JFrame and ActionListener

Question

I'm a bit of a newbie to java, and I'm having an issue with a game I'm making in Swing. I have a class, guiPulUp, which has buttons and a text field. One of the buttons is "Magic". I'm trying to make it so if you click the Magic button then a JFrame, another one called guiPullUpMagic, appears with preset "Spell" buttons. Is that even possible? Or is there also a way to use .setVisible to make the spell GUI visible when clicked? Please help! I can't find any topic related to this on the internet. Thanks! (If there's any other errors, let me know) Also, I am getting VERY confused with how to get variables made in one class to work in another, such as getting my JButton "buttonMAGIC" to work in my guiPullUpMagic class.

For reference here's my code (It's pretty big!):

---

import javax.swing.*;

import java.lang.Math.*;

import java.awt.event.*;

/**
 * main GUI class
 */

public class guiPullUp extends JFrame
{

    public static void main(String[] args)
    {
        new guiPullUp();
    }

    //declaring buttons for main GUI

    private JButton buttonOK;
    private JButton buttonUP;
    private JButton buttonDOWN;
    private JButton buttonRIGHT;
    private JButton buttonLEFT;
    private JButton buttonMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonRUN;
    private JTextField userINPUT;
    private JLabel healthDisplay;

    public guiPullUp()
    {
        this.setSize(600,500);
        this.setTitle("Xenix V_1");
        this.setDefaultCloseOperation(
            JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);

         //button names to appear on panel1*
         //*button coordinates needed

         JButton buttonOK = new JButton ("OK");
        JButton buttonUP = new JButton ("Up");
        JButton buttonDOWN = new JButton ("Down");
        JButton buttonRIGHT = new JButton ("Right");
        JButton buttonLEFT = new JButton ("Left");
        JButton buttonMAGIC = new JButton ("Magic");
        JButton buttonRUN = new JButton ("RUN");
        JTextField userINPUT = new JTextField(30);
        JLabel healthDisplay = new JLabel("Health:  ");
        JPanel panel1 = new JPanel ();

        ButtonListener bl = new ButtonListener();

         buttonOK.addActionListener(bl);
         buttonUP.addActionListener(bl); 
         buttonDOWN.addActionListener(bl);
         buttonRIGHT.addActionListener(bl);
         buttonLEFT.addActionListener(bl);
         buttonMAGIC.addActionListener(bl); 
         buttonRUN.addActionListener(bl);


         panel1.add(buttonOK);
         panel1.add(buttonDOWN);
         panel1.add(buttonRIGHT);
         panel1.add(buttonLEFT);
         panel1.add(buttonMAGIC);
         panel1.add(buttonRUN);

         panel1.add(healthDisplay);

         panel1.add(userINPUT);

         this.add(panel1);

         this.setVisible(true);
        }       


     //declaring variables "counters" for magic count, 
    //health count, etc.

    int healthMAX = 100;
    int healthMINIMUM = 0;
    int magicMAX = 100;
    int magicMINIMUM = 0;
    int walletSizeMAX = 9999;
    int walletSizeMINIMUM = 0;

    /** 
     * class used to create events
     * based on button sources
     */


    public class ButtonListener implements
        ActionListener
    {

        public void actionPerformed (ActionEvent e)
        {
            //Haven't made these codes yet but some WILL need to bring up a GUI
                }

        }
    }
}

The guiPullUpMagic class:

---

import javax.swing.*;

import java.awt.event.*;

import java.lang.Math.*;

/**
* class used to pull up the "spells" GUI
*/

public class guiPullUpMagic extends JFrame
{
    public void magic(String[] args)
    {
        new guiPullUpMagic();
    }

    private JButton buttonFIREMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonICEMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonHEALMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonSHOCKMAGIC;

    public guiPullUpMagic()
    {
        this.setSize(400,400);
        this.setTitle("Spells");
        this.setDefaultCloseOperation(
            JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);

        //button names to appear on panel2*
        //*button coordinates needed

        JButton buttonFIREMAGIC = new JButton ("FireBall");
        JButton buttonICEMAGIC = new JButton ("Ice Flurry");
        JButton buttonSHOCKMAGIC = new JButton ("Spark");
        JButton buttonHEALMAGIC = new JButton ("Heal Minor Wounds");
        JPanel panel2 = new JPanel();

