JTable Model -- How to set the width of columns

Question

Hello,
This project of mine is due in 2 days. :(
I am using AbstractTableModel and I can't figure out how to set the columns' width inside my JTable?
This following code does not work.
int vColIndex = 1;
TableColumn col = table.getColumnModel().getColumn(vColIndex);
int width=399;
col.setPreferredWidth(width);Please remember, that I'm using AbstractTableModel and not just simple JTables.
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

The DataModel (AbstractTableModel or otherwise) has nothing to do with the table column size. The DataModel is used to store data.
When you create a JTable using a DataModel then a TableColumn is created for each column in the DataModel using a default column size. The normal order of creation would be:
TableModel model = new DefaultTableModel(...);
JTable table = new JTable(model);
Now that the table and table columns are created you can change the size of the columns:
int vColIndex = 1;
TableColumn col = table.getColumnModel().getColumn(vColIndex);
int width=399;
col.setPreferredWidth(width);
So your code looks ok.
However, if somewhere in you code you do:
a) table.setModel(...)
b) fireTableStructureChanged();
then the table columns are recreated based on the current DataModel and the table column size would be reset to the default values.