Re: [sdljava-users] Can AWT/Swing widgets be used inside or alongside sdlsurface?

[Sannie K. <sa...@in...>]

Chris Dennett wrote:

> Chris Dennett wrote:
>
>> Chris Dennett wrote:
>>
>>> Sannie Kwakman wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hi everyone!
>>>>
>>>> I'm checking out various high-speed graphics and game libraries for 
>>>> use in a java based multiplayer game I'm developing. Sdljava seems 
>>>> to do the trick on most requirements, but there is something that I 
>>>> haven't figured out yet. At certain points in the game, there will 
>>>> be several animations and sprite-movements displayed at once, with 
>>>> some basic chat functionality right next to it. My knowledge of 
>>>> sdljava (or SDL for that matter) is still pretty limited, but my 
>>>> understanding is that I have to create a SDLSurface for the 
>>>> animations and sprite movements (using openGL or sdl_gfx). I wanted 
>>>> to use the standard AWT (or, if possible, Swing) widgets for the 
>>>> chatinterface, which is nothing more than a TextField and 
>>>> scrollable TextArea. In my tests I haven't been able to combine a 
>>>> SDL_surface and AWT/Swing widgets in one window. My approaches so 
>>>> far have been pretty awt-centric (trying to add a SDLSurface to a 
>>>> Container/Frame/JFrame and trying to get a AWT/Swing widget to draw 
>>>> on a SDLSurface) none of which were succesfull. And because a 
>>>> SDLSurface creates its own window, drawing/adding AWT widgets next 
>>>> to the SDLSurface don't seem to be possible either.
>>>>
>>>> Is combining AWT/Swing with SDL graphics actually possible (and if 
>>>> so, how) or are there other methods for creating a chat interface 
>>>> within a surface?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks in advance!
>>>>
>>>> -- Sannie Kwakman
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> This seems to be quite a good idea, but you can't do it using the 
>>> approach you are taking.
>>>
>>>
>> Have a look at this: 
>> http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/docs/api/java/awt/Graphics.html. If you 
>> want AWT stuff in an SDLJava SDL window, you will need to extend this 
>> class and implement all the abstract methods. You then have to shove 
>> this into somewhere to register it as the default graphics thingy, 
>> but it dosen't tell you how to do this anywhere.
>>
> Have a look at Odonata -- they are attempting to have AWT working on 
> SDL, which is what you want to do. I expect they have taken the 
> approach which I outlined in the previous message. See 
> http://adorphuye.com/gallery/Odonata/Odonata20040816 for a screenshot. 
> If you can get the source to this, then it might be adaptable to
> SDLJava. I think the project is also GPLed, so you can modify and 
> redistribute the source if you want.
>
> I'm just trying to find the Odonata CVS so I can check out the latest 
> files (I'm interested in this myself), but it may not have anonymous 
> access. There was also something about AWT / Swing being OpenGL 
> accelerated in the latest version of Java, so perhaps that could also 
> be used?
>
> Regards,
> Chris
>
'lo Chris,

thanks for the reponses. I managed to download the Odonata src 
(http://odonata.tangency.co.uk/files/). While scanning through them, I 
got one mystery solved on how to replace Java's standard 
GraphicsEnvironments. Odonata seems to do this pretty simple:

System.setProperty("java.awt.graphicsenv","uk.co.tangency.odonata.GraphicsEnvironment");

Odonata is still pretty early in development, and by the looks of it, 
far from finished. In search for other methods, I found some threads on 
the LWJGL forum that are discussing the awt/swing problem, and the 
latest posts about it indicate that they were very close in having a 
awt/swing adapter class. There was some code for it posted on the 
forums, but I haven't found it in their CVS yet.Here are some related 
forum threads:
http://lwjgl.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=904&highlight=awt
http://lwjgl.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=900&highlight=awt

As I understand it, their approach is to use a pbuffer in which the gl 
is rendered and draw the resulting pixels in a custom JComponent. Looks 
like a more elegant solution to me, altough I don't know how bad it will 
affect performance.

-- Sannie