Casting variables in constructor before calling super?

Question

I am creating a game, and I wish to display the number of lives on the screen. I don't know how to add a number to the screen, but I do know the GLabel class which lets you write a String on the screen. So I thought this would be a good idea:

public class Lives extends GLabel
{
    double xPoistion, yPosition;
    int lives;
    String s_lives;

    public Lives(int lives, double xPosition, double yPosition){
        super(lives, xPosition, yPosition);
        this.lives = lives;
    }
}

However the constructor of the GLabel class only works with a String for the place where lives is in the super. I can't seem to find a solution to fix this. Is it even possible?

I tried this:

super(lives.toString(s_lives), xPosition, yPosition);

result was:

Lives.java:14: cannot reference s_lives before supertype constructor has been called
    super(lives.toString(s_lives), xPosition, yPosition);

Answer 1

It appears you are using the class member s_lives (I'm assuming that's what s_lives is) instead of the passed lives parameter, and you are trying to call toString() on a primitive.

It looks like what you need is :

public Lives(int lives, double xPosition, double yPosition)
{
    super(Integer.toString(lives), xPosition, yPosition);
    this.lives = lives;
}

Answer 2

you just need to convert int to string

public class Lives extends GLabel{
    double xPoistion, yPosition;
    int lives;

    public Lives(int lives, double xPosition, double yPosition){
        super(lives+"", xPosition, yPosition);// use '+' operation can easily convert the number
        this.lives = lives;
    }
}