Using java swing components in MATLAB

A custom class that eases the use of java.awt and javax.swing components in MATLAB

Description

JCONTROL provides an easy way to integrate a full range of java GUIs from the java.awt and javax.swing libraries into MATLAB.
 
Example:
obj=JCONTROL(Parent, Style);
obj=JCONTROL(Parent, Style,...
PropertyName1, PropertyValue1,...
PropertyName2, ProeprtyValue2....);
Inputs:
Parent: the handle of a MATLAB figure or other container for the resulting component
Style: string describing a java component e.g. 'javax.swing.JPanel',
        'javax.swing.JButton'

A JCONTROL object aggregates the MATLAB handle graphics container and the Java component (as returned by MATLAB's JAVACOMPONENT function) into a single object. Access to the JCONTROL's properties is provided by GET/SET calls. MATLAB dot notation may also be used. This notation also provides access to the java object's methods e.g.
pos=myobject.Position;
sz=myObject.getSize;
myobject.setEnabled(1);
myobject.setToolTipText('My tip');
myobject.setOpaque(1);

The class has been modified so that all jcontrol objects have a uipanel ancestor. This is to accommodate changes to the javacomponent.m function introduced in ML R2008b by TMW. The changes should be backwards compatible - tested with R2006a/R2008b.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to acknowledge the following in the creation of this submission:
UICOMPONENT - expands uicontrol to all Java classes

• MATLAB release: MATLAB 7.4 (R2007a)
• Other requirements: Platform independent.

Other Files

@jcontrol/ancestor.m,
@jcontrol/close.m,
@jcontrol/Contents.m,
@jcontrol/delete.m,
@jcontrol/get.m,
@jcontrol/getappdata.m,
@jcontrol/isappdata.m,
@jcontrol/jcontrol.m,
@jcontrol/private/VisibleProperty.m,
@jcontrol/README.TXT,
@jcontrol/rmappdata.m,
@jcontrol/set.m,
@jcontrol/setappdata.m,
@jcontrol/subsasgn.m,
@jcontrol/subsref.m,
jcontrolDemo.m

[Yair Altman]

Excellent submission. Simple, easy to understand, richly documented and very effective. A great source of knowledge and examples for anyone interested in Java-Matlab integration as well as in object-oriented Matlab programming. This submission is one of, if not the, best that I've seen in fully utilizing Matlab's class properties (with some undocumented Matlab functionality), subscripted referencing & assignment, and method overloading. Aside from class methods which are missing here, this is a great example for Matlab OOP.

[Nick Clark]

Wonderful work! The author emailed me with a fix to get this working if you're a 7.0.1 user. See the following:

*In your copy of MATLAB's javacomponent.m , change lines 66-68 to this:
if isa(handle(parent), 'figure') || isa(handle(parent), 'uicontainer')
    parentIsFigure = true;
    peer = get(ancestor(parent, 'figure' ), 'JavaFrame');

*In jcontrolDemo:
Comment out lines 46-48
and save/run it

[Mathias Ortner]

I like this work : however I got a problem when trying the demo,

here is my udate of the javacomponent.m that made it work

if ( isa(hParent, 'figure') || ...
     isa(hParent, 'uicontainer') || ...
     isa(hParent, 'uiflowcontainer') || ...
     isa(hParent, 'uigridcontainer') ||...
     isa(hParent, 'hgjavacomponent'))
    parentIsFigure = true;
    peer = get(ancestor(parent,'figure'),'JavaFrame');
elseif isa(hParent, 'uitoolbar')
    peer = get(parent,'JavaContainer');
    if isempty(peer)
        drawnow;
        peer = get(parent,'JavaContainer');
    end
else
        error('MATLAB:javacomponent:InvalidParentHandle', 'Invalid parent handle\n%s', usage)
end

[Thierry Dalon]

I could not find any demo in the package.(jControldemo missing?)

[Malcolm Lidierth]

Thierry. Many thanks. Demo file now restored to zip.

[Jveer]

way too much effort required to integrate within guide created GUIs. can't be asked.

[Ritesh Sood]

I have only run the demo so far (which worked well), but it's surely a very useful contribution and I would like to thank the author for the same.

Although I haven't programmed awt/swing, or even much java, I recently wrote a fairly complex gui in perl-Gtk2, and I've some experience in gui programming.

My first question is if it's possible to have tabbed panes like we do in web browsers and a number of other guis? I don't think Matlab has it natively, and I'm sure swing has it. So how about our jobjects?

Second, one very desirable (even essential) feature in gui toolkits is widget packing. One programs the relative layout of the widgets and the toolkit computes the absolute positions and dimensions. I mean why should I be bothered with the arithmetic, let the computer do the math. Now that we can access swing via jobjects, is it possible to do automatic widget packing?

Thanks for your help!

[Malcolm Lidierth]

PS That should be uitab + uitabgroup

[Malcolm Lidierth]

Ritesh
See the undocumented MATLAB uitab and uitabgroup functions for tabbed panes
For widgets, I may have misunderstood. Jcontrols can be positioned using normalized units 0 to 1. MATLAB then does the work.

[Jose Miguel Ramon]

Great work! I have a question about the problems with the containers in R2008b onwards. As you comment before, hgjavacomponent may not parent other hgjavacomponent. Does this mean I cannot use Jframe as parent for my Javacomponents in R2008b onwards?

Therefore the only one way to contain JavaComponents is a figure, isn’t it? Is there any restriction in terms of including Javacomponent if I use a figure as parent? Can I build complex GUI’s using figure as parent?

Thanks in advance

[Malcolm Lidierth]

Jose
You will get Java exceptions if you try to create a JFrame ('adding a window to a container') so jcontrol does not allow that.

You can however, build very complex GUIs using a MATLAB figure or uipanel as parent and I hope to include tabbed panes once TWM provide full support for these. An advantage of using MATLAB containers is that you can mix and match jcontrols and MATLAB components including graphics in a single figure/panel.

Apart from using a java window, there are few restrictions. You can for example create a uipanel, add a swing JPanel to it, populate that with a JScrollPane and add a JTree to it along with a set of JButtons in the JPanel.
Regards
Malcolm