My "problem" can be described by the following. Assume we have an intensive process that we want to have running in the background and have it update a Swing JProgress bar. The solution is easy:

import java.util.List;

import javax.swing.JOptionPane;
import javax.swing.JProgressBar;
import javax.swing.SwingWorker;


/**
 * @author Savvas Dalkitsis
 */
public class Test {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        final JProgressBar progressBar = new JProgressBar(0,99);
        SwingWorker<Void, Integer> w = new SwingWorker<Void, Integer>(){

            @Override
            protected void process(List<Integer> chunks) {
                progressBar.setValue(chunks.get(chunks.size()-1));
            }

            @Override
            protected Void doInBackground() throws Exception {

                for (int i=0;i<100;i++) {
                    publish(i);
                    Thread.sleep(300);
                }

                return null;
            }

        };
        w.execute();
        JOptionPane.showOptionDialog(null,
                new Object[] { "Process", progressBar }, "Process",
                JOptionPane.OK_CANCEL_OPTION, JOptionPane.QUESTION_MESSAGE,
                null, null, null);
    }

}

Now assume that i have various methods that take a long time. For instance we have a method that downloads a file from a server. Or another that uploads to a server. Or anything really. What is the proper way of delegating the publish method to those methods so that they can update the GUI appropriately?

What i have found so far is this (assume that the method "aMethod" resides in some other package for instance):

import java.awt.event.ActionEvent;
import java.util.List;

import javax.swing.AbstractAction;
import javax.swing.Action;
import javax.swing.JOptionPane;
import javax.swing.JProgressBar;
import javax.swing.SwingWorker;


/**
 * @author Savvas Dalkitsis
 */
public class Test {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        final JProgressBar progressBar = new JProgressBar(0,99);
        SwingWorker<Void, Integer> w = new SwingWorker<Void, Integer>(){

            @Override
            protected void process(List<Integer> chunks) {
                progressBar.setValue(chunks.get(chunks.size()-1));
            }

            @SuppressWarnings("serial")
            @Override
            protected Void doInBackground() throws Exception {

                aMethod(new AbstractAction() {

                    @Override
                    public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
                        publish((Integer)getValue("progress"));
                    }
                });

                return null;
            }

        };
        w.execute();
        JOptionPane.showOptionDialog(null,
                new Object[] { "Process", progressBar }, "Process",
                JOptionPane.OK_CANCEL_OPTION, JOptionPane.QUESTION_MESSAGE,
                null, null, null);
    }

    public static void aMethod (Action action) {
        for (int i=0;i<100;i++) {
            action.putValue("progress", i);
            action.actionPerformed(null);
            try {
                Thread.sleep(300);
            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
                e.printStackTrace();
            }
        }
    }

}

It works but i know it lacks something. Any thoughts?