Something is eating my key events!

Question

Okay, so I am trying to add some key events to a game. I have added this listener to a class I called Background:
          this.addKeyListener(new java.awt.event.KeyAdapter() {
               public void keyPressed(java.awt.event.KeyEvent e) {
                    System.out.println("A key was pressed");
                    backgroundpanelKeyPressed(e);
               public void keyReleased(java.awt.event.KeyEvent e) {
                    System.out.println("A key was released");
                    backgroundpanelKeyReleased(e);
And then the code for my key events is as follows:
     // pressing the arrow button will allow the ship to move
     public void backgroundpanelKeyPressed(java.awt.event.KeyEvent e) {
     System.out.println ("In Here!");
     switch(e.getKeyCode()) {
     case KeyEvent.VK_LEFT:
     System.out.println("Left key pressed");
     break;
     case KeyEvent.VK_DOWN:
     System.out.println("Down key pressed");     
     break;
     case KeyEvent.VK_UP:
     System.out.println("Up key pressed");     
     break;
     case KeyEvent.VK_RIGHT:
     System.out.println("Right key pressed");     
     break;
               // releasing the arrow button will stop the ship from moving
     public void backgroundpanelKeyReleased(java.awt.event.KeyEvent e) {
     switch(e.getKeyChar()) {
     case KeyEvent.VK_LEFT:
     System.out.println("Left key released");
     break;
     case KeyEvent.VK_DOWN:
     System.out.println("Down key released");
     break;
     case KeyEvent.VK_UP:
     System.out.println("Up key released");
     break;
     case KeyEvent.VK_RIGHT:
     System.out.println("Right key released");
     break;
I can't find the problem with any of that, but something is intercepting my key events before they even get there. Pressing the arrow keys does nothing, but if I hit the spacebar, then it calls Background's constructor.
I searched through the entire code, and nowhere is there any key listener, or any reference to the Background class aside from where I am actually trying to call it.

Answer 1

Does your program always react when you press space? Because if it didn't I'd guess you have problems with the event focus (or whatever it's called). Let's say you add your KeyListener to the Frame/Applet your game is displayed in. At some stage during gameplay a java.awt.Button is pressed. The button will keep the focus and subsequent keypresses will be reported solely to it, so your KeyListener has to listen at the button, too (or you can do a requestFocus() for the component you want to listen to, whenever it looses focus. See FocusListener on this).