Basic Layout stuff (adding) and Clearing screens

Question

Ok I have 2 problems I cannot figure out
1) I am using a gridlayout (6,1) inside a panel inside the southern border of a borderlayout. I have 2 textfields and 4 buttons added to the panel. I want the buttons and textfields to be a certain size and not the size of my applet. Any Help?? Can I add buttons and Textfields to specific pixels instead of on a layout???
2) My applet is actually a game. I have multiple classes and stuff and I need to clear objects at times to hide them so they are not visible. I know in VB there is a .visible() method. How do i make buttons, images, and textfields, invisible and visible????
Please help
Sam

Answer 1

(1)
Not all Layout managers repect the requested size.
When using GridLayout each cell in the Grid will be the same size - the size of the largest component added - and the other components expand to fill the available space.
You can position components absolutely by using a null Layout and then using the specific method - setPosition(x,y) or whatever it is. However, you can normally get the desired effect using the Layout Managers by adding Panels inside Panels.
GridbagLayout gives you a lot more flexibility but this is also more complicated to use.
Ideally, you should have a look at the Swing tutorial on using Layout Managers.
For the problem at hand however, I'd set the Panel holding your button's and textfield's to be a FlowLayout as this does respect the preferred component size:
// new Panel - components added left to right with centre alignment
JPanel myPanel = new JPanel (new FlowLayout(FlowLayout.CENTER));
JButton myButton = new JButton("CLICK");
// set size of new button
myButton.setPreferredSize(new Dimension(40,40));
JTextField myTextField = new JTectField(5);
// add to Panel
myPanel.add(myButton);
myPanel.add(myTextField);(2)
yourComponent.setVisible(boolean);