Generating an N x N grid

Question

What is the most painless way to create an N x N grid in a JavaFX application?

The only requirements I\'m looking for is that the size of the grid will always take u

Answer 1

Don't stray away from the original ideas. Why are you looking for "painless" ways when all the methods you've given are all viable? Here's one using your rectangles. The GridMaker.SCREEN_SIZE refers to the size of the screen you must have.

   public static Pane makeGrid(int n){

    double width = GridMaker.SCREEN_SIZE/n;
    Pane p = new Pane();

    Rectangle [][] rec = new Rectangle [n][n];

    for(int i=0; i<n; i++){
        for(int j=0; j<n; j++){
            rec[i][j] = new Rectangle();
            rec[i][j].setX(i * width);
            rec[i][j].setY(j * width);
            rec[i][j].setWidth(width);
            rec[i][j].setHeight(width);
            rec[i][j].setFill(null);
            rec[i][j].setStroke(Color.BLACK);
            p.getChildren().add(rec[i][j]);

        }
    }

    return p;
}

Then simply add the mouse listener to the pane if you wish to make it change color.

 p.setOnMouseClicked(new EventHandler <MouseEvent> (){
        @Override
        public void handle(MouseEvent me){
            double posX = me.getX();
            double posY = me.getY();

            int colX = (int)(posX / width);
            int colY = (int) (posY / width);

            rec[colX][colY].setFill(Color.RED);
        }
    });

-- Edit

1)

2) For Hover, what kind of hover effects are you looking for? You can add Hover effects onto each rectangles, if you want me to show you how, I can definitely code it for you.