Question

I am writing a simple population model in scala. I want to model each species with a different colored dot and output (in the gui…I’m using scala swing) a continuous display of each instances position. The animals are free to move and can multiply, eat each other, etc.

How exactly do I output this continuous display? I can do buttons and layouts in swing but this idea of a continuous display screen is foreign to me

Answer 1

You can create a custom component by extending JPanel and override paintComponent(Graphics g) where you implement the drawing of your colored dots.

See Trail: 2D Graphics and Lesson: Getting Started with Graphics for more information about Java 2D graphics API.

To continuosly update the panel, you can use a Swing Timer to update it in intervals:

To perform a task repeatedly.
For example, you might perform animation or update a component that displays progress toward a goal.