Edit: as of Java 8, lambda expressions are a nice solution as other answers have pointed out. The answer below was written for Java 7 and earlier...

Take a look at the command pattern.

// NOTE: code not tested, but I believe this is valid java...
public class CommandExample 
{
    public interface Command 
    {
        public void execute(Object data);
    }

    public class PrintCommand implements Command 
    {
        public void execute(Object data) 
        {
            System.out.println(data.toString());
        }    
    }

    public static void callCommand(Command command, Object data) 
    {
        command.execute(data);
    }

    public static void main(String... args) 
    {
        callCommand(new PrintCommand(), "hello world");
    }
}

Edit: as Pete Kirkham points out, there's another way of doing this using a Visitor. The visitor approach is a little more involved - your nodes all need to be visitor-aware with an acceptVisitor() method - but if you need to traverse a more complex object graph then it's worth examining.

Since Java 8 there is a Function<T, R> interface (docs), which has method

R apply(T t);

You can use it to pass functions as parameters to other functions. T is the input type of the function, R is the return type.

In your example you need to pass a function that takes Component type as an input and returns nothing - Void. In this case Function<T, R> is not the best choice, since there is no autoboxing of Void type. The interface you are looking for is called Consumer<T> (docs) with method

void accept(T t);

It would look like this:

public void setAllComponents(Component[] myComponentArray, Consumer<Component> myMethod) {
    for (Component leaf : myComponentArray) {
        if (leaf instanceof Container) { 
            Container node = (Container) leaf;
            setAllComponents(node.getComponents(), myMethod);
        } 
        myMethod.accept(leaf);
    } 
}

And you would call it using method references:

setAllComponents(this.getComponents(), this::changeColor);
setAllComponents(this.getComponents(), this::changeSize); 

Assuming that you have defined changeColor() and changeSize() methods in the same class.

If your method happens to accept more than one parameter, you can use BiFunction<T, U, R> - T and U being types of input parameters and R being return type. There is also BiConsumer<T, U> (two arguments, no return type). Unfortunately for 3 and more input parameters, you have to create an interface by yourself. For example:

public interface Function4<A, B, C, D, R> {

    R apply(A a, B b, C c, D d);
}

Use the java.lang.reflect.Method object and call invoke

First define an Interface with the method you want to pass as a parameter

public interface Callable {
  public void call(int param);
}

Implement a class with the method

class Test implements Callable {
  public void call(int param) {
    System.out.println( param );
  }
}

// Invoke like that

Callable cmd = new Test();

This allows you to pass cmd as parameter and invoke the method call defined in the interface

public invoke( Callable callable ) {
  callable.call( 5 );
}

Last time I checked, Java is not capable of natively doing what you want; you have to use 'work-arounds' to get around such limitations. As far as I see it, interfaces ARE an alternative, but not a good alternative. Perhaps whoever told you that was meaning something like this:

public interface ComponentMethod {
  public abstract void PerfromMethod(Container c);
}

public class ChangeColor implements ComponentMethod {
  @Override
  public void PerfromMethod(Container c) {
    // do color change stuff
  }
}

public class ChangeSize implements ComponentMethod {
  @Override
  public void PerfromMethod(Container c) {
    // do color change stuff
  }
}

public void setAllComponents(Component[] myComponentArray, ComponentMethod myMethod) {
    for (Component leaf : myComponentArray) {
        if (leaf instanceof Container) { //recursive call if Container
            Container node = (Container) leaf;
            setAllComponents(node.getComponents(), myMethod);
        } //end if node
        myMethod.PerfromMethod(leaf);
    } //end looping through components
}

Which you'd then invoke with:

setAllComponents(this.getComponents(), new ChangeColor());
setAllComponents(this.getComponents(), new ChangeSize());

I didn't find any example explicit enough for me on how to use java.util.function.Function for simple method as parameter function. Here is a simple example:

import java.util.function.Function;

public class Foo {

  private Foo(String parameter) {
    System.out.println("I'm a Foo " + parameter);
  }

  public static Foo method(final String parameter) {
    return new Foo(parameter);
  }

  private static Function parametrisedMethod(Function<String, Foo> function) {
    return function;
  }

  public static void main(String[] args) {
    parametrisedMethod(Foo::method).apply("from a method");
  }
}

Basically you have a Foo object with a default constructor. A method that will be called as a parameter from the parametrisedMethod which is of type Function<String, Foo>.

• Function<String, Foo> means that the function takes a String as parameter and return a Foo.
• The Foo::Method correspond to a lambda like x -> Foo.method(x);
• parametrisedMethod(Foo::method) could be seen as x -> parametrisedMethod(Foo.method(x))
• The .apply("from a method") is basically to do parametrisedMethod(Foo.method("from a method"))

Which will then return in the output:

>> I'm a Foo from a method

The example should be running as is, you can then try more complicated stuff from the above answers with different classes and interfaces.

Java-8 onwards

Java 8 onwards, you can provide the implementation of the abstract method of a functional interface (an interface that has only one abstract method) using a lambda expression and pass the same to a method as a parameter.

