Best way to do a pop-up 'info bubble'

[lightstream]

this is my first post so hi to everybody :)

I'm making a Java applet which reads XML data and displays it on a JPanel. There can be several hundred to several thousand points (each point is a GPS position from a cycle ride, I have a screenshot but unfortunately I haven't posted enough to put it in the message). The route is plotted as a graph-like line, and when the mouse is moved over the route, the point underneath is selected and is highlighted in orange.

My intention is to have a bubble pop up as the mouse selects different points, showing details of that point (speed etc), but I'm not sure what would be the best way to create these 'info-bubbles'.

I could draw the bubble as 2D geometry directly on the same JPanel as the route, or I could create a child JPanel to hold it. Does anyone know what are the advantages of each approach, or perhaps there's a better method altogether?

thanks in advance for any suggestions!

[DarrylBurke]

I would go with overriding getToolTipText for the JPanel.

Recommended reading:
How to Use Tool Tips (The Java™ Tutorials > Creating a GUI with JFC/Swing > Using Swing Components)

db

[lightstream]

Thanks for the suggestion. Tool tips could work, however I really want to have a bit more control - e.g. multi-line text, images / graphics, and also I want the messages to be 'sticky' i.e. to stay 'popped up' until the mouse moves onto another point.

I will definitely use that tool tip class, so thanks again for the pointer, but for the info-bubbles - which are to be more like the bubbles on Google maps - I need something a bit more flexible.