Menus, Dialogs and the Notepad App

Menus

Menus need a MenuBar attached to the Frame, containing Menu objects with MenuItems:

MenuBar bar = new MenuBar();
Menu file = new Menu("File");
file.add(new MenuItem("New"));
file.add(new MenuItem("Open"));
file.add(new MenuItem("Exit"));
bar.add(file);
setMenuBar(bar);

Menus can nest (sub-menus) and items fire ActionEvent just like buttons.

File and Print Dialogs

FileDialog opens native open/save dialogs without extra code:

FileDialog fd = new FileDialog(this, "Open", FileDialog.LOAD);
fd.setVisible(true);
String file = fd.getFile();

Edit Operations

A TextArea supports clipboard operations directly with cut(), copy() and paste(), which are wired into a File/Edit menu.

The Notepad Demo

Combining a menu bar, file dialog and text area builds a small Notepad editor - open a file into the TextArea, edit it, and save it back.

Key Points

• MenuBar > Menu > MenuItem is the menu structure.
• FileDialog gives native open/save without extra code.
• cut(), copy() and paste() make an editor trivial to build.