Reference object

How do you reference an object that is private in a different class? There is this method you see below and I need to reference it in another class. I had tried doing: createCustomerDisplay = new JScrollPane; in the new class but that didn't work and doesn't make sense when I look at again since it won't contain everything it needs to.

Code:

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private JScrollPane createCustomerDisplay() {
                customerDB = new JTable(new CustomerTableModel(customers));

                customerDB.doLayout();
                customerDB.setShowGrid(true);

                // make it so only rows can be selected.
                customerDB.setRowSelectionAllowed(true);
                customerDB.setColumnSelectionAllowed(false);

                JScrollPane scrollpane = new JScrollPane(customerDB);
                customerDB.setFillsViewportHeight(true);

                return scrollpane;
        }

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I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to do. Can you post more detail about the problem you're trying to solve?

okay. Overall, once a customer has been added to the system, the display needs to be updated. The above method code is a part of the GUI; MainScreen.java but within the controller for this class;CustomerScreenHandler, it needs to update the display on the GUI. This may help a little more.

Code:

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public void addNewCustomer(String name, String number, String address) {
                // TODO Adds the customer with the given information into the database
                pro_Model.addCustomer(name, number, address);
        }
                /**
                * Updates the main screen
                */
                public void update(){
                // TODO tells the customer display on the main screen to update.
                // Added getters and setters to MainScreen.java so you can access the customer database panel (cDB) and the customer display
                // remove the display from the db
                // set the customer display to mainScreen.createCustomerDisplay() (You'll need a reference to the main screen object)
                // add the new customer display to the customer db (center of a border layout)
               
                ms_View.getcDB().remove(ms_View.getCustomerDisplay());
                ms_View.getCustomerDB().remove(ms_View.getCustomerDisplay());
               
                ms_View.setCustomerDisplay(customerDisplay);
                ms_View.setCustomerDisplay(customerDisplay);
               
                ms_View.getcDB().add(customerDisplay, BorderLayout.CENTER);
                ms_View.getCustomerDB().add(customerDisplay, BorderLayout.CENTER);
        }

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and the reason you see two of each is because I'm waiting to hear from a group member to know which one to use.

I don't think that you want your control messing with scrollpanes and removing or adding components. Rather why not have the control either update that data displayed by the view (usually change the text displayed) or update the model and have the view listen for changes to the model and update accordingly?

For instance, you could extract the JTable's model from the JTable and update the data that it holds, or you could give the JTable an entirely new model. There's no need to mess with the components of the view, methinks.

That was the initial plan, but the view starting getting real messy so it was thought to move some things to the controller. Guess we should just leave it in the view to make it easier though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by clj89

That was the initial plan, but the view starting getting real messy so it was thought to move some things to the controller. Guess we should just leave it in the view to make it easier though.

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Your thoughts of messing with the view components in the controller is much messier still, especially when all you're trying to do is change the data being displayed. So change the data, but leave the components untouched (unless necessary, but here it's not necessary).