Java Doc for IconsFactory.java in  » Swing-Library » jide-common » com » jidesoft » icons » Java Source Code / Java DocumentationJava Source Code and Java Documentation

Any application usually need to access image files. One way to do it is to put those image files in the installation and access them use direct file access. However this is not a good way because you have to know the full path to the image file. So a better way that most Java applications take is to bundle the image files with in the jar and use class loader to load them.

For example, if a class Foo needs to access image files foo.gif and bar.png, we put the image files right below the source code under icons subfolder. See an example directory structure below.

 /src/com/jidesoft/Foo.java
 /icons/foo.gif
 /icons/bar.png
 

 /classes/com/jidesoft/Foo.class
 /icons/foo.gif
 /icons/bar.png
 

If you setup directory structure as above, you can now use IconsFactory to access the images like this.

 ImageIcon icon = IconsFactory.get(Foo.class, "icons/foo.gif");
 

There are a few methods on IconsFactory to create difference variation from the original icon. For example, IconsFactory.getDisabledImageIcon(Class,String) will get the imaage icon with disabled effect.

We also suggest you to use the template below to create a number of IconsFactory classes in your application. The idea is that you should have one for each functional area so that all your image files can be grouped into each functional area. All images used in that functional area should be put under the folder where this IconsFactory is. Here is an template.

 class TemplateIconsFactory {
 public static class Group1 {
 public final static String IMAGE1 = "icons/image11.png";
 public final static String IMAGE2 = "icons/image12.png";
 public final static String IMAGE3 = "icons/image13.png";
 }
 

 public static class Group2 {
 public final static String IMAGE1 = "icons/image21.png";
 public final static String IMAGE2 = "icons/image22.png";
 public final static String IMAGE3 = "icons/image23.png";
 }
 

 public static ImageIcon getImageIcon(String name) {
 if (name != null)
 return IconsFactory.getImageIcon(TemplateIconsFactory.class, name);
 else
 return null;
 }
 

 public static void main(String[] argv) {
 IconsFactory.generateHTML(TemplateIconsFactory.class);
 }
 }
 

In the template, we defined the image names as constants. When you have a lot of images, it's hard to remember all of them when writing code. If using the IconsFactory above, you can use

 ImageIcon icon = TemplateIconsFactory.getImageIcon(TemplateIconsFactory.Group1.IMAGE1);
 

You probably also notice this is a main() method in this template. You can run it. When you run, you will see a message printed out like this.

 "File is generated at "... some directory ...\com.jidesoft.icons.TemplateIconsFactory.html". Please copy it to the same directory as TemplateIconsFactory.java"
 

Please note, getImageIcon will print out error message to stderr if image is not found. The reason we did so is because we want you to make sure all image files are there in your application.

Please note, getImageIcon will print out error message to stderr if image is not found. The reason we did so is because we want you to make sure all image files are there in your application. If you ever see the error message, you should correct it before shipping the product. But if you just want to test if the image file is there, you don't want any error message print out. If so, you can use IconsFactory.findImageIcon(Class,String) method. It will throw IOException when image is not found.
Parameters:
  clazz - the Class
Parameters:
  fileName - relative file name the ImageIcon