Java Swing - how to show a panel on top of another panel?

Question

I wish to have an internal (non window) dialog to ask for member input. I would like the dialog to be placed centrally on an existing JPanel.

I have looked at layered

Answer 1

There's another layout manager that may be of interest here: Overlay Layout Here's a simple tutorial: OverlayLayout: for layout management of components that lie on top of one another. Overlay Layout allows you to position panels on top of one another, and set a layout inside each panel. You are also able to set size and position of each panel separately.

(The reason I'm answering this question from years ago is because I have stumbled upon the same problem, and I have seen very few mentions of the Overlay Layout on StackOverflow, while it seems to be pretty well documented. Hopefully this may help someone else who keeps searching for it.)