Question about writting a cutom component

Question

I have an area in my application window (0,0 to 500,500) in whcih I do all my drawing. underneath I have a bunch of boxes I drew to represent buttons. Now in my draw area I wish to always display the exact mouse cursor x,y coordinates. But to use mouseEntered, it has to be attached to a component. Is there a way to define a custom component for my draw area, so that the area throws the mouseEntered event? Is there another way of fixing the problem?

Answer 1

this is how you would do it with a custom component.
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.event.*;
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.awt.geom.*;
public class CustomComp implements MouseListener{
public static void main(String[] args) {
     new CustomComp();
public CustomComp(){
     setupGUI();
     displayFrame();
public void setupGUI(){
     jc.addMouseListener(this);
     jc.setPreferredSize(new Dimension(300, 300));
     p.setBackground( Color.white );
     p.setPreferredSize(new Dimension(300, 300));
                     // you may want to add jc to a container panel
public void displayFrame(){
     fr.setContentPane(jc);
     fr.pack();
     fr.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
     fr.show();
public class MyPanel extends JPanel{
public MyPanel(){ }
public void paint(Graphics g){
     super.paint(g);
     Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D)g;
public class MyComponent extends JComponent{
public MyComponent(){ }
public void paint(Graphics g){
     super.paint(g);
     Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D)g;
     Rectangle2D.Double button = new Rectangle2D.Double(0, 0, 300, 300);
     g2d.setPaint( buttoncolor );
     g2d.fill( button );
// Mouse Listeners
public void mouseEntered(MouseEvent e) {
     buttoncolor = Color.blue;
     jc.repaint();
public void mouseExited(MouseEvent e) {
     buttoncolor = Color.red;
     jc.repaint();
public void mouseClicked(MouseEvent e) {}
public void mouseReleased(MouseEvent e) {}
public void mousePressed(MouseEvent e) {}
     JFrame fr = new JFrame();
     JPanel p = new MyPanel();
     JComponent jc = new MyComponent();
     Color buttoncolor = Color.red;
}