The Properties view displays and lets you edit the properties of the selected component(s). Select one or more components in the Design or Structure view to see its properties. If more than one component is selected, only properties that are available in all selected components are shown.
The properties table displays the component name, component class, layout manager and constraints properties, bindings, events, client properties, component properties and code generation properties. The list of component properties comes from introspection of the component class (JavaBeans).
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Properties are organized in
categories, which you can expand/collapse by clicking on the category
name or on the small plus/minus icons. The number of properties in a
category and the number of set properties is displayed near the
category name. The category names of component property categories (Properties, Expert Properties, etc) are displayed in blue color. Different font styles are used for the property names. Bold style is used for preferred (often used) properties, plain style for normal properties and italic style for expert properties. Read-only properties are shown using a gray font color. The light gray background indicates unset properties. The shown values are the default values of the component. The white background indicates set properties. Java code will be generated for set properties only. Use Restore Default Value ( ![]() ![]() null .A small arrow ( ![]() |
Use Group by Category () to organize component properties into three
predefined categories (normal, expert and read-only) and custom categories (defined in BeanInfo). Group by
Defining Type (
) organizes
component properties into defining types (e.g. JTextField,
JTextComponent, JComponent, Container, Component). Alphabetical
(
) shows all component properties in one
category.
The left column displays the property names, the right column the property values. Click on a property value to edit it.
You can either edit a value directly in
the property table or use a custom property editor by clicking on the
ellipsis
button () on the right side. The custom editor pops up
in a new dialog. The globe button (
),
which is only available for
localized forms and string properties, allows you to choose existing
strings from the resource bundle of the form.
The type of the editor depends on the data type of the property. JFormDesigner has built-in property editors for all standard data types.
For numbers, a spinner editor makes it easier to increase or decrease the value using the arrow buttons or Up and Down keys. Press the Enter key to confirm the change; or the Esc key to cancel it.
To filter the list of shown properties, select the Show Filter
() toolbar button. This shows a text field below the
toolbar, where you can enter your filter criteria.
Property/Category | Description |
---|---|
Name | The name of the component. Must be unique within the form. Used as variable name in the generated Java code. It is also possible to specify a different variable name in the Code Generation category. |
Class | The class name of the component. The tooltip displays the full class name and the class hierarchy. Click on the value to morph the component class to another class (e.g. JTextField to JTextArea). |
Button Group | The
name
of the button group assigned to the component. This property is only
visible for components derived from JToggleButton
(e.g. JRadioButton
and JCheckBox ). |
Layout Manager | Layout manager properties of the container component. Click on the plus sign to expand it. The list of layout properties depends on the used layout manager. This property is only visible for container components. Click on the value to change the layout manager. |
Layout Constraints | Layout constraints properties of the component. Click on the plus sign to expand it. The list of constraints properties depends on the layout manager of the parent component. This property is only visible if the layout manager of the parent component uses constraints. |
Bindings | Bindings of the component. |
Events | Events of the component. |
Client Properties | Client properties of the component. Click on the plus sign to expand it. This property is only visible if there are client properties defined in the Client Properties preferences. |
Code Generation | Code Generation properties of the component. |