Set z-order of Frames

Question

Hi, I have an application that has a lot of open Frames, and one main control bar frame. (Looks like an old Macintosh app, with windows all over the place.) When I'm using this app in windows, and switching back and forth between other apps, the windows associated with this app get "lost", ie hidden behind other frames.
What I'd like is when the user activates the control bar frame, it brings all other frames to front, followed by the control bar frame. So I wrote a window listener for the control bar Frame, see below. But it's not working, because apparently the windowActivated event sometimes happens after the bringFramesToFront method is called and sometimes not; when it does, the Frames fight each other for focus. The other problem is that, even when this works, the Frames come up in apparent random order. I'd like them to maintain thier z-order with respect to each other, but be on top of all my other windows.
Is there an easier way to get/set z-order for Frames in Java? Note, I am stuck using Frames and not JFrames because of legacy issues.
boolean ignore=false;
// I tried this with windowGainedFocus also, with the same result
public void windowActivated(WindowEvent e)
if (!ignore)
bringFramesToFront();
private void bringFramesToFront()
ignore = true;
Frame[] frames = Frame.getFrames();
for (int i = 0; i < frames.length; i++)
if (frames[i] != this)
frames.toFront();
toFront();
ignore = false;
// even though I called toFront() before setting ignore to false,
// sometimes a new windowGainedFocus event is received after
// this function exits.

Answer 1

The reason they come up in random order is because when you call Frame.getFrames() it returns an array with the order they were (created)? and not the z-order. So you have to remember the z-order yourself.
You can do this using a frame manager. Basically, when you create one of your frames, you register it with the manager. Then anytime you need the z-order, you can ask the frame manager.
When the frame is registered, the frame manager adds it to it's queue of frames, and adds a WindowListener to it. It uses the window listener to listenen for activated, and closed events.
When it hears an activated event, it puts that frame at the front of its queue and pushes the other frames one position back, and when it hears a closed event, it removes that frame from the queue.
So when you want to know the z-order of the frames, ask the frame manager and it will return an array of the items in its queue.
Also, you will need to consider how to handle minimized frames(?). Good luck.