Using an individual String with a JList<String> for an action

Question

I am writing a Pokedex in Java Swing and I plan to have each Pokemon represented by a String in a JList Object. Upon the user clicking a Pokemon, I want it to open a new tabbed Panel within the main frame that holds all the information for that specific Pokemon sorted with Categories. But I can't figure out how to get the String to implement an action. I am willing to change the type of list if that fixes the problem. My current code is below:

//this is an intermediate Pokedex application for windows.  the code for the application is below.
//import the needed jlibraries for the program
import javax.swing.*;
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.image.*;
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.event.*;
import javax.swing.UIManager.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
import javax.imageio.*;
import java.io.*;
import java.lang.*;
import javax.swing.JRadioButtonMenuItem.*;
import java.util.*;
import javax.swing.JOptionPane;

//everything below is the pokedex class
public class Pokedex extends JFrame
{
    String[] gen1 = {"Bulbasaur", "Ivysaur"};
    JList<String> gen1List = new JList<String>(gen1);
    JScrollPane browsePane = new JScrollPane(gen1List);
    JPanel topIndexPanel = new JPanel();

    int intX;

    public static void main(String[] args)
    {
        Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().setDynamicLayout(true);
        System.setProperty("sun.awt.noerasebackground", "true");
        JFrame.setDefaultLookAndFeelDecorated(true);
        JDialog.setDefaultLookAndFeelDecorated(true);

        try
        {
            UIManager.setLookAndFeel("com.jtattoo.plaf.noire.NoireLookAndFeel");
        }
        catch (ClassNotFoundException ex)
        {
            java.util.logging.Logger.getLogger(Pokedex.class.getName()).log(java.util.logging.Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
        }
        catch (InstantiationException ex)
        {
            java.util.logging.Logger.getLogger(Pokedex.class.getName()).log(java.util.logging.Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
        }
        catch (IllegalAccessException ex)
        {
            java.util.logging.Logger.getLogger(Pokedex.class.getName()).log(java.util.logging.Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
        }
        catch (javax.swing.UnsupportedLookAndFeelException ex)
        {
            java.util.logging.Logger.getLogger(Pokedex.class.getName()).log(java.util.logging.Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
        }
        Pokedex f = new Pokedex();
        Dimension screenSize = Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().getScreenSize();
                f.setBounds(0,0,screenSize.width, screenSize.height);
                f.setVisible(true);
                f.setTitle("Pokedex");
    }

    public Pokedex()
    {
        add(browsePane, BorderLayout.WEST);
        gen1List.setSelectionMode(ListSelectionModel.SINGLE_INTERVAL_SELECTION);
        gen1List.setBackground(Color.BLACK);
        gen1List.setForeground(Color.WHITE);
        gen1List.setFont(new Font("Arial", Font.PLAIN, 18));
        addWindowListener(
        new WindowAdapter()
        {
            @Override
            public void windowClosing(WindowEvent e)
            {
            System.exit(0);
            }
        });

        String selected = gen1List.getSelectedValue().toString();
        System.out.println(selected);
    }
}

EDIT

I was able to create a work Around with the Below code and with a couple of modifications it will do what i need.

gameRedList.addListSelectionListener(new ListSelectionListener()
        {
            public void valueChanged(ListSelectionEvent arg0)
            {
                if (!arg0.getValueIsAdjusting())
                {
                  actionString = gameRedList.getSelectedValue().toString();
                  if (actionString=="Bulbasaur")
                  {
                      JFrame testFrame = new JFrame();
                      testFrame.setBounds(0,0,500,500);
                      testFrame.setBackground(Color.BLACK);
                      testFrame.setForeground(Color.WHITE);
                      testFrame.setTitle("Success");
                      testFrame.setVisible(true);

                  }
                }
            }
        });

Answer 1

Upon the user clicking a Pokémon

You can't assume the user will click on a Pokémon. The user could use the mouse or the keyboard. To be notified when an item in a JList is selected you would use a ListSelectionListener. Read the section from the Swing tutorial on Selecting Items in a List for more information and a working examples

I want it to open a new tabbed Panel within the main frame that holds all the information for that specific Pokemon

You probably don't want to open a new tabbed panel. Instead you create GUI with your component. Then as the selection is changed you just update the data displayed. That is, when designing a GUI you avoid adding/removing components.

Also you don't need the WindowListener. That is old AWT code. In Swing you can just use:

setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);