12 User Iteractions

Goals

In this lab you will learn a little about programming user interactions using the Model-View-Control pattern for organizing the responsibilities.

The JPT library allows you to concentrate on the key concepts and avoid the pitfalls of multitude of details, typically associated with GUI programming.

The Existing Balloon Controls

Examine briefly the code already supplied with the lab. The code consists of the following classes:

class Balloon represents one balloon object, allows the user to move it, paint it, and to compare two balloons for closeness to the top of the graphics window.
interface BalloonInput contains two methods: demandBalloon() and requestBalloon().
class ConsoleBalloonInput implements the BalloonInput interface used for reading the input from the console.
class BalloonInputView defines a GUI to request the user input for the data needed to initialize one Balloon instance. It contains two TextFieldViews, one SliderView, and one ColorView.
class GUIBalloonInput implements the BalloonInput interface for extracting the user input from the BalloonInputView GUI.

Run the code, and note the behavior in response to the various buttons.

Answer the following questions

Read the code for the class Balloon. Add the method eraseBalloon which will paint the balloon in a white color (Color.white. Make sure you have the examples and tests for this method.
Read the code for the method testConsoleInput in the class Interactions. Describe to your partner (find one, just for this exercise) what the method does. Look at the ConsoleBalloonInput class to make sure you understand how the input is being read in.
Find the code for the action for the New button. Currently, it only sets the value of the Balloon instance variables. Add to this action a call to the method which paints the balloon, from the class Balloon. Make sure it works.
Find all places where the xTFV is defined or used. Talk with your partner and make sure you understand what is the purpose of each of these code segments.

Using a similar technique, define a new TextFieldView named rTFV, to represent the numerical value of the Balloon radius.

Test the behavior of the slider. Does it have any effect on the balloon? Does it have any effect on the value displayed in the rTFV field? Change the value of the rTFV field. Does it affect the slider? Does it affect the balloon?
Define two new SimpleActions and the corresponding methods -- an rTFVaction and a SliderAction. It does not matter what you choose for the label, because we are not going to use the actions with a button.

The first one void rTFVaction will be invoked when the value in the field rTFV changes. It should then set the value of the balloon radius and the value of the rSlider to the value displayed in the rTFV. To set the state of the rSlider use the method
```
rSlider.setViewState("" + b.radius);
```
The second method void rSliderAction() will be invoked every time the location of the slider (and the value it represents) changes. It must then change the radius of the balloon and set the view state of the rTFV calling the method setViewState in a manner similar to the above. If you run the program now, you may be surprised to see that these changes have no effect. Can you think of the way to test that the methods work correctly?
Now you have to tell the rSlider and the rTFV to perform this action when their values change. The following two statements have to be added at the end of the method void createViews():
```
rTFV.addActionListener(rTFVaction);
rSlider.addSlidingAction(sliderAction);
```
Test that this works.
Now that you have seen the method setViewState, add such method to the class BalloonInputView. To see that is works, we need to modify some of the fields of a Balloon instance and invoke the method. Try it.
In the last part you will control the balloon with the mouse. The first thing you need to do is to change the manner in which the GUI is displayed. Look at the code in the class Interactions for the method testBalloonControl(). Replace the line which calls the method showOKDialog with the following:
```
JPTFrame.createQuickJPTFrame("Balloon Control", bc);
```
This places the BalloonControl into a window that runs in its own thread, i.e. independently of the rest of the application. That allows the rest of the appplication to watch out for the mouse movement and clicks inside of the graphics window.
The first mouse action you will build will increase the radius of the balloon by ten, every time you click the mouse. All of this is in the class BalloonControl. Start by defining the method
protected click(MouseEvent mevt) which does the following:
- Print into the console a message that the mouse was clicked.
- Erase the balloon
- Increase the balloon radius by 10
- Set the view state of the BalloonInputView bView to the current values of the balloon. (Only the radius has changed, but it is easier to let the BalloonView do the whole job by invoking the method setViewState.
- Finally, paint the changed balloon.
We need to ask the window to provide us with its MouseActionAdapter as follows:
- After the definition of the BufferedPanel, add the definition:
```
  public MouseActionAdapter mouseAdapter;
```
- Inside of the constructor for the class BalloonControl first initialize the mouseAdapter as follows:
```
  mouseAdapter = window.getMouseActionAdapter();
```
- Add the action to perform when the mouse is clicked as follows:
```
  // respond to mouse clicks
  mouseAdapter.addMouseClickedAction(
    new MouseAction() {
      public void mouseActionPerformed(MouseEvent mevt){
        click(mevt);
      }        
    });  
	
```
  At this point you should test that your program runs as you expected.
- Finally, you will make the balloon move when the mouse moves. Do all the steps you have done for the clicked action, but do not get a new mouseAdapter. The following code will add the action:
```
  // track mouse motions
  mouseAdapter.addMouseMovedAction(
    new MouseAction() {
      public void mouseActionPerformed(MouseEvent mevt){
        track(mevt);
      }       
    }); 
```
  Inside of the track method get the coordinates of the mouse as follows:
```
  b.x = mevt.getX();
  b.y = mevt.getY();
```
  and see what your program does. (Probably nothing - you still have to erase the old balloon, before you make the changes, paint the new balloon, and as a courtesy, set the view state for the view.) Now you should have fun.

Last modified: Tuesday, April 5th, 2005
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