JToolBar/JButton text/icon on and off

Question

Is there an easy way to turn on/off all text/icon display in all the buttons of a JToolBar in one shot? You know, I want to let the user choose to view the toolbar in 3 ways:
1. icon only
2. text only
3. icon plus text
I know I could iterate over each JButton and do
jbutton.setText(null) or jbutton.setIcon(null), but this way I will have to store the original text/icon somewhere so I can easily restore them later on. This is cumbersome.

Answer 1

Hi,
try something like this :
regards
[email protected]
//demonstrates use of the Action object
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.util.*;
//swing classes
import javax.swing.text.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public class xtendMenu extends JxFrame {
JPanel jp;
JMenuItem menuitem;
ActionToolBar toolbar;
public xtendMenu() {
super("Extended Menu");
JMenuBar mbar = new JMenuBar(); //set up menu bar
setJMenuBar(mbar);
//Add File menu
JMenu mFile = new JMenu("File");
mbar.add(mFile);
//create two Action Objects
Action Open = new FileButton("Open", new ImageIcon("open.gif"), this);
menuitem = mFile.add(Open);
menuitem.setIcon(null);
Action Exit = new ExitButton("Exit", new ImageIcon("exit.gif"));
mFile.addSeparator();
menuitem = mFile.add(Exit);
menuitem.setIcon(null);
//Exit.setEnabled(false); --used to test disable
//now create toolbar that fixes up the buttons as you add them
toolbar = new ActionToolBar();
getContentPane().add(jp = new JPanel());
jp.setLayout(new BorderLayout());
jp.add("North", toolbar);
//add the two action objects
toolbar.add(Open, "Open a file");
toolbar.addSeparator();
toolbar.addSeparator();
toolbar.addSeparator();
toolbar.add(Exit, "Exit from program");
setSize(300, 200);
setVisible(true);
static public void main(String argv[]) {
new xtendMenu();
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.util.*;
//swing classes
import javax.swing.text.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public abstract class ActionButton extends AbstractAction {
Hashtable properties;
public ActionButton(String caption, Icon img) {
properties = new Hashtable();
properties.put(DEFAULT, caption);
properties.put(NAME, caption);
properties.put(SHORT_DESCRIPTION, caption);
properties.put(SMALL_ICON, img);
public void putValue(String key, Object value) {
properties.put(key, value);
public Object getValue(String key) {
return properties.get(key);
public abstract void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e);
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.util.*;
//swing classes
import javax.swing.text.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public class ExitButton extends ActionButton {
JFrame fr;
public ExitButton(String caption, Icon img) {
super(caption, img);
public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
System.exit(0);
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.util.*;
//swing classes
import javax.swing.text.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public class ActionToolBar extends JToolBar
public ActionToolBar()
setFloatable(false);
public void add(Action act, String tip)
JButton button = super.add(act);
button.setText("");
button.setToolTipText(tip);
button.setMargin(new Insets(0,0,0,0));
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.util.*;
//swing classes
import javax.swing.text.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
public class FileButton extends ActionButton
JFrame fr;
public FileButton(String caption, Icon img, JFrame frm)
super(caption, img);
fr = frm;
public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e)
FileDialog fdlg = new FileDialog(fr, "Open File", FileDialog.LOAD);
//JFileChooser fdlg = new JFileChooser();
//fdlg.showOpenDialog(fr);