SWT: A Developer's Notebook

Adding Widgets Other Than Buttons to the CoolBar

It is possible to add other types of widgets to the CoolBar in the same manner as was done in Example 15-1 with Button. However, it only makes sense to consider a couple widget types for inclusion on a CoolBar. List, for example, is not a good candidate, since the room required for the List would exceed the amount of space available (top to bottom) on the CoolBar.

Combo is a good candidate for inclusion on a CoolBar when you must enable your user to select an item from a list.

Note

Not only that, but it would be ugly.

How do I do that?

You add a Combo to the CoolBar using the same steps that are used to add a Button. Use this code to add a Combo to CoolbarShellExample from Example 15-1:

final CoolItem fontCoolItem = new CoolItem(bar, SWT.PUSH);
final Combo fontCombo = new Combo(bar, SWT.READ_ONLY | SWT.BORDER);
String[] items = {"Arial", "Courier", "Times New Roman"};
fontCombo.setItems(items);
fontCombo.pack( );
size = fontCombo.getSize( );
fontCoolItem.setControl(fontCombo);
fontCoolItem.setSize(fontCoolItem.computeSize(size.x, size.y));
fontCoolItem.setMinimumSize(size);

Doing so yields the result shown in Figure 15-2.

Figure 15-2. Using a Combo on a CoolBar

A selectionListener can be associated with the Combo to take appropriate action when the user selects an item.

fontCombo.addSelectionListener(new SelectionAdapter( ) { public void widgetSelected(SelectionEvent ...