Java FX, TextField, Keyboard handling

Question

I need to look for specific characters that may be typed in a text field and perform an action accordingly. For example if the user hits F1 key while inside a textfield, i need to popup a different panel. I am using FXML to do the form layout. Please help mw with some example code. If I can set these functions at a global level (Scene) it would be even better way, for example no matter which ever text field use is on, I need to handle F1 key the same way.
Thank you

Answer 1

What am I doing wrong?F1 key presses don't generate KeyTyped events, you need to handle KeyPressed events to receive the function key presses, so perhaps use onKeyPressed="#handleKeyInput" in your FXML instead.
I haven't used FXML, so perhaps there are other issues in the way you have defined the interaction between the FXML and the controller code, but I don't really know.
The code below will globally catch any F1 key presses for any TextFields in the scene, so maybe you could just install the keyfilter when you setup your scene rather than placing a reference to an onKeyPressed handler for each TextField in your FXML.
import javafx.application.Application;
import javafx.event.EventHandler;
import javafx.scene.Scene;
import javafx.scene.control.*;
import javafx.scene.input.*;
import javafx.scene.layout.VBox;
import javafx.stage.Stage;
public class TextFieldTrapper extends Application {
  public static void main(String[] args) { Application.launch(args); }
  @Override public void start(Stage primaryStage) {
    // create some controls.
    final Label eventText = new Label("Press F1 in any text field to capture a KeyEvent");
    TextField text1 = new TextField("Some Text"); text1.setId("text1");
    TextField text2 = new TextField("More Text"); text2.setId("text2");
    // layout the scene.
    final VBox root = new VBox(5);
    root.setStyle("-fx-background-color: cornsilk; -fx-padding: 10;");
    root.getChildren().addAll(text1, text2, eventText);
    primaryStage.setScene(new Scene(root, 1000, 100));
    // monitor and respond to any F1 key presses sent to any text field in the scene.
    root.addEventFilter(KeyEvent.KEY_PRESSED, new EventHandler<KeyEvent>() {
      @Override public void handle(KeyEvent event) {
        if (KeyCode.F1.equals(event.getCode()) && event.getTarget() instanceof TextField) {
          eventText.setText(event.toString());
    primaryStage.show();
}