org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete

The automatic completion feature allows the user to enter a few characters using the keyboard - meanwhile, the computer "guesses" what the user intents to enter. Take a look at the example below to get an idea of the resulting user experience. Suppose the user types 'J','O','R' and 'G'...

The easiest way to get automatic completion for a component is to use the {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.AutoCompleteDecorator AutoCompleteDecorator}.

Enabling automatic completion for e.g. a JComboBox is only one line of code:

import org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.AutoCompleteDecorator;
[...]
JComboBox comboBox = [...];
AutoCompleteDecorator.decorate(comboBox);

When the combo box is not editable when calling {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.AutoCompleteDecorator#decorate(JComboBox) decorate}, the automatic completion will be strict (only allowing items contained in the combo box). When the combo box is editable it will also be possible to enter items that are not contained in the combo box.

Take care when enabling automatic completion for a JComboBox that is used as the cell editor for a JTable. You need to use the special {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.ComboBoxCellEditor ComboBoxCellEditor} instead of the standard DefaultCellEditor:

JTable table = [...];
JComboBox comboBox = [...];
[...]
TableColumn column = table.getColumnModel().getColumn([...]);
column.setCellEditor(new ComboBoxCellEditor(comboBox));

If you want to enable automatic completion for a component that is not supported by the {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.AutoCompleteDecorator AutoCompleteDecorator}, you need to implement {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.AbstractAutoCompleteAdaptor AbstractAutoCompleteAdaptor}. For an example see {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.ComboBoxAdaptor ComboBoxAdaptor} and {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.ListAdaptor ListAdaptor}.

The automatic completion works only for subclasses of {@link javax.swing.text.JTextComponent JTextComponent}. So you either use a component that contains a JTextComponent (e.g. JComboBox) or you connect a JTextComponent with another component (e.g. a JTextField and a JList). Of course, it's also possible to enable automatic completion for a JTextComponent without another visual component.

Once you have a custom implementation of {@link org.jdesktop.swingx.autocomplete.AbstractAutoCompleteAdaptor AbstractAutoCompleteAdaptor}, you normally would only have to make three more calls:

AbstractAutoCompleteAdaptor adaptor = new YourAdaptor([...]);
AutoCompleteDocument document = new AutoCompleteDocument(adaptor, true); // or false if you need non-strict matching
AutoCompleteDecorator.decorate(yourTextComponent, document, adaptor);

Wrapper around the combobox editor that translates combobox items into strings.

This is a cell editor that can be used when a combo box (that has been set up for automatic completion) is to be used in a JTable.

This class is used to provide string representations for objects when doing automatic completion.

A class inherited from this class could be used, when the object's toString method is not appropriate for automatic completion.

An example for i18n:

 public class I18NStringConverter extends ObjectToStringConverter {
 ResourceBundle bundle;
 public I18NStringConverter(ResourceBundle bundle) {
 this.bundle = bundle;
 }
 public String getPreferredStringForItem(Object item) {
 return item==null ? null : bundle.getString(item.toString());
 }
 }
 

It's also possible to return more than one string representation.