NetBeans IDE Components Overview: Java Programming

NetBeans IDE provides different views of your code as well as other windows. When programming in java, programmer feels amazing working experience with windows like palette, properties or output window.

Earlier article was about NetBeans Features, in this article I will discuss about NetBeans IDE with their mostly used components. Start NetBeans IDE and create a desktop application from File-->New Project--> Java Desktop Application. It will show a window like below image:

The image shown some important components like properties window, palette with tools, inspector window, output window and etc. This article have a brief description about these components.

Title Bar

The tittle bar displays the tittle of the application. By default, NetBeans will give names as DesktopApplication1, DesktopApplication2 etc. to your project. Notice in following figure, it has given title DesktopApplication1 to your application.

Menu Bar and Pull-down Menu

You are familiar with menu bars as you have worked with MS-Windows operating system. A menu bar is displayed directly below the title bar and includes a lot of options. Each option on the menu bar has a drop down list of item (known as Pull-down menus) that helps you to perform various tasks.

Toolbar

A tool bar is a bar that displays icons for commonly used tasks. The standard toolbar of NetBeans IDE displays icons for the most frequency used commands in NetBeans.

GUI Builder

Also called Design Area or Design Space. The design Area is where you will visually construct your GUI. It is the primary workspace within which GUI design takes place in the IDE. The GUI Builder enables you to layout forms by placing components where you want them and by providing visual feedback in the form of guidelines.

It has two views: Source View and Design View. Design view is the default, as shown above. The Source View opens the code editor for programmer to be add/edit the code for application. You can toggle between views at any time by clicking their respective tabs.

The Palette

The palette contains all of the components needed to create a GUI Application. Palette consist of window controls and frames.

Frames
A frame is a window that typically has decorations such as a border, title, and buttons for closing and iconifying itself. A GUI application typically uses at least one frame. Frames are used to display things like labels, text fields, buttons and other controls.

Controls
Controls are component objects such as text fields, labels, and list boxes etc. that are drawn on frame to get data input or to display output.

Inspector Window

This window displays a hierarchy of all components contained in the currently opened from. Displayed items include visual components and containers, such as buttons, labels, menus and panels, as well as non-visual components such as timers and data source.

Properties window

This window displays the editable settings for the currently selected component. The figure shows the Property Editor for JFrame object.

Code Editor Window

The code editor window is where you write Java code for your application. By code we mean language statements, constants and declarations. The Code Editor window serves as an editor for entering application code. A separate code editor window is created for each top level frame that you create in your application. Using the Code Editor window, you can quickly view and edit any codes in your application.

To open the Code window Double-click the control for which you choose to write code. Or from the GUI Builder window, click at Source tab. You may also press Ctrl + Alt + Page Up/ Page Down.

NetBeans IDE Features