Time for action – getting in focus

To allow the time zone of the clock widgets to be changed, a drop-down box (known as Combo) as well as a Button will be added to the view. The Combo will be created from a set of ZoneId instances.

1. Create a timeZones field in the ClockView class:

   private Combo timeZones;

2. At the end of the createPartControl method, add this snippet to create the drop-down list:

   public void createPartControl(Composite parent) {
     ...
     timeZones = new Combo(parent, SWT.DROP_DOWN);
     timeZones.setVisibleItemCount(5);
     for (String zone : ZoneId.getAvailableZoneIds()) {
       timeZones.add(zone);
     }
   }

3. Run the target Eclipse and open the Clock View again; a list of time zone names will be shown in a drop-down:

   

4. It's conventional to set the focus on a particular widget when a view is opened. Implement the appropriate call in the ClockView method setFocus:

   public void setFocus() {
     timeZones.setFocus();
   }

5. Run Eclipse and show the Clock View; the time zone drop-down widget will be focused...