How to add multiple fonts to a string drawn by an Graphics2D object

Question

I have a Graphics2D object and I want to use its drawString method. I can call that method and pass a String and (x, y) positions, which is very nice. However, I also have the possibility to change the font of my Graphics2D object, using the setFont method, which expects a Font object. This is also very nice. Unfortunately this is not enough for me, because I intend to define multiple font texts to my Font object.

This is the textual representation I would like to transfer to my Font object:

font-family:"Lucida Grande", "Lucida Sans Unicode", Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif

I have seen that I have the possibility to use the AttributedCharacterIterator interface to solve my problem, however, I am not sure how should I use that. I have seen that there is actually an implementation called AttributedString, which has a set of Attributes, but I am not sure how could I create an AttributedString object which could be used by the constructor of Font in such a way that my Graphics2D object will recognize the multiple fonts and apply them when I call drawString.

EDIT:

    public static AttributedString getFontByAttributes(String atts, String value)
    {
        String[] attributes = atts.split(",");
        AttributedString attributedString = new AttributedString(value);
        for (int attributeIndex = 0; attributeIndex < attributes.length; attributeIndex++)
        {
            attributedString.addAttribute(TextAttribute.FONT, attributes[attributeIndex].trim());
        }
        return attributedString;
    }
//...
    public void drawTitle(Graphics2D g2d)
{
//...
        g2d.drawString(getFontByAttributes(Settings.titleFontString, Settings.title).getIterator(), Settings.headerWidthOffset, Settings.headerHeightOffset);
//...
}

In the code above I have tried with Andale Mono, which is known on the system where I test this application, however, in the generated graphics, the text is drawn in Times New Roman font. Something is wrong and unfortunately I don't have a clue about what could I be missing.

Answer 1

Basically, AttributedString provides methods to allow you to apply rendering attributes to a String. Seems obvious really.

After that, you can pass the AttributedString's AttributedCharacterIterator to Graphics2D for rendering...

import java.awt.BorderLayout;
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Dimension;
import java.awt.EventQueue;
import java.awt.Font;
import java.awt.FontMetrics;
import java.awt.Graphics;
import java.awt.Graphics2D;
import java.awt.font.LineMetrics;
import java.awt.font.TextAttribute;
import java.text.AttributedString;
import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JPanel;
import javax.swing.UIManager;
import javax.swing.UnsupportedLookAndFeelException;

public class TestAttributedString {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        new TestAttributedString();
    }

    public TestAttributedString() {
        EventQueue.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
            @Override
            public void run() {
                try {
                    UIManager.setLookAndFeel(UIManager.getSystemLookAndFeelClassName());
                } catch (ClassNotFoundException | InstantiationException | IllegalAccessException | UnsupportedLookAndFeelException ex) {
                }

                JFrame frame = new JFrame("Testing");
                frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
                frame.setLayout(new BorderLayout());
                frame.add(new TestPane());
                frame.pack();
                frame.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
                frame.setVisible(true);
            }
        });
    }

    public class TestPane extends JPanel {

        public TestPane() {
        }

        @Override
        public Dimension getPreferredSize() {
            return new Dimension(200, 200);
        }

        @Override
        protected void paintComponent(Graphics g) {
            super.paintComponent(g);
            Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D) g.create();
            AttributedString text = new AttributedString("Bunny rabits and flying ponies");
            text.addAttribute(TextAttribute.FONT, new Font("Arial", Font.BOLD, 24), 0, "Bunny rabits".length());
            text.addAttribute(TextAttribute.FOREGROUND, Color.RED, 0, "Bunny rabits".length());

            text.addAttribute(TextAttribute.FONT, new Font("Arial", Font.BOLD & Font.ITALIC, 32), 17, 17 + "flying ponies".length());
            text.addAttribute(TextAttribute.FOREGROUND, Color.BLUE, 17, 17 + "flying ponies".length());

            FontMetrics fm = g2d.getFontMetrics();
            LineMetrics lm = fm.getLineMetrics(text.getIterator(), 0, text.getIterator().getEndIndex(), g);

            g2d.drawString(text.getIterator(), 0, (int)lm.getAscent() + lm.getHeight());
            g2d.dispose();
        }
    }

}

You can check out this for more details

Answer 2

Graphics2D has a drawString(AttributedCharacterIterator, int, int) method that you'll want to use.

Simply build up your AttributedString with all the different TextAttribute.FONT properties you want for each specific sub-range of the string, then call:

g2d.drawString(myAttributedString.getIterator(), x, y);