Help fixing design flaw

Question

I have coded my self into somewhat of a corner. I am creating a GUI that has multiple panels, each handling its own events. The problem is that I am not sure how to properly design it so that each panel can return events back to the main class that holds the JFrame. I have put the different panels in packages, and now I am not sure how to get the entire app to see events that happen in one panel.
Example: I have a custom panel that holds nothing but buttons. When a button is pressed this panel catches the event. But not sure as to how I can get the Frame that this panel sits in to react to the button press. How is a GUI properly designed, in terms of the different panels interacting with each other and the system?

Answer 1

I have a second design question which I gues is also
answered by your response. I was wondering what isa
good design when you need an app to interact with
your GUI?The answer is in my previous post, but I think a code snippet might clarify things a bit.
Create a class to act as your controller. This class will have methods to allow you to 'register' your GUI components and to perform actions. Remember, all your program logic doesn't have to be written in the controller class. It can be in delegate classes that the controller uses.
public class Controller {
   public Controller() {
   public void registerLabel(JLabel label) {
      this.label = label;
   public void updateLabelText(String text) {
      label.setText(text);
   private JLabel label;
}In your GUI class that contains your various GUI compoents, I'll use a JFrame for this example, pass in a reference to your controller. This will allow you to 'register' those components.
public class MainWindow extends JFrame implements ActionListener {
   public MainWindow(Controller controller) {
      this.controller = controller;
      // create your various GUI components and build your window
      // after creating components make the call to register
      controller.registerLabel(label);
   // if you have added an action listener to your window then
   // you can call the controller to perform the required action
   // your event handling setup may be different
   public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent event) {
      controller.updateLabelText("text from somewhere");
   private Controller controller;
}This is obviously an incomplete example, but it should give you a good starting point.
Cheers,
Kerry