Trouble with private variables

Question

I have an XML parser running inside a GUI. my problem is that I have the actual parse command inside the actionPerformed method, so that when the user specifies their search conditions, those entities that match those conditions will be the only ones returned from the parse. My problem is that although I have the first thing happening when you hit the search button is to grab the contents of the search fields, the first thing that happens is the XML file is parsed, resulting in a NullPointerException when the parser tries to compare data with the search conditions, which is says are not set. I've already made the strings that will contain the data class-wide variables, but that didn't work. I have found that the variables are set inside the actionPerformed function, but once control leaves that function to the parser, they're no longer set, as if they have been wiped out of scope. any suggestions??

Answer 1

okay, It is a map with a rubber-banding box for selecting latitiude-longitude coordinates. I have, inside the actionPerformed method, a utility that copies the values inside the textfields into String variables. these variables are declared as private members of the class that both of these methods belong to. I have it set up so that it is supposed to pull the value of the textfields into the strings BEFORE it parses the XML file. I even have the parsing of the XML file inside a finally clause and the setting of the variables in the try, so it's supposed to pull in those variables first no matter what, and it still refuses to get the values.