Dynamically Created ActionHandler List

Question

I'm trying to create a program that allows the user to specify the number of JButtons to be created, where each one has its own event listener, but the same event handler.
Take the following code:
//Brief code explanation:
//Upon instantiation of the MultiButton class, a user-specified number of JButtons are created
//If the user clicks on the second button, they will be notified
//All other buttons do nothing
class MultiButton(){
    private MultiButton(int numButtons){//Constructor
        for(int i=0; i<numButtons; i++){
            buttonVector.add(new JButton());
            buttonVector.get(i).addActionListener(new buttonActionPerformed);
            //... code to attach JButton to GUI ... (assume this works)
    private Vector<JButton> buttonVector = new Vector<JButton>();
    class buttonActionPerformed(){
        public void Actionperformed(ActionEvent e){
            if(callingButtonID == buttonVector.get(2).JButtonID) //This would be where the problem is
                System.out.println("The second JButton was called");
}Basically, I need a way to know which JButton was called so that I can see which button in the buttonVector was activated. I'm not sure if this is possible, but I'm open to any advice or alternate methods.
Good luck!

Answer 1

have a look at this:
import java.awt.GridLayout;
import java.awt.event.ActionEvent;
import java.awt.event.ActionListener;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.List;
import javax.swing.BorderFactory;
import javax.swing.JButton;
import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JPanel;
import javax.swing.SwingUtilities;
public class MultiButton extends JPanel
    private List<JButton> buttonList = new ArrayList<JButton>();
    public MultiButton(int numButtons)
        super(new GridLayout(0, 1, 5, 5));
        setBorder(BorderFactory.createEmptyBorder(5, 5, 5, 5));
        for (int i = 0; i < numButtons; i++)
            JButton btn = new JButton("Button Number " + i);
            btn.addActionListener(new buttonActionPerformed());
            add(btn);
            buttonList.add(btn);
    private class buttonActionPerformed implements ActionListener
        public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e)
            JButton selectedBtn = (JButton)e.getSource();
            System.out.println("Button ActionCommand = " + selectedBtn.getActionCommand());
            // to find it in the array, you could use its text or you could loop through the arrya
            for (int i = 0; i < buttonList.size(); i++)
                if (buttonList.get(i).equals(selectedBtn))
                    System.out.println("Selected Button index in array is: " + i);
                    break;
    private static void createAndShowGUI()
        JFrame frame = new JFrame("Swing Application");
        frame.getContentPane().add(new MultiButton(7));
        frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
        frame.pack();
        frame.setVisible(true);
    public static void main(String[] args)
        SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable()
            public void run()
                createAndShowGUI();
}