300, 300);   

    frameObj.setVisible(true);   

}   

 

// main method 

public static void main(String argvs[])  

{   

    new FlowLayoutExample();   

}   

}   

Ø  Java BoxLayout

The Java BoxLayout class is used to arrange the components either vertically or horizontally. For this purpose, the BoxLayout class provides four constants. They are as follows:

1. public static final int X_AXIS: Alignment of the components are horizontal from left to right.
2. public static final int Y_AXIS: Alignment of the components are vertical from top to bottom.
3. public static final int LINE_AXIS: Alignment of the components is similar to the way words are aligned in a line, which is based on the ComponentOrientation property of the container. If the ComponentOrientation property of the container is horizontal, then the components are aligned horizontally; otherwise, the components are aligned vertically. For horizontal orientations, we have two cases: left to right, and right to left. If the value ComponentOrientation property of the container is from left to right, then the components are rendered from left to right, and for right to left, the rendering of components is also from right to left. In the case of vertical orientations, the components are always rendered from top to bottom.
4. public static final int PAGE_AXIS: Alignment of the components is similar to the way text lines are put on a page, which is based on the ComponentOrientation property of the container. If the ComponentOrientation property of the container is horizontal, then components are aligned vertically; otherwise, the components are aligned horizontally. For horizontal orientations, we have two cases: left to right, and right to left. If the value ComponentOrientation property of the container is also from left to right, then the components are rendered from left to right, and for right to left, the rendering of components is from right to left. In the case of vertical orientations, the components are always rendered from top to bottom.

Constructor of BoxLayout class

1. BoxLayout(Container c, int axis): creates a box layout that arranges the components with the given axis.

Ø  Java CardLayout

The Java CardLayout class manages the components in such a manner that only one component is visible at a time. It treats each component as a card that is why it is known as CardLayout.

Constructors of CardLayout Class

1. CardLayout(): creates a card layout with zero horizontal and vertical gap.
2. CardLayout(int hgap, int vgap): creates a card layout with the given horizontal and vertical gap.

Commonly Used Methods of CardLayout Class

• public void next(Container parent): is used to flip to the next card of the given container.
• public void previous(Container parent): is used to flip to the previous card of the given container.
• public void first(Container parent): is used to flip to the first card of the given container.
• public void last(Container parent): is used to flip to the last card of the given container.
• public void show(Container parent, String name): is used to flip to the specified card with the given name.

 

Ø  Java GridBagLayout

The Java GridBagLayout class is used to align components vertically, horizontally or along their baseline.

The components may not be of the same size. Each GridBagLayout object maintains a dynamic, rectangular grid of cells. Each component occupies one or more cells known as its display area. Each component associates an instance of GridBagConstraints. With the help of the constraints object, we arrange the component's display area on the grid. The GridBagLayout manages each component's minimum and preferred sizes in order to determine the component's size. GridBagLayout components are also arranged in the rectangular grid but can have many different sizes and can occupy multiple rows or columns.

Constructor:

GridBagLayout(): The parameterless constructor is used to create a grid bag layout manager.

Ø  GroupLayout

GroupLayout groups its components and places them in a Container hierarchically. The grouping is done by instances of the Group class.

Group is an abstract class, and two concrete classes which implement this Group class are SequentialGroup and ParallelGroup.

SequentialGroup positions its child sequentially one after another whereas ParallelGroup aligns its child on top of each other.

The GroupLayout class provides methods such as createParallelGroup() and createSequentialGroup() to create groups.

GroupLayout treats each axis independently. That is, there is a group representing the horizontal axis, and a group representing the vertical axis. Each component must exist in both a horizontal and vertical group, otherwise an IllegalStateException is thrown during layout or when the minimum, preferred, or maximum size is requested.

Ø  Java SpringLayout

A SpringLayout arranges the children of its associated container according to a set of constraints. Constraints are nothing but horizontal and vertical distance between two-component edges. Every constraint is represented by a SpringLayout.Constraint object.

Each child of a SpringLayout container, as well as the container itself, has exactly one set of constraints associated with them.

Each edge position is dependent on the position of the other edge. If a constraint is added to create a new edge, than the previous binding is discarded. SpringLayout doesn't automatically set the location of the components it manages.

Constructor:

SpringLayout(): The default constructor of the class is used to instantiate the SpringLayout class

Ø  ScrollPaneLayout

The layout manager is used by JScrollPane. JScrollPaneLayout is responsible for nine components: a viewport, two scrollbars, a row header, a column header, and four "corner" components.

Constructor:

ScrollPaneLayout(): The parameterless constructor is used to create a new ScrollPanelLayout.