JTable change cell colors using TableCellRenderer

Question

I am using a JTable in my GUI application as a grid to represent positions for a game. I want the cells of the table that represent a certain position of an object to have a certain color, and on some actions, the object to move (i.e the color cell to move around in the Grid /JTable). I know that I can change cell colors by making a class that extends DefaultTableCellRenderer , is this the only way it can be done? or is there a simpler way to chage cell colors??Also Is JXTable better than JTable for such an application ?

EDIT: I didn't include the fact that I need certain cell colors to change dynamically, i.e with button clicks, keyboard clicks ...etc, is that still possible with any TableCellRenderer in case I am still using JTable ?

Thanks,

Buckjumper

Answer 1

With JTable, DefaultTableCellRenderer is the best way to do it.

However, if you use JXTable, it'll be much easier to use a Highlighter and a custom Predicate. Generally, Predicates are used to color based on contents of the cell, but you could just as easily have it color based on row/column and some external value.

Look in http://www.jarvana.com/jarvana/view/org/swinglabs/swingx-core/1.6.2/swingx-core-1.6.2-javadoc.jar!/org/jdesktop/swingx/JXTable.html under Rendering and Highlighting, which is a striped table and pattern matching. You'd essentially do the same thing as the pattern highlighter, but with your own Predicate.

Kolosick

How can do this dynamically though? Does it work the same way if I need to click a button that change a cell color, or make a keyboard click change cell colors as well? Thanks You – Buckjumper

Answer 2

As an alternative, consider using prepareRenderer(), as suggested by @mKorbel and shown in the article Table Row Rendering.

Schappe

can I use prepareRenderer() on a button action to change a color of one cell or a set of cells? – Buckjumper

Yes, if the state is a pure function of row & column. See also this answer. – Schappe