Help with drawing strings!

[JavaInLove]

Hello,

to be honest am quite a newbie to this forum and to java aswell despite my love with java programming. I have searched this entire part of forum and still cant find an answer to my query.

Im planning to write a program (just for fun & practice) which can draw strings. Ive looked up few sources which they tell me to use a graphics package such as awt/swing. Plus some of its classes and methods such as:
paint/paintcomponent, drawstrings etc...
But the problem is i dont know where to start?

My program must be able to draw strings effectively and hopefully can draw strings from input aswell by taking in from keyboard. To do that i will click on a button and then it draws the inputted string to program.

my mainly qs are:

how & where do i start?
should i use packages?
AWt? or SWING?
Application? or Applet???
how do i draw from input by clicking on buttons?

* - i have read over many tutorials/ notes and some websites and books + still cant help myself to solve this solution.

Many thanks

[hardwired]

how & where do i start?
There are many ways to do this. On possibility is shown below in pseudocode.
should i use packages?
Yes, you will need to import a few.
AWt? or SWING?
Swing is easier and more fun. The tutorial examples use Swing.
Application? or Applet???
Your choice. Applications are easy enough to start with. Some prefer applets.
how do i draw from input by clicking on buttons?
Say, for an application, you could put something like this together to get started.

Code:

public class MyClassName extends JPanel {
    JTextField textField;
    String text = "";

    protected void paintComponent(Graphics g) {
        super.paintComponent(g);
        float x = whereever
        float y = you prefer
        g.drawString(text, x, y);
    }

    private JPanel getNorth() {
        textField = new JTextField(numCols);
        // add this to a panel and
        return panel
    }

    private JPanel getButtonPanel() {
        JButton button = new JButton("your_string");
        button.addActionListener(new ActionListener() {
            public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
                text = textField.getText();
                repaint();
            }
        });
        // add the button to a JPanel and
        return panel;
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        MyClassName app = new MyTestApp();
        JFrame f = new JFrame();
        f.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
        f.add(app.getNorth(), BorderLayout.NORTH);
        f.add(test);  // default center section
        f.add(test.getButtonPanel(), "South");
        f.setSize(...
        f.setLocation(...
        f.setVisible(true);
    }
}