The listener interface for receiving notification of events dispatched to objects that are instances of Component or MenuComponent or their subclasses. Unlike the other EventListeners in this package, AWTEventListeners passively observe events being dispatched in the AWT, system-wide. Most applications should never use this class; applications which might use AWTEventListeners include event recorders for automated testing, and facilities such as the Java Accessibility package.

The class that is interested in monitoring AWT events implements this interface, and the object created with that class is registered with the Toolkit, using the Toolkit's addAWTEventListener method. When an event is dispatched anywhere in the AWT, that object's eventDispatched method is invoked.