JTable with a complex editor

Question

I have many custom editors for a JTable and it\'s an understatement to say that the usability, particularly in regard to editing with the keyboard, is lacking.

The main

Answer 1

I fixed something similar in 2 steps

First override the editCellAt from your JTable and call requestFocus after preparing the editor:

public boolean editCellAt( int row, int column, EventObject e )
{
  if ( cellEditor != null && !cellEditor.stopCellEditing() )
    {
    return false;
    }

  if ( row < 0 || row >= getRowCount() ||
      column < 0 || column >= getColumnCount() )
    {
    return false;
    }

  if ( !isCellEditable(row, column) )
    return false;

  TableCellEditor editor=getCellEditor(row, column);
  if ( editor != null && editor.isCellEditable(e) )
    {
    editorComp=prepareEditor(editor, row, column);
    if ( editorComp == null )
      {
      removeEditor();
      return false;
      }
    //aangepast
    Rectangle rect=getCellRect(row, column, false);
    if ( datamodel_.useAdaptedEditorRect() )
      rect=datamodel_.changeRectangle(rect, editorComp);
    editorComp.setBounds(rect);
    add(editorComp);
    editorComp.validate();

    setCellEditor(editor);
    setEditingRow(row);
    setEditingColumn(column);
    editor.addCellEditorListener(this);
    //NEXT LINE ADDED 
    editorComp.requestFocus();
    return true;
    }
  return false;
}

Then overload the requestFocus from your JPanel and make sure your textfield is put as editorComponent:

public class EditorPanel extends JPanel {
   JComponent editorComponent;

   public boolean isRequestFocusEnabled()
   {
     return true;
   }

   public void requestFocus()
   {
   editorComponent.requestFocus();
   }
}

You can always grab the keyEvent and set it yourself:

AWTEvent event = EventQueue.getCurrentEvent();
if ( event instanceof KeyEvent )
  {
  char newSelection = ( (KeyEvent) event).getKeyChar();
  int keyCode = ( (KeyEvent) event ).getKeyCode();
  editorComponent.requestFocus();
  if ( editorComponent instanceof JTextField )
    {
    if ( ( newSelection >= (char) FIRST_ALLOWED_CHAR ) && ( newSelection != (char) LAST_ALLOWED_CHAR ) ) //comes from DefaultKeyTypedAction
       ( (JTextField) editorComponent ).setText(Character.toString(newSelection));
    if ( keyCode == KeyEvent.VK_BACK_SPACE || keyCode == KeyEvent.VK_DELETE )
      ( (JTextField) editorComponent ).setText("");          
    }
  }
else
  editorComponent.requestFocus();