Nimbus JTable Checkbox Rendering Bug

I ran across a Nimbus Look and Feel bug that affects the GUIs I work on. This is a known issue: see Bug ID 6723524 on the Bug Parade. It is marked Low priority, so I hope it is fixed before the Java 6u10 release. (unlike Bug 4795987, for example, which has been open since 2002 and is also affecting my GUIs).

Here is a standard JTable with Boolean values in the third column. Notice how the standard checkbox renderer fails to properly paint alternate row colors: (this is very subtle on some displays)

In this next picture, I clicked on “Jones” to demonstrate the standard Nimbus focus border:

In this next picture, I clicked on the checkbox. Notice how the border is not painted on the checkbox renderer:

Sample Code

Here is the demonstration program, it requires JDK 1.6u10 to run.

import javax.swing.*;
import static javax.swing.UIManager.*;
import javax.swing.table.DefaultTableModel;
import javax.swing.table.TableModel;
import java.awt.*;

/**
 * Demonstrates bug 6723524, checkboxes do not render properly in JTable.
 *
 * @author Eric M. Burke
 */
public class NimbusDemo extends JFrame {
    public static void main(String... args) {
        SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
            public void run() {
                setNimbusLaf();
                new NimbusDemo().setVisible(true);
            }
        });
    }

    private static void setNimbusLaf() {
        try {
            for (LookAndFeelInfo lafInfo : getInstalledLookAndFeels()) {
                if ("Nimbus".equals(lafInfo.getName())) {
                    setLookAndFeel(lafInfo.getClassName());
                    return;
                }
            }
        } catch (Exception e) {
            throw new RuntimeException(e);
        }
        throw new RuntimeException("Unable to find Nimbus LAF.");
    }

    public NimbusDemo() {
        super("Bug 6723524");
        setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);

        Object[] columnNames = {
                "First Name", "Last Name", "Married"
        };
        Object[][] data = {
                {"Harry", "Smith", true},
                {"Sally", "Jones", false},
                {"Bob", "Clark", true},
                {"Eric", "Burke", true}
        };

        TableModel tm = new DefaultTableModel(data, columnNames) {
            public Class getColumnClass(int columnIndex) {
                return (columnIndex == 2) ? Boolean.class : String.class;
            }

            public boolean isCellEditable(int row, int column) {
                return false;
            }
        };
        add(new JScrollPane(new JTable(tm)), BorderLayout.CENTER);
        pack();
    }
}

Posted on Wednesday, July 30th, 2008 at 1:32 pm in Bugs, Java.