Override single UI in Swing Look and Feel

Question

Is there a way to override just a single UI component's L&F (not a single instance of it, but all instances) with a custom one? Basically I want to override the L&F defaults for it.

It looks like all of that gets setup in BasicLookAndFeel#getDefaults

I guess if I really needed to I could create a custom look and feel that extends the one I want to use and override it in the initClassDefaults method, but I would prefer to just be able to override whatever UI is currently being used.

I was thinking I could just do UIManager.put(<ui_class_id>,<my-delegate-classname>)

This doesn't seem to work for the example I'm working on, but that could be because I'm trying to set a component that's not part of the standard look and feel (the component adds itself on). I'm trying to figure out if this is even the right approach.

only my curiosity, please why, why to override [UIDefaults](http://tips4java.wordpress.com/2008/10/09/uimanager-defaults/) — mKorbel, Feb 28 '12 at 19:46
I'm using a 3rd party component that installs its own ui delegates. I want to customize how it looks so I'm trying to override the default ui used for that 3rd party component. — Jeff Storey, Feb 28 '12 at 19:52

Jeff Storey · Answer 1 · 2012-02-29T00:31:20.430

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Ah, the problem was that I forgot to implement createUI in my UI. Once I did that, I was able to just call UIManager.put(<ui_class_id>,<my-delegate-classname>) and it worked.

edited Feb 29 '12 at 00:31

answered Feb 28 '12 at 20:40

Jeff Storey

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Right, but that's for installing on a single component – Jeff Storey Feb 28 '12 at 20:51
I think the delegate also has to be `public`; I know it can't be nested. Note spelling of `UIManager`. – trashgod Feb 28 '12 at 23:13
Yes, I believe you are correct. And yes, That was a type-o above (corrected). – Jeff Storey Feb 29 '12 at 00:31

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 09 '15 at 23:18

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Here is the solution to change a L&F for a component

JFileChooser fc = new JFileChooser();
WindowsFileChooserUI wui = new WindowsFileChooserUI(fc);
wui.installUI(fc);

You can find all existing component class UI From

com.sun.java.swing.plaf.(L&F).*;

answered Oct 09 '15 at 23:18

Mahbubur Rahman Khan

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f4lco · Answer 3 · 2012-02-28T20:33:33.913

From the Java Tutorials:

Changing the Look and Feel After Startup

You can change the L&F with setLookAndFeel even after the program's GUI is visible. To make existing components reflect the new L&F, invoke the SwingUtilities updateComponentTreeUI method once per top-level container. Then you might wish to resize each top-level container to reflect the new sizes of its contained components. For example:

UIManager.setLookAndFeel(lnfName);
SwingUtilities.updateComponentTreeUI(frame);
frame.pack();

In other words: you can change the look and feel of a top-level container (I don't have tested if it is limited to top-level containers only or if this method can be applied to any container). Or, to answer your question even more precisely: I don't see there's method of styling a single component, but there is a way for single components in (toplevel) containers.

I do not need to set the whole look and feel, just the one component — Jeff Storey, Feb 28 '12 at 20:23

Override single UI in Swing Look and Feel

3 Answers3