@FunctionalInterface
interface ArithmeticFunction {
    public int calcualate(int a, int b);
}

public class Main {
    public static void main(String args[]) {
        ArithmeticFunction addition = (a, b) -> a + b;
        ArithmeticFunction subtraction = (a, b) -> a - b;

        int a = 20, b = 5;

        System.out.println(perform(addition, a, b));
        // or
        System.out.println(perform((x, y) -> x + y, a, b));

        System.out.println(perform(subtraction, a, b));
        // or
        System.out.println(perform((x, y) -> x - y, a, b));
    }

    static int perform(ArithmeticFunction function, int a, int b) {
        return function.calcualate(a, b);
    }
}

Output:

25
25
15
15

ONLINE DEMO

Learn more about it from Method References.

Java do have a mechanism to pass name and call it. It is part of the reflection mechanism. Your function should take additional parameter of class Method.

public void YouMethod(..... Method methodToCall, Object objWithAllMethodsToBeCalled)
{
...
Object retobj = methodToCall.invoke(objWithAllMethodsToBeCalled, arglist);
...
}

I did not found any solution here that show how to pass method with parameters bound to it as a parameter of a method. Bellow is example of how you can pass a method with parameter values already bound to it.

1. Step 1: Create two interfaces one with return type, another without. Java has similar interfaces but they are of little practical use because they do not support Exception throwing.

    public interface Do {
    void run() throws Exception;
    }


    public interface Return {
        R run() throws Exception;
    }

2. Example of how we use both interfaces to wrap method call in transaction. Note that we pass method with actual parameters.

    //example - when passed method does not return any value
    public void tx(final Do func) throws Exception {
        connectionScope.beginTransaction();
        try {
            func.run();
            connectionScope.commit();
        } catch (Exception e) {
            connectionScope.rollback();
            throw e;
        } finally {
            connectionScope.close();
        }
    }

    //Invoke code above by 
    tx(() -> api.delete(6));

Another example shows how to pass a method that actually returns something

        public  R tx(final Return func) throws Exception {
    R r=null;
    connectionScope.beginTransaction();
    try {
                r=func.run();
                connectionScope.commit();
            } catch (Exception e) {
                connectionScope.rollback();
                throw e;
            } finally {
                connectionScope.close();
            }
        return r;
        }
        //Invoke code above by 
        Object x= tx(() -> api.get(id));

Use the Observer pattern (sometimes also called Listener pattern):

interface ComponentDelegate {
    void doSomething(Component component);
}

public void setAllComponents(Component[] myComponentArray, ComponentDelegate delegate) {
    // ...
    delegate.doSomething(leaf);
}

setAllComponents(this.getComponents(), new ComponentDelegate() {
                                            void doSomething(Component component) {
                                                changeColor(component); // or do directly what you want
                                            }
                                       });

new ComponentDelegate()... declares an anonymous type implementing the interface.

Example of solution with reflection, passed method must be public

import java.lang.reflect.Method;
import java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException;

public class Program {
    int i;

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Program   obj = new Program();    //some object

        try {
            Method method = obj.getClass().getMethod("target");
            repeatMethod( 5, obj, method );
        } 
        catch ( NoSuchMethodException | IllegalAccessException | InvocationTargetException e) {
            System.out.println( e ); 
        }
    }

    static void repeatMethod (int times, Object object, Method method)
        throws IllegalAccessException, InvocationTargetException {

        for (int i=0; i<times; i++)
            method.invoke(object);
    }
    public void target() {                 //public is necessary
        System.out.println("target(): "+ ++i);
    }
}

I appreciate the answers above but I was able to achieve the same behavior using the method below; an idea borrowed from Javascript callbacks. I'm open to correction though so far so good (in production).

The idea is to use the return type of the function in the signature, meaning that the yield has to be static.

Below is a function that runs a process with a timeout.

public static void timeoutFunction(String fnReturnVal) {

    Object p = null; // whatever object you need here

    String threadSleeptime = null;

    Config config;

    try {
        config = ConfigReader.getConfigProperties();
        threadSleeptime = config.getThreadSleepTime();

    } catch (Exception e) {
        log.error(e);
        log.error("");
        log.error("Defaulting thread sleep time to 105000 miliseconds.");
        log.error("");
        threadSleeptime = "100000";
    }

    ExecutorService executor = Executors.newCachedThreadPool();
    Callable<Object> task = new Callable<Object>() {
        public Object call() {
            // Do job here using --- fnReturnVal --- and return appropriate value
            return null;
        }
    };
    Future<Object> future = executor.submit(task);

    try {
        p = future.get(Integer.parseInt(threadSleeptime), TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
    } catch (Exception e) {
        log.error(e + ". The function timed out after [" + threadSleeptime
                + "] miliseconds before a response was received.");
    } finally {
        // if task has started then don't stop it
        future.cancel(false);
    }
}

private static String returnString() {
    return "hello";
}

public static void main(String[] args) {
    timeoutFunction(returnString());
}