How to use GroupLayout in Java?

[Samarth]

Hi friends,
I want your help immediately. I have done some layout managers like flow layout, border layout, etc. But I don't know about the group layout. So thought that posting here would help me.!! Please tell me how to use GroupLayout in Java? Help me as soon as possible.!!

[Allan.d]

GroupLayout uses two types of arrangements -- sequential and parallel

• With sequential arrangement, the components are simply placed one after another, just like BoxLayout or FlowLayout would do along one axis. The position of each component is defined as being relative to the preceding component.
• The second way places the components in parallel—on top of each other in the same space. They can be baseline-, top-, or bottom-aligned along the vertical axis. Along the horizontal axis, they can be left-, right-, or center-aligned if the components are not all the same size.

[Warner]

Components are added to groups by using the addComponent method. :

layout.setHorizontalGroup(
   layout.createSequentialGroup()
      .addComponent(c1)
      .addComponent(c2)
      .addGroup(layout.createParallelGroup(GroupLayout.Alignment.LEADING)
           .addComponent(c3)
           .addComponent(c4))
);
layout.setVerticalGroup(
   layout.createSequentialGroup()
      .addGroup(layout.createParallelGroup(GroupLayout.Alignment.BASELINE)
           .addComponent(c1)
           .addComponent(c2)
           .addComponent(c3))
      .addComponent(c4)
);

[MELTRONICS]

The preferred distance of the two components is only used as the minimum size of the gap. See the following sample of coding :

layout.createSequentialGroup()
    .addComponent(c1)
    .addPreferredGap(LayoutStyle.ComponentPlacement.RELATED,
                     GroupLayout.DEFAULT_SIZE, Short.MAX_VALUE)
    .addComponent(c2);