{"id":999,"date":"2016-08-09T12:24:50","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T10:24:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/?p=999"},"modified":"2016-08-09T12:24:50","modified_gmt":"2016-08-09T10:24:50","slug":"javafx-and-netbeans-dynamically-loading-windows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/?p=999","title":{"rendered":"JavaFX and NetBeans: Dynamically Loading Windows"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Swing-based window system in the NetBeans Platform has the concept of a window that is loaded at runtime. These windows derive from the class TopComponent and are registered using annotations, and are created using a handy wizard in the NetBeans IDE. Today I am going to show you how to do something similar with JavaFX components, using the default lookup<\/a> of the NetBeans platform. My aim is to load an FXML file and display it on a tabbed pane. <\/p>\n

I am using the source code from my previous blog entry<\/a> as a starting point because I already had it handy. That main fxml file already had a tabPane, which is what I require in the GUI.<\/p>\n

\"Window<\/a>
Application from the previous blog entry<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I created a package called za.co.pellissier.javafxwindowsystem.api where the public API of my JavaFXWindowSystem will be located. To be able to add a component to the tabbed pane, the text to be displayed on the tab as well as a javafx.scene.Node object is needed. So I created an interface that windows will need to implement:<\/p>\n

[java]package za.co.pellissier.javafxwindowsystem.api;<\/p>\n

import javafx.scene.Node;<\/p>\n

public interface IJavaFXWindow {<\/p>\n

public Node load();<\/p>\n

String getWindowName();
\n}[\/java]<\/p>\n

There is a class called FXMLLoader that is able to load an fxml file and return a Node object representing its content. To save future implementers of this API some effort, here is an abstract class that handles the loading:<\/p>\n

[java]package za.co.pellissier.javafxwindowsystem.api;<\/p>\n

import java.io.IOException;
\nimport java.net.URL;
\nimport java.util.logging.Level;
\nimport java.util.logging.Logger;
\nimport javafx.fxml.FXMLLoader;
\nimport javafx.scene.Node;<\/p>\n

public abstract class AJavaFXWindow implements IJavaFXWindow {<\/p>\n

private final String fxmlFileName;<\/p>\n

public AJavaFXWindow(String fxmlName) {
\n fxmlFileName = fxmlName;
\n }<\/p>\n

@Override
\n public Node load() {
\n try {
\n URL resource = getClass().getResource(fxmlFileName);
\n return (Node) FXMLLoader.load(resource);
\n } catch (IOException ex) {
\n Logger.getLogger(getClass().getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, null, ex);
\n }
\n return null;
\n }
\n}[\/java]<\/p>\n

That is all that there is to the API, for now. \ud83d\ude42 <\/p>\n

Note: Remember to export the package (set it to public) if you want it to be visible to other modules!<\/p>\n

So lets look at how it is used by the window system. In my MainWindowController class (the JavaFX controller for the main fxml file), I added this method:<\/p>\n

[java] private void loadWindows() {
\n Collection windows =
\n Lookup.getDefault().lookupAll(IJavaFXWindow.class);
\n for (IJavaFXWindow window : windows) {
\n Node win = window.load();
\n String name = window.getWindowName();
\n tabPane.getTabs().add(new Tab(name, win));
\n }
\n }[\/java]<\/p>\n

I called this method in the initialize() method after the menu items are loaded.<\/p>\n

All that remains is to see how a new window can be added to the system. First, lets create a new module called JavaFXTestWindow to contain the new window. It needs dependencies on Lookup API and JavaFXWindowSystem (the module where the API is defined). <\/p>\n

In the JavaFXTestWindow module, I created a new fxml file called testwindow.fxml using SceneBuilder, and generated a controller class using the NetBeans IDE. Now for the most important step… implementing that brand new API!<\/p>\n

[java]package za.co.pellissier.testwindow;<\/p>\n

import org.openide.util.lookup.ServiceProvider;
\nimport za.co.pellissier.javafxwindowsystem.api.AJavaFXWindow;
\nimport za.co.pellissier.javafxwindowsystem.api.IJavaFXWindow;<\/p>\n

@ServiceProvider(service = IJavaFXWindow.class)
\npublic class MyWindow extends AJavaFXWindow implements IJavaFXWindow {<\/p>\n

public MyWindow() {
\n super(“testwindow.fxml”);
\n }<\/p>\n

@Override
\n public String getWindowName() {
\n return “Test Me!”;
\n }
\n}[\/java]<\/p>\n

The most important line is the @ServiceProvider annotation – if you leave that out, the default lookup will not be able to find the window!<\/p>\n

After cleaning and building, here is the result!<\/p>\n

\"FXML<\/a>
FXML file loaded<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There are certainly still improvements to be made to this implementation. It only emulates a single mode in the NetBeans Platform Window System. And it requires the user to manually create an additional class. But it is a good start! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Swing-based window system in the NetBeans Platform has the concept of a window that is loaded at runtime. These windows derive from the class TopComponent and are registered using annotations, and are created using a handy wizard in the NetBeans IDE. Today I am going to show you how to do something similar with … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[8,3,5],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1v8WL-g7","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=999"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1020,"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999\/revisions\/1020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pellissier.co.za\/hermien\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}