JTable and cell color

Question

Hello, hope you can help me here -
I have a JTable, and based on the value of a certain column in a row, I want the background color of that entire row to change to a different color. How can I perform this operation?
I have tried to override JTable's prepareRenderer, but it doesn't seem to be working.
Any clues?
Thanks!
-Kirk

Answer 1

Hi.
First of all. Try searching the forum there have been plenty of posts on this subject.
Now to answer your question of how to set the color. The trick lies in the cellrenderer.
A JTabel contains several models internally. If I'm not mistaking the ColumnModel contains the appropriate rendere for every column. The simplest thing to do in my opinion is to use a decorator pattern on the TableCellRenderer interface. Something along the likes of this.
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Component;
import javax.swing.JTable;
import javax.swing.table.TableCellRenderer;
public class ColorTableCellRenderer implements TableCellRenderer {
private TableCellRenderer render;
public ColorTableCellRenderer( TableCellRenderer render ){
this.render = render;
* @see javax.swing.table.TableCellRenderer#getTableCellRendererComponent(javax.swing.JTable, java.lang.Object,
* boolean, boolean, int, int)
public Component getTableCellRendererComponent( JTable table , Object value , boolean isSelected , boolean hasFocus ,
int row , int column ) {
if( table != null ){ //Replace with specific condition
Component cmp = this.render.getTableCellRendererComponent( table , value , isSelected , hasFocus , row , column );
cmp.setBackground( Color.cyan );
//Maybe need to call a validate or setOpaque. if experiencing problems.
return cmp;
}else{
return this.render.getTableCellRendererComponent( table , value , isSelected , hasFocus , row , column );
After that the easiest to do is set the defaultCellrenderer of your table in the following fashion.
table.setDefaultRenderer(Object.class, new ColorTableCellRenderer( table.getDefaultRenderer(Object.class) ));
Or this should also work.
table.getColumnModel().getColumn(0).setCellRenderer(new ColorTableCellRenderer(chosenRenderer));
Hope this helps & Good luck!