Java Swing

Editing and Rendering

You can build your own editors and renderers for the cells in your table. By default, you get renderers and editors for Boolean types (JCheckBox for display and editing), ImageIcon types, Number types (right-justified JTextField for an editor), and Object types (JTextField for editing). However, you can specify a particular editor or renderer for a class type or a particular column, or even a particular cell.

The TableCellRenderer Interface

This interface provides access to a rendering component without defining what the component will do. This works because a renderer functions by rubber-stamping a component’s image in a given location. The only method this interface defines initializes and returns just such a component:

public abstract Component getTableCellRendererComponent(JTable table, Object value, boolean isSelected, boolean hasFocus, int row, int column)

Takes a value, which could also be retrieved by getting the cell at row, column of table, and returns a component capable of drawing the value in a table cell (or anywhere, really). The resulting drawing can be affected by the selection state of the object and whether or not it currently has the keyboard focus.

The DefaultTableCellRenderer Class

The javax.swing.table package includes a default renderer that produces a JLabel to display text for each cell in the table. The JTable class uses this renderer to display Numbers, Icons, and Objects. JTable creates a new default renderer and then aligns ...