Question

I want to create a custom border with rounded corners.

Code –

import java.awt.BasicStroke;
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Component;
import java.awt.FlowLayout;
import java.awt.Graphics;
import java.awt.Graphics2D;
import java.awt.Insets;
import java.awt.RenderingHints;
import javax.swing.JButton;
import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.SwingUtilities;
import javax.swing.border.AbstractBorder;

class JRoundedCornerBorder extends AbstractBorder 
{   
    private static final long serialVersionUID = 7644739936531926341L;
    private static final int THICKNESS = 5;

    JRoundedCornerBorder()
    {
        super();
    }

    @Override
    public void paintBorder(Component c, Graphics g, int x, int y, int width, int height) 
    {
        Graphics2D g2 = (Graphics2D)g.create();

        g2.setRenderingHint(RenderingHints.KEY_ANTIALIASING, RenderingHints.VALUE_ANTIALIAS_ON);
        if(c.hasFocus())
        {
            g2.setColor(Color.BLUE);
        }
        else
        {
            g2.setColor(Color.BLACK);
        }
        g2.setStroke(new BasicStroke(THICKNESS, BasicStroke.CAP_ROUND, BasicStroke.JOIN_ROUND));
        g2.drawRect(x, y, width - 1, height - 1);

        g2.dispose();
    }

    @Override
    public Insets getBorderInsets(Component c) 
    {
        return new Insets(THICKNESS, THICKNESS, THICKNESS, THICKNESS);
    }

    @Override
    public Insets getBorderInsets(Component c, Insets insets) 
    {
        insets.left = insets.top = insets.right = insets.bottom = THICKNESS;
        return insets;
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) 
    {
        SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable()
        {
            @Override
            public void run() 
            {
                final JFrame frame = new JFrame();
                frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
                frame.setLayout(new FlowLayout());

                // Add button with custom border
                final JButton button = new JButton("Hello");
                button.setBorder(new JRoundedCornerBorder());
                frame.add(button);

                // Add button without custom border
                frame.add(new JButton("Goodbye"));

                frame.pack();
                frame.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
                frame.setVisible(true);
            }
        });
    }
}

Result –

As you can see, Graphics.drawRect completely ignores the BasicStroke.CAP_ROUND and BasicStroke.JOIN_ROUND attributes. Why?

Answer 1

As explained at Learning Java 2D, Part 1:

java.awt.BasicStroke.CAP_ROUND: This makes a circular cap centered on the endpoint, with a diameter of the pen width.

The key word is “centered”. I believe that it is always the case that when drawing with thick strokes, Java2D will center the thickness of the line along the hypothetical, infinitesimally-thin line between the centers of the pixels at the starting and ending coordinates. For example, when drawing a vertical blue line 7 pixels thick, Java2D paints 3 pixels on each side of the hypothetical line segment that is being drawn.

In your example, the thickness is 5 pixels. You need to offset the coordinates to draw the stroke completely within the graphics clip. By moving in 2 pixels (or THICKNESS/2), the rounded corners become visible:

//...
        g2.setStroke(new BasicStroke(THICKNESS, BasicStroke.CAP_ROUND, BasicStroke.JOIN_ROUND));
        g2.drawRect(x + THICKNESS/2, y + THICKNESS/2, width - 2*(THICKNESS/2) - 1, height - 2*(THICKNESS/2) - 1);

        g2.dispose();
    }

    @Override
    public Insets getBorderInsets(Component c) {
        return new Insets(THICKNESS + THICKNESS/2, THICKNESS + THICKNESS/2, THICKNESS + THICKNESS/2, THICKNESS + THICKNESS/2);
    }
//...