Components get squished in JPanel and JFrame

Question

I'm trying to create a GUI window for the user to enter some information for my program. But it seems like no matter how I change the sizes or the locations, all of my components are squished in far smaller than what I want. Could someone please point out what I am missing? Here's what I tried:

          JFrame inputFrame = new JFrame();
          JPanel panel = new JPanel();
          inputFrame.setTitle("Create Event");
          inputFrame.setSize(500,400);

          JTextField eventName = new JTextField("Untitled event");
          JTextField eventStart = new JTextField();
          JTextField eventEnd = new JTextField();
          JButton save = new JButton("Save");

          JLabel selectedDate = new JLabel(MyCalendarTester.currentMonth + 1 + "/" + selectedDay + "/" + MyCalendarTester.currentYear);

          selectedDay = null;
          panel.setSize(450,300);
          eventName.setBounds(10, 10, 600, 50);
          panel.add(eventName);
          selectedDate.setBounds(10, 20, 50, 20);
          panel.add(selectedDate);
          panel.add(eventStart);
          eventStart.setBounds(100, 20, 50, 20);
          panel.add(eventEnd);
          eventEnd.setBounds(175, 20, 50, 20);
          panel.add(save);
          save.setBounds(250, 20, 60, 30);


          inputFrame.add(panel);
          inputFrame.setVisible(true);

Answer 1

The default layout manager for a JPanel is the FlowLayout. The FlowLayout will display components at their preferred size, which is the way the component should be displayed.

You should not attempt to give the component a random size because you don't know what the best size for the component should be based on Font, OS etc.

When you create a JTextField you can use:

JTextField textField = new JTextField(10);

The value 10 will allow the text field to give itself a reasonable preferred size.

The JLabel and JButton size will be determined by the text of the component.