How to show a JPopupMenu on a JMenuItem?

Question

I am trying to add a RMB context menu to an existing JMenuItem. For example Firefox has bookmark popup menus that can be "edited" by right clicking on the popup menu to say delete an entry.
The code below is a sample app that demonstraits the problem. Open up the main menu and attempt to right click on various things.
It seems like it might will work for "sub" JMenus but not JMenuItems (meaining no exception in thrown). In either case the menu to which the popup should be attached disappears when the RMB is clicked (at least on windows). This is likely the cause of the exception that is thrown below when the RMB is clicked on a JMenuItem. Furthermore if the popup is shown it is not properly hidden.
How would one properly accomplish this or is it just plain impossible?
java.awt.IllegalComponentStateException: component must be showing on the screen to determine its location
     at java.awt.Component.getLocationOnScreen_NoTreeLock(Component.java:1507)
     at java.awt.Component.getLocationOnScreen(Component.java:1481)
     at javax.swing.JPopupMenu.show(JPopupMenu.java:921)
     at sample.App$MouseHandler.checkPopup(App.java:76)
     at sample.App$MouseHandler.mouseReleased(App.java:69)
     at java.awt.AWTEventMulticaster.mouseReleased(AWTEventMulticaster.java:232)
     at java.awt.Component.processMouseEvent(Component.java:5100)
     at java.awt.Component.processEvent(Component.java:4897)
     at java.awt.Container.processEvent(Container.java:1569)
     at java.awt.Component.dispatchEventImpl(Component.java:3615)
     at java.awt.Container.dispatchEventImpl(Container.java:1627)
     at java.awt.Component.dispatchEvent(Component.java:3477)
     at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.retargetMouseEvent(Container.java:3483)
     at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.processMouseEvent(Container.java:3198)
     at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.dispatchEvent(Container.java:3128)
     at java.awt.Container.dispatchEventImpl(Container.java:1613)
     at java.awt.Window.dispatchEventImpl(Window.java:1606)
     at java.awt.Component.dispatchEvent(Component.java:3477)
     at java.awt.EventQueue.dispatchEvent(EventQueue.java:456)
     at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpOneEventForHierarchy(EventDispatchThread.java:201)
     at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEventsForHierarchy(EventDispatchThread.java:151)
     at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(EventDispatchThread.java:145)
     at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(EventDispatchThread.java:137)
     at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.run(EventDispatchThread.java:100)
package sample;
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import javax.swing.*;
public class App {
private JFrame frame;
private JPopupMenu popup;
public static void main( String[] args ) {
try {
new App();
catch( Exception e ) {
e.printStackTrace();
public App() {
popup = createPopupMenu();
frame = new JFrame( "Sample" );
frame.addWindowListener( new WindowHandler() );
frame.setSize( 200, 200 );
frame.setJMenuBar( createMenuBar() );
Dimension screenSize = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getScreenSize();
frame.setLocation(
screenSize.width/2-frame.getWidth()/2,
screenSize.height/2-frame.getHeight()/2 );
frame.setVisible( true );
private JMenuBar createMenuBar () {
JMenuBar bar;
JMenu menu, submenu;
JMenuItem item;
bar = new JMenuBar();
menu = new JMenu ( "Menu" );
bar.add ( menu );
item = new JMenuItem( "Item" );
item.addMouseListener( new MouseHandler() );
menu.add( item );
submenu = new JMenu ( "SubMenu" );
submenu.addMouseListener( new MouseHandler() );
menu.add ( submenu );
item = new JMenuItem( "SubItem" );
item.addMouseListener( new MouseHandler() );
submenu.add( item );
return bar;
private JPopupMenu createPopupMenu() {
JPopupMenu popup = new JPopupMenu();
popup.add( "Popup" );
return popup;
private class MouseHandler extends MouseAdapter {
private void checkPopup( MouseEvent e ) {
if( e.isPopupTrigger() ) {
popup.show( e.getComponent(), e.getX(), e.getY() );
public void mousePressed( MouseEvent e ) {
checkPopup( e );
public void mouseReleased( MouseEvent e ) {
checkPopup( e );
public void mouseClicked( MouseEvent e ) {
checkPopup( e );
private class WindowHandler extends WindowAdapter {
public void windowClosing( WindowEvent e ) {
System.exit( 0 );

Answer 1

I've looked there. If there is help there for popping up a context menu on top of another menu I can't find it. Could you please be a bit more specific? Did you try the sample code?