Question

I have the following problem (this is related to my post blink a tree node):
I have a custom cell renderer.
In some part of my code I create a new DefaultMutableTreeNode and store it in a list

public static List<DefaultMutableTreeNode> nodes = new ArrayList<DefaultMutableTreeNode>() 
//in some time
DefaultMutableTreeNode aNode = new DefaultMutableTreeNode("SomeValue");
nodes.add(node);

In my cell renderer I do:

public Component getTreeCellRendererComponent(JTree tree, Object value,
      boolean selected, boolean expanded, boolean leaf, int row,
      boolean hasFocus) {
    DefaultMutableTreeNode n = (DefaultMutableTreeNode)value;
    if(nodes.contains(n)){
     //set background to red
    }
}

At this point nodes has a node but the code never goes in the if branch.
Why? I can not understand since I already stored it in the arraylist. Do I get a different reference?
Also I created a swing timer:

Timer t = new Timer(400, new ActionListener(){
   public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent evt) {
        if(nodes.size == 0)
            return;
        TreePath p = new TreePath(nodes.get(0));
        Rectangle r = tree.getPathBounds(p);
        tree.repaint(r);
   }

});    

But I get a NPE in tree.getPathBounds.
I can not understand why. Can’t I manipulate DefaultMutableNodes I stored in my list this way? What am I doing wrong in my thinking?
Note: If I simply call repaint(); in the timer and in the cell renderer I loop over the nodes to see if it displays the sametext with the node I have stored, what I want I get the blinking, works

Thanks

Answer 1

Actually TreePath is a list of objects… path from tree root to the node. If you create a path from the single node the path exists in the tree only if the node is root of the tree.
I woul recommend to use TreeSelectionEvent public TreePath[] getPaths() method. The method provides actual paths.