Center text in a JComponent?

[Zman3359]

How would you go about centering a String in a JComponent? I'm drawing to the JComponent using a Graphics object, so the String is drawn using drawString().

[Fubarable]

The easiest way is to add a JLabel to it that has its horizontalAlignment property set to SwingConstants.CENTER. If you give the JComponent a BorderLayout and add the JLabel to the BorderLayout.CENTER position then it will fill the component. Otherwise, you may need to muck with FontMetrics, something I've not yet done.

[Zman3359]

The JComponent isn't going to hold any other components though. The JComponent is just a canvas for the program to draw on, that's why im using drawString() to put the message on the screen. I also don't like messing with layout's I never got the hang of 'em. So I will look into FontMetrics and see what I can find about that. Thanks.

EDIT: Found a way using FontMetrics. Here is an example for future reference:
fontName = the name of the font you want to use
g = the graphics object your drawing on
width = the width of the area you want the text centered in
height = the height of the area you want the text centered in

Font font = new Font(fontName,Font.PLAIN,16);
FontMetrics fm = g.getFontMetrics(font);
g.drawString("Hello",(width - fm.stringWidth("Hello")) / 2,(height - font.getSize()) / 2);

[camickr]

I also don't like messing with layout's I never got the hang of 'em.

Learning to use Swing properly by using the provided components and the layout managers is far easier than reinventing the wheel and creating your own component every time.

I agree with Fubarable, a JLabel is the way to go.

[DarrylBurke]

The easiest way is to add a JLabel to it that has its horizontalAlignment property set to SwingConstants.CENTER. If you give the JComponent a BorderLayout and add the JLabel to the BorderLayout.CENTER position then it will fill the component. Otherwise, you may need to muck with FontMetrics, something I've not yet done.

Another easy way is to set a GridBagLayout and add a JLabel without specifying a GridBagConstraint.

db