+ *
+ * Having this interface enables complex components (the client of the
+ * editor) such as JTree and
+ * JTable to allow any generic editor to
+ * edit values in a table cell, or tree cell, etc. Without this generic
+ * editor interface, JTable would have to know about specific editors,
+ * such as JTextField, JCheckBox, JComboBox,
+ * etc. In addition, without this interface, clients of editors such as
+ * JTable would not be able
+ * to work with any editors developed in the future by the user
+ * or a 3rd party ISV.
+ *
+ * To use this interface, a developer creating a new editor can have the
+ * new component implement the interface. Or the developer can
+ * choose a wrapper based approach and provide a companion object which
+ * implements the CellEditor interface (See
+ * JCellEditor for example). The wrapper approach
+ * is particularly useful if the user want to use a 3rd party ISV
+ * editor with JTable, but the ISV didn't implement the
+ * CellEditor interface. The user can simply create an object
+ * that contains an instance of the 3rd party editor object and "translate"
+ * the CellEditor API into the 3rd party editor's API.
+ *
+ * @see javax.swing.event.CellEditorListener
+ *
+ * @author Alan Chung
+ */
+public interface CellEditor {
+
+ /**
+ * Returns the value contained in the editor.
+ * @return the value contained in the editor
+ */
+ public Object getCellEditorValue();
+
+ /**
+ * Asks the editor if it can start editing using anEvent.
+ * anEvent is in the invoking component coordinate system.
+ * The editor can not assume the Component returned by
+ * getCellEditorComponent is installed. This method
+ * is intended for the use of client to avoid the cost of setting up
+ * and installing the editor component if editing is not possible.
+ * If editing can be started this method returns true.
+ *
+ * @param anEvent the event the editor should use to consider
+ * whether to begin editing or not
+ * @return true if editing can be started
+ * @see #shouldSelectCell
+ */
+ public boolean isCellEditable(EventObject anEvent);
+
+ /**
+ * Returns true if the editing cell should be selected, false otherwise.
+ * Typically, the return value is true, because is most cases the editing
+ * cell should be selected. However, it is useful to return false to
+ * keep the selection from changing for some types of edits.
+ * eg. A table that contains a column of check boxes, the user might
+ * want to be able to change those checkboxes without altering the
+ * selection. (See Netscape Communicator for just such an example)
+ * Of course, it is up to the client of the editor to use the return
+ * value, but it doesn't need to if it doesn't want to.
+ *
+ * @param anEvent the event the editor should use to start
+ * editing
+ * @return true if the editor would like the editing cell to be selected;
+ * otherwise returns false
+ * @see #isCellEditable
+ */
+ public boolean shouldSelectCell(EventObject anEvent);
+
+ /**
+ * Tells the editor to stop editing and accept any partially edited
+ * value as the value of the editor. The editor returns false if
+ * editing was not stopped; this is useful for editors that validate
+ * and can not accept invalid entries.
+ *
+ * @return true if editing was stopped; false otherwise
+ */
+ public boolean stopCellEditing();
+
+ /**
+ * Tells the editor to cancel editing and not accept any partially
+ * edited value.
+ */
+ public void cancelCellEditing();
+
+ /**
+ * Adds a listener to the list that's notified when the editor
+ * stops, or cancels editing.
+ *
+ * @param l the CellEditorListener
+ */
+ public void addCellEditorListener(CellEditorListener l);
+
+ /**
+ * Removes a listener from the list that's notified
+ *
+ * @param l the CellEditorListener
+ */
+ public void removeCellEditorListener(CellEditorListener l);
+}