blinking tab pane

[sk said]

i created a tabbed pane with 3 jPanel.
1 of them is for output display.
how can i make it's title blinking when there is output to be displayed?

[Tarun Bolla]

You can write a thread for setting the title of the Output tab (say tab #3 in (0, 1, 2, 3)) TABBEDPANE.setTitleAt(3, "Output") and TABBEDPANE.setTitleAt(3, " ") alternately with a 600 ms delay(sleep interval)...

[Darryl Burke]

Tarun Bolla wrote:You can write a thread for setting the title of the Output tab (say tab #3 in (0, 1, 2, 3)) TABBEDPANE.setTitleAt(3, "Output") and TABBEDPANE.setTitleAt(3, " ") alternately with a 600 ms delay(sleep interval)...

Did you try that to see what happens?

Also, I recommend you go through these two tutorials: How to Use Swing Timers and Concurrency in Swing.

[Darryl Burke]

sk said wrote:i created a tabbed pane with 3 jPanel.
1 of them is for output display.
how can i make it's title blinking when there is output to be displayed?

You can try using setForegroundAt(...) using a Swing Timer.

[Tarun Bolla]

Darryl Burke wrote:
Did you try that to see what happens?

Here is a sample code that demonstrates what i mean...

import java.awt.event.MouseAdapter;
import java.awt.event.MouseEvent;

import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JLabel;
import javax.swing.JPanel;
import javax.swing.JTabbedPane;
import javax.swing.SwingUtilities;
import javax.swing.SwingWorker;


public class TabbedPaneBlink {
	public static void main(String[] args) {
		JFrame jf = new JFrame();
		jf.setSize(500, 500);
		jf.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
		
		final JTabbedPane jp = new JTabbedPane();
		
		JPanel jp1 = new JPanel();
		JLabel jl1 = new JLabel("1");
		jl1.addMouseListener(new MouseAdapter() {
			@Override
			public void mouseClicked(MouseEvent arg0) {
				notifyOutput();
				super.mouseClicked(arg0);
			}

			private void notifyOutput() {
				Runnable runnable = new Runnable() {
					
					@Override
					public void run() {
						int i = 0;
						while(i++ < 6){
							System.out.println(jp.getTitleAt(2));
							if(jp.getTitleAt(2).equals("Output")){
								jp.setTitleAt(2, "             ");
							}else{
								jp.setTitleAt(2, "Output");
							}
                                      // [EDIT] Not needed....
							jp.revalidate();
							try {
								Thread.sleep(600);
							} catch (InterruptedException e) {
								e.printStackTrace();
							}
						}
					}
				};
				Thread t = new Thread(runnable);
				t.start();
			}
		});
		jp1.add(jl1);
		jp.add(jp1, "One");
		
		JPanel jp2 = new JPanel();
		JLabel jl2 = new JLabel("2");
		jp2.add(jl2);
		jp.add(jp2, "Two");
		
		JPanel jp3 = new JPanel();
		JLabel jl3 = new JLabel("Output");
		jp3.add(jl3);
		jp.add(jp3, "Output");

		jf.getContentPane().add(jp);
		jf.setVisible(true);
	}
}

After running it...click on the JLabel with Text "1" in the first tab and see that the output tab text blinks...

[Rob Spoor]

I personally would never use blinking. I'd instead use colouring - make it red or something like that when there's output, then make it black again when the tab is selected. Since Java 6 JTabbedPane has method setTabComponentAt which allows you to set a simple JLabel for that one tab, letting the default UI work for the others. There's no need for a timer then; keep a reference to this JLabel and simply change its foreground colour when needed.

Edit: or use setForegroundAt. I never knew this method existed. Thanks Darryl!

And Tarun, you clearly have not read the concurrency in Swing page Darryl linked to, or you wouldn't be using a regular thread.

[Darryl Burke]

Tarun Bolla wrote:

Darryl Burke wrote:
Did you try that to see what happens?

Here is a sample code that demonstrates what i mean...

// snip
							if(jp.getTitleAt(2).equals("Output")){
								jp.setTitleAt(2, "             ");
							}else{
								jp.setTitleAt(2, "Output");

1. That's not what you wrote earlier.

TABBEDPANE.setTitleAt(3, "Output") and TABBEDPANE.setTitleAt(3, " ")

2. The number of spaces is totally dependent on the Font, making this a very fragile 'solution'.

Here's a more robust approach:

import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Dimension;
import java.awt.event.ActionEvent;
import java.awt.event.ActionListener;
import javax.swing.*;

public class BlinkingTabPane {

  Color bgSelectedColor;
  Color bgUnselectedColor;
  Color fgColor;

  public static void main(String[] args) {
    SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() {

      @Override
      public void run() {
        new BlinkingTabPane().makeUI();
      }
    });
  }

  public void makeUI() {
    final JTabbedPane tabbedPane = new JTabbedPane();
    for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
      JPanel panel = new JPanel();
      panel.setName("tab" + (i + 1));
      panel.setPreferredSize(new Dimension(400, 400));
      tabbedPane.add(panel);
    }
    
    bgSelectedColor = UIManager.getColor("TabbedPane.selected");
    bgUnselectedColor = UIManager.getColor("TabbedPane.unselectedBackground");
    fgColor = tabbedPane.getForegroundAt(1);

    JFrame frame = new JFrame();
    frame.add(tabbedPane);
    
    frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
    frame.pack();
    frame.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
    frame.setVisible(true);
    
    new Timer(800, new ActionListener() {

      boolean show;

      public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
        tabbedPane.setForegroundAt(1, show
                ? fgColor
                : tabbedPane.getSelectedIndex() == 1
                ? bgSelectedColor
                : bgUnselectedColor);
        show = !show;
      }
    }).start();
  }
}

[Tarun Bolla]

If not spaces ... colors can do that....

import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.event.MouseAdapter;
import java.awt.event.MouseEvent;

import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JLabel;
import javax.swing.JPanel;
import javax.swing.JTabbedPane;
import javax.swing.SwingUtilities;
import javax.swing.SwingWorker;


public class TabbedPaneBlink {
	public static void main(String[] args) {
		JFrame jf = new JFrame();
		jf.setSize(500, 500);
		jf.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
		
		final JTabbedPane jp = new JTabbedPane();
		final JLabel jl3 = new JLabel("Output");
		
		JPanel jp1 = new JPanel();
		JLabel jl1 = new JLabel("1");
		jl1.addMouseListener(new MouseAdapter() {
			@Override
			public void mouseClicked(MouseEvent arg0) {
				notifyOutput();
				super.mouseClicked(arg0);
			}

			private void notifyOutput() {
				Runnable runnable = new Runnable() {
					
					@Override
					public void run() {
						int i = 0;
						while(i++ < 6){
							if(jl3.getForeground() == Color.white){
								jl3.setForeground(Color.black);
							}else{
								jl3.setForeground(Color.white);
							}
							try {
								Thread.sleep(600);
							} catch (InterruptedException e) {
								e.printStackTrace();
							}
						}
					}
				};
				Thread t = new Thread(runnable);
				t.start();
			}
		});
		
		
		jp1.add(jl1);
		jp.add(jp1, "One");
		
		JPanel jp2 = new JPanel();
		JLabel jl2 = new JLabel("2");
		jp2.add(jl2);
		jp.add(jp2, "Two");
		
		JPanel jp3 = new JPanel();
		jp3.add(jl3);
		jp.add(jp3, "Output");
		jp.setTabComponentAt(2, jl3);

		jf.getContentPane().add(jp);
		jf.setVisible(true);
		
	}
}