Focusable JTextArea not gaining focus.

Question

I am creating a JTextArea and want to give it the focus when it's created. THis happens twice in the program, and the first time it works, the second time the JTextArea is created but doesn't get the focus until I click on it.
In both cases the code is called from the Swing event queue (see the output below). In both cases the class which creates the jTextArea is the same (an extension of JPanel), and is added to a new tab in a tabbed pane.
Because I know that you need to make sure that the component's been created before it gets focus, the code to create it and give it focus is:
private javax.swing.JTextArea jtaInfo;
// Class constructor for outer class
  public PanelInfo(String s, boolean editable ) {
    initComponents();  // this is the NetBeans call which creates jtaInfo and a few buttons
    jtaInfo.setText(s);
    jtaInfo.setEditable(editable);
    setVisible(true);
    selectTextBox();
  public void selectTextBox() {
    UtilFunctions.tcaProgramInfoMessage("selectTextBox thread="+Thread.currentThread().getName());
    SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
      public void run() {
        UtilFunctions.tcaProgramInfoMessage("Runnable thread="+Thread.currentThread().getName());
        UtilFunctions.tcaProgramInfoMessage("Info frame focusable: "+jtaInfo.isFocusable());
        if (!jtaInfo.requestFocusInWindow()) {
          UtilFunctions.tcaProgramInfoMessage("Failed to give info pane focus");
  }The UtilFunctions.tcaProgramInfoMessage call produces output with a timestamp.
The output is:
Sat Nov 11 11:25:38 GMT 2006: selectTextBox thread=AWT-EventQueue-0
Sat Nov 11 11:25:38 GMT 2006: Runnable thread=AWT-EventQueue-0
Sat Nov 11 11:25:38 GMT 2006: Info frame focusable: true
Sat Nov 11 11:25:44 GMT 2006: selectTextBox thread=AWT-EventQueue-0
Sat Nov 11 11:25:44 GMT 2006: Runnable thread=AWT-EventQueue-0
Sat Nov 11 11:25:44 GMT 2006: Info frame focusable: true
Sat Nov 11 11:25:44 GMT 2006: Failed to give info pane focus
So it seems that the threads are OK, and the area is focusable, but I can't work out why one succeeds and the other fails. The program's too huge to post here - I may be able to cut it down to size. But is there anything obvious that I might be doing wrong?

Answer 1

Because I know that you need to make sure that the component's been created before it gets focus,Actually the parent frame or dialog must be "realized" (maybe thats what you mean by "created") before a component can receive focus. This basically means that you've done a pack() or setVisible(true) on the frame. Using setVisible(true) on the actual component does nothing since by default all JComponents are visible.
The program's too huge to post here - I may be able to cut it down to sizeI fail to see why its so difficult to create a short demo program showing the problem. The code you posted doesn't help because we don't know the context of how the code is executed.
Below is a simple demo that shows an incorrect version and a correct version in 10 lines of code. So if this code doesn't help solve the problem you will now need to wait hours again until you post a version of your code that does demonstrate the problem. Whereas if you had spent 5-10 minutes to create a demo that doesn't work I may have been able to help you out right now.
Simplify your problems and the answer will also be simpler.
import java.awt.*;
import javax.swing.*;
public class FocusTest
     public static void main(String[] args)
          JTextField textField1 = new JTextField("One");
          JTextField textField2 = new JTextField("Two");
          JTextField textField3 = new JTextField("Three");
          JFrame frame = new JFrame();
          frame.setDefaultCloseOperation( JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE );
          frame.getContentPane().add(textField1, BorderLayout.NORTH);
          frame.getContentPane().add(textField2, BorderLayout.CENTER);
          frame.getContentPane().add(textField3, BorderLayout.SOUTH);
          // This doesn't work
          textField3.requestFocusInWindow();
          frame.pack();
          // This does work
//          textField3.requestFocusInWindow();
          frame.setLocationRelativeTo(null);
          frame.setVisible(true);
}