Setting table cell background

Question

Friends,
I have a JTable with 5 rows and 4 columns now I want to set the Background color of cells as I select the set of cells it changes the background color.
the problem in the below code is I have to select the individual cells to set the bg. can anyone tell what I should add to set bg of all the selection + I am unable to see the cell selection.
import javax.swing.JComponent;
import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JPanel;
import javax.swing.JScrollPane;
import javax.swing.JTable;
import javax.swing.table.AbstractTableModel;
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Dimension;
import java.awt.GridLayout;
import java.awt.event.MouseEvent;
import java.awt.event.MouseListener;
* This is like TableDemo, except that it substitutes a
* Favorite Color column for the Last Name column and specifies
* a custom cell renderer and editor for the color data.
public class TestClass extends JPanel implements MouseListener {
     private boolean DEBUG = false;
     private JTable table;
     private Color defColor = Color.WHITE;
     private Color selColor = Color.GRAY;
     private Color[][] color = {
          {defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor},
          {defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor},
          {defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor},
          {defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor},
          {defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor, defColor}
     public TestClass() {
          super(new GridLayout(1,0));
          table = new JTable(new MyTableModel());
          table.setRowSelectionAllowed(false);
          table.setCellSelectionEnabled(true);
          table.addMouseListener(this);
          table.setPreferredScrollableViewportSize(new Dimension(500, 70));
          //Create the scroll pane and add the table to it.
          JScrollPane scrollPane = new JScrollPane(table);
          //Set up renderer and editor for the Favorite Color column.
          table.setDefaultRenderer(String.class,
                                         new ColorRenderer(color));
          //Add the scroll pane to this panel.
          add(scrollPane);
     class MyTableModel extends AbstractTableModel {
          private String[] columnNames = {"First Name",
                                                  "Favorite Color",
                                                  "Sport",
                                                  "# of Years",
                                                  "Vegetarian"};
          private Object[][] data = {
          public int getColumnCount() {
               return columnNames.length;
          public int getRowCount() {
               return data.length;
          public String getColumnName(int col) {
               return columnNames[col];
          public Object getValueAt(int row, int col) {
               return data[row][col];
           * JTable uses this method to determine the default renderer/
           * editor for each cell.  If we didn't implement this method,
           * then the last column would contain text ("true"/"false"),
           * rather than a check box.
          public Class getColumnClass(int c) {
               return getValueAt(0, c).getClass();
          public boolean isCellEditable(int row, int col) {
               return false;
          public void setValueAt(Object value, int row, int col) {
               if (DEBUG) {
                    System.out.println("Setting value at " + row + "," + col
                                           + " to " + value
                                           + " (an instance of "
                                           + value.getClass() + ")");
               data[row][col] = value;
               fireTableCellUpdated(row, col);
               if (DEBUG) {
                    System.out.println("New value of data:");
                    printDebugData();
          private void printDebugData() {
               int numRows = getRowCount();
               int numCols = getColumnCount();
               for (int i=0; i < numRows; i++) {
                    System.out.print("    row " + i + ":");
                    for (int j=0; j < numCols; j++) {
                         System.out.print("  " + data[i][j]);
                    System.out.println();
               System.out.println("--------------------------");
      * Create the GUI and show it.  For thread safety,
      * this method should be invoked from the
      * event-dispatching thread.
     private static void createAndShowGUI() {
          //Make sure we have nice window decorations.
          JFrame.setDefaultLookAndFeelDecorated(true);
          //Create and set up the window.
          JFrame frame = new JFrame("TableDialogEditDemo");
          frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
          //Create and set up the content pane.
          JComponent newContentPane = new TestClass();
          newContentPane.setOpaque(true); //content panes must be opaque
          frame.setContentPane(newContentPane);
          //Display the window.
          frame.pack();
          frame.setVisible(true);
     public static void main(String[] args) {
          //Schedule a job for the event-dispatching thread:
          //creating and showing this application's GUI.
          javax.swing.SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
               public void run() {
                    createAndShowGUI();
     /* (non-Javadoc)
      * @see java.awt.event.MouseListener#mouseClicked(java.awt.event.MouseEvent)
     public void mouseClicked(MouseEvent e) {
          if (table.getSelectedColumn() > 0) {
               if (color[table.getSelectedRow()][table.getSelectedColumn()] == selColor) {
                    color[table.getSelectedRow()][table.getSelectedColumn()] = defColor;
               } else {
                    color[table.getSelectedRow()][table.getSelectedColumn()] = selColor;
          } else {
          ((MyTableModel)table.getModel()).fireTableStructureChanged();
     /* (non-Javadoc)
      * @see java.awt.event.MouseListener#mouseEntered(java.awt.event.MouseEvent)
     public void mouseEntered(MouseEvent e) {
     /* (non-Javadoc)
      * @see java.awt.event.MouseListener#mouseExited(java.awt.event.MouseEvent)
     public void mouseExited(MouseEvent e) {
     /* (non-Javadoc)
      * @see java.awt.event.MouseListener#mousePressed(java.awt.event.MouseEvent)
     public void mousePressed(MouseEvent e) {
     /* (non-Javadoc)
      * @see java.awt.event.MouseListener#mouseReleased(java.awt.event.MouseEvent)
     public void mouseReleased(MouseEvent e) {
import javax.swing.JLabel;
import javax.swing.JTable;
import javax.swing.border.Border;
import javax.swing.table.TableCellRenderer;
import java.awt.Color;
import java.awt.Component;
public class TableCellColorRenderer extends JLabel
                           implements TableCellRenderer {
    Color[][] colorBG = null;
    public TableCellColorRenderer(Color[][] color) {
        this.colorBG = color;
        setOpaque(true); //MUST do this for background to show up.
    public Component getTableCellRendererComponent(
                            JTable table, Object color,
                            boolean isSelected, boolean hasFocus,
                            int row, int column) {
          setBackground(colorBG[row][column]);
        return this;

Answer 1

I would guess that it's because you set the background to Color.WHITE
I'm not sure why you're passing in an array of Color objects ... typically you'd either pick the color based on the value of the cell, or use standard colors.
Finally, your getTableCellRendererComponent() should check the isSelected argument, and use a different color to highlight the selection.