        ButtonListener bl = new ButtonListener();

        buttonFIREMAGIC.addActionListener(bl);
        buttonICEMAGIC.addActionListener(bl);
        buttonSHOCKMAGIC.addActionListener(bl);
        buttonHEALMAGIC.addActionListener(bl);

        panel2.add(buttonFIREMAGIC);
        panel2.add(buttonICEMAGIC);
        panel2.add(buttonSHOCKMAGIC);
        panel2.add(buttonHEALMAGIC);

        this.add(panel2);

        this.setVisible(false);     
    }

    public class ButtonListener implements
        ActionListener
    {

        public void actionPerformed (ActionEvent e)
        {
            if (e.getSource() == buttonMAGIC); //THIS is where I'll need
                                                           //the buttonMAGIC variable
                                                           //from guiPullUp
            {
                    //code to bring up the guiPullUpMagic GUI
            }
        }
    }
}

Answer 1

If you want to pass a field of a JFrame to another JFrame you can send a ComponentEvent to that jframe with that control

For example you can define a ComponentEvent(for example ShowPopUpEvent) for showing JFrame A and A would listen for that. Whenever you would like to show a and pass that JButton to a you can dispatch that event.

Answer 2

Note the changes

1. ActionListener is implemented in class GuiPullUp
2. Class GuiPullUpMagic is JDialog
3. Check method actionPerformed
   

Class GuiPullUp:

public class GuiPullUp extends JFrame implements ActionListener {

//declaring buttons for main GUI
private JButton buttonOK;
private JButton buttonUP;
private JButton buttonDOWN;
private JButton buttonRIGHT;
private JButton buttonLEFT;
private JButton buttonMAGIC;
private JButton buttonRUN;
private JTextField userINPUT;
private JLabel healthDisplay;

public GuiPullUp() {
    this.setSize(600, 500);
    this.setTitle("Xenix V_1");
    this.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);

    buttonOK = new JButton("OK");
    buttonUP = new JButton("Up");
    buttonDOWN = new JButton("Down");
    buttonRIGHT = new JButton("Right");
    buttonLEFT = new JButton("Left");
    buttonMAGIC = new JButton("Magic");
    buttonRUN = new JButton("RUN");
    userINPUT = new JTextField(30);
    healthDisplay = new JLabel("Health:  ");
    JPanel panel1 = new JPanel();


    buttonOK.addActionListener(this);
    buttonUP.addActionListener(this);
    buttonDOWN.addActionListener(this);
    buttonRIGHT.addActionListener(this);
    buttonLEFT.addActionListener(this);
    buttonMAGIC.addActionListener(this);
    buttonRUN.addActionListener(this);


    panel1.add(buttonOK);
    panel1.add(buttonDOWN);
    panel1.add(buttonRIGHT);
    panel1.add(buttonLEFT);
    panel1.add(buttonMAGIC);
    panel1.add(buttonRUN);

    panel1.add(healthDisplay);

    panel1.add(userINPUT);

    this.add(panel1);


}
//declaring variables "counters" for magic count, 
//health count, etc.
int healthMAX = 100;
int healthMINIMUM = 0;
int magicMAX = 100;
int magicMINIMUM = 0;
int walletSizeMAX = 9999;
int walletSizeMINIMUM = 0;

@Override
public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
    if(e.getActionCommand().equals(buttonMAGIC.getActionCommand())) {
        new GuiPullUpMagic(this).setVisible(true);
    }
}

public static void main(String[] args) {
    SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            GuiPullUp guiPullUp = new GuiPullUp();
            guiPullUp.setVisible(true);
        }
    });
}
}

Class GuiPullUpMagic

public class GuiPullUpMagic extends JDialog implements ActionListener {

    private JButton buttonFIREMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonICEMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonHEALMAGIC;
    private JButton buttonSHOCKMAGIC;

    public GuiPullUpMagic(JFrame parent) {
        super(parent);
        this.setSize(400, 400);
        this.setTitle("Spells");

        buttonFIREMAGIC = new JButton("FireBall");
        buttonICEMAGIC = new JButton("Ice Flurry");
        buttonSHOCKMAGIC = new JButton("Spark");
        buttonHEALMAGIC = new JButton("Heal Minor Wounds");
        JPanel panel2 = new JPanel();



        buttonFIREMAGIC.addActionListener(this);
        buttonICEMAGIC.addActionListener(this);
        buttonSHOCKMAGIC.addActionListener(this);
        buttonHEALMAGIC.addActionListener(this);

        panel2.add(buttonFIREMAGIC);
        panel2.add(buttonICEMAGIC);
        panel2.add(buttonSHOCKMAGIC);
        panel2.add(buttonHEALMAGIC);

        this.add(panel2);
    }

    @Override
    public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {

    }
}