combine a console application with a GUI in netbeans

[Damon Salvatore]

I want to combine a console application with a GUI in netbeans. I tried to do it using a jButton. I want to get the output of the console application into a jTextArea.
There is a function called

private static void printBytes(byte[] data, String name)

in the console application. When calling that function have to do as follow.

printBytes(activeKey,"After permuted choice 1 table- Active key:");

For this I have to pass the 2nd parameter to the text box.I created an object of the jTextArea called ta and gave ;

printBytes(activeKey,ta.append("After permuted choice 1 table- Active key:"));

It gave an error called cannot convert void type into string.
Then I tried as follow.

String a="After permuted choice 1 table- Active key:"
printBytes(activeKey,ta.getText(a));

It also didn't work.
Someone please tell me how to do it.What i want to do is somehow connect my console application to GUI and getting the output on the GUI.