Methods for Milestones

The Applet class provides a framework for applet execution, defining methods that the system calls when milestones occur. Milestones are major events in an applet's life cycle. Most applets override some or all of these methods to respond appropriately to milestones.

init Method

The init method is useful for one-time initialization that doesn't take very long. The init method typically contains the code that you would normally put into a constructor. The reason applets don't usually have constructors is that they aren't guaranteed to have a full environment until their init method is called. Keep the init method short so that your applet can load quickly.

start Method

Every applet that performs tasks after initialization (except in direct response to user actions) must override the start method. The start method starts the execution of the applet. It is good practice to return quickly from the start method. If you need to perform computationally intensive operations it might be better to start a new thread for this purpose.

stop Method

Most applets that override the start should also override the stop method. The stop method should suspend the applet's execution, so that it doesn't take up system resources when the user isn't viewing the applet's page. For example, an applet that displays an animation should stop trying to draw the animation when the user isn't viewing it.

destroy Method

Many applets don't need to override the destroy method because their stop method (which is called before destroy) will perform all tasks necessary to shut down the applet's execution. However, the destroy method is available for applets that need to release additional resources.