Is it possible to use events for objects that do not use swing or awt

Question

Dear Experts
I want to know if events are possible with plain java objects. A simple class that is capable of firing an event and another simple class that can receive that event. My question is
1. If it is possible - then what is the approach that needs to be taken and would appreciate an example.
2. Is Observer Pattern in java going to help?
To explain further i am doing [Add,Modify,Delete,Traverse] Data tutorial using swing in Net beans. I have a ButtonState Manager class that enables and disables buttons according to a given situation. For example if add is clicked the modify button becomes Save and another becomes Cancel. The other buttons are disabled. What i want is the ButtonStateManager class to do a little further - i.e. if Save is clicked it should report to DBClass that it has to save the current record which was just added. I am foxed how this can be done or what is the right way. Thanks for reading a long message. Appreciate your help.
Best regards

Answer 1

Thanks Kayaman
i guess i am doing something else maybe it is crazy but i need to work further i guess... i cant post the entire code as it is too big but some snippets
public class DatabaseApplication extends javax.swing.JFrame {
    ButtonStateManager bsm;
    /** Creates new form DatabaseApplication */
    public DatabaseApplication() {
        initComponents();
        // ButtonStateManager has a HUGE constructor that takes all the buttons as argument!
        bsm = new ButtonStateManager(
                btnAdd,
                btnModify,
                btnDelete,
                btnQuit,
                btnMoveNext,
                btnMovePrevious,
                btnMoveLast,
                btnMoveFirst );One of the methods in the ButtonStateManager Class is as follows
  private void modifyButtonState()
        btnAdd.setText("Save");
        btnModify.setEnabled(false);
        btnDelete.setText("Cancel");
        btnQuit.setEnabled(false);
        ...Finally the Crazy way i was trying to do ... using EXCEPTIONS!
  void modifyClicked() throws DBAction
        if(btnModify.getText().equalsIgnoreCase("MODIFY"))
            modifyButtonState();
        else
            throw new DBAction("SaveAddedRecord");
    }And Finally how i was Tackling exceptions....
  private void btnAddActionPerformed(java.awt.event.ActionEvent evt) {                                      
      try {
            bsm.addClicked();
        } catch (Exception e1) {
            processDBAction(e1.getMessage());
    private void processDBAction(String msg)
        if(msg.equalsIgnoreCase("SAVEMODIFIEDRECORD"))
            System.err.println(msg);
            bsm.normalButtonState();
        }Edited by: standman on Mar 30, 2011 4:51 PM