GridBagLayout panels alignment

Question

I have a little issue with the GridBag Layout Manager. I am trying to display 9 panels like this:

Answer 1

For the last two JPanel, I would suggest you to simply add them to a new JPanel with GridLayout and set this JPanel with the GridLayout on to the JPanel having the GridBagLayout. Please have a look at the code example, that resulted in actually the same output, as you were expecting :

import javax.swing.*;
import java.awt.*;

/**
 * Created with IntelliJ IDEA.
 * User: Gagandeep Bali
 * Date: 2/7/13
 * Time: 10:34 PM
 * To change this template use File | Settings | File Templates.
 */
public class GridBagExample
{
    private JPanel contentPane, footerPanel;
    private JPanel s1, s2, s3, s4, s5, s6, s7, s8, s9;

    private void displayGUI()
    {
        JFrame frame = new JFrame("GridBagLayout Example");
        frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.DISPOSE_ON_CLOSE);

        contentPane = new JPanel();
        contentPane.setLayout(new GridBagLayout());
        GridBagConstraints gbc = new GridBagConstraints();
        /*
         * Constraints for S1 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.anchor = GridBagConstraints.CENTER;
        gbc.gridx = 0;
        gbc.gridy = 0;
        gbc.fill = GridBagConstraints.BOTH;
        gbc.gridwidth = 1;
        gbc.gridheight = 2;
        gbc.weightx = 0.2;
        gbc.weighty = 0.8;
        s1 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s1.setOpaque(true);
        s1.setBackground(Color.BLUE);
        s1.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s1Label = new JLabel("S1", JLabel.CENTER);
        s1.add(s1Label);
        contentPane.add(s1, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for S2 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.weighty = 0.4;
        gbc.gridx = 1;
        gbc.gridheight = 1;
        s2 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s2.setOpaque(true);
        s2.setBackground(Color.GREEN);
        s2.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s2Label = new JLabel("S2", JLabel.CENTER);
        s2.add(s2Label);
        contentPane.add(s2, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for S3 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.gridy = 1;
        s3 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s3.setOpaque(true);
        s3.setBackground(Color.CYAN);
        s3.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s3Label = new JLabel("S3", JLabel.CENTER);
        s3.add(s3Label);
        contentPane.add(s3, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for S4 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.weighty = 0.8;
        gbc.gridx = 2;
        gbc.gridy = 0;
        gbc.gridheight = 2;
        s4 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s4.setOpaque(true);
        s4.setBackground(Color.WHITE);
        s4.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s4Label = new JLabel("S4", JLabel.CENTER);
        s4.add(s4Label);
        contentPane.add(s4, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for S5 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.weighty = 0.4;
        gbc.gridx = 3;
        gbc.gridheight = 1;
        s5 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s5.setOpaque(true);
        s5.setBackground(Color.RED);
        s5.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s5Label = new JLabel("S5", JLabel.CENTER);
        s5.add(s5Label);
        contentPane.add(s5, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for S6 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.gridy = 1;
        s6 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s6.setOpaque(true);
        s6.setBackground(Color.MAGENTA);
        s6.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s6Label = new JLabel("S6", JLabel.CENTER);
        s6.add(s6Label);
        contentPane.add(s6, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for S7 JPanel.
         */
        gbc.gridheight = 2;
        gbc.weighty = 0.8;
        gbc.gridx = 4;
        gbc.gridy = 0;
        s7 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s7.setOpaque(true);
        s7.setBackground(Color.ORANGE);
        s7.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s7Label = new JLabel("S7", JLabel.CENTER);
        s7.add(s7Label);
        contentPane.add(s7, gbc);

        footerPanel = new JPanel();
        footerPanel.setLayout(new GridLayout(1, 2, 5, 5));

        s8 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s8.setOpaque(true);
        s8.setBackground(Color.PINK);
        s8.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s8Label = new JLabel("S8", JLabel.CENTER);
        s8.add(s8Label);
        footerPanel.add(s8);

        s9 = new JPanel(new GridBagLayout());
        s9.setOpaque(true);
        s9.setBackground(Color.YELLOW);
        s9.setBorder(BorderFactory.createLineBorder(Color.DARK_GRAY, 5));
        JLabel s9Label = new JLabel("S9", JLabel.CENTER);
        s9.add(s9Label);
        footerPanel.add(s9, gbc);

        /*
         * Constraints for Footer JPanel.
         */
        gbc.gridheight = 1;
        gbc.gridwidth = 5;
        gbc.weightx = 1.0;
        gbc.weighty = 0.2;
        gbc.gridx = 0;
        gbc.gridy = 2;
        contentPane.add(footerPanel, gbc);

        frame.setContentPane(contentPane);
        frame.pack();
        //frame.setSize(500, 500);
        frame.setLocationByPlatform(true);
        frame.setVisible(true);
    }

    public static void main(String... args)
    {
        EventQueue.invokeLater(new Runnable()
        {
            @Override
            public void run()
            {
                new GridBagExample().displayGUI();
            }
        });
    }
}

Here is the Output of the above code :