TableModel and JTable

Question

I'm fairly new to Java and am currently working on a class project involving JDBC and mySQL.
The information that I pull out of the database is being displayed in a table. I have textfields and buttons that allow users to input new information. The problem is that I need the tables to update when this new information is submitted.
I have figured out that I should use a tablemodel and the method fireTableDataChanged, but I have no idea how to implement a tabelmodel. Currently I create an array from the database data, create a table and add the arrays, then I add the table to a scroll plane, and finally add the scrollpane to a tab.
Where and how do I implement/use TableModel? Can I just use DefaultTableModel?
I am very confused right now :(

Answer 1

I believe that when learning how to use JTable you should just use the DefaultTableModel, especially for a simple requirement like reading data from a database. Here is a simple example. Notice how only a couple of lines of code are for the creation and display of the JTable. The rest of the code is for reading the database
import java.awt.*;
import java.io.*;
import java.sql.*;
import java.util.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import javax.swing.table.*;
public class TableFromDatabase extends JFrame
     public TableFromDatabase()
          Vector columnNames = new Vector();
        Vector data = new Vector();
        try
            //  Connect to the Database
            String driver = "sun.jdbc.odbc.JdbcOdbcDriver";
//            String url = "jdbc:odbc:Teenergy";  // if using ODBC Data Source name
            String url =
        "jdbc:odbc:Driver={Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb)};DBQ=c:/teenergy/data/teenergy.mdb";
            String userid = "";
            String password = "";
            Class.forName( driver );
            Connection connection = DriverManager.getConnection( url, userid, password );
            //  Read data from a table
            String sql = "Select * from Page";
            Statement stmt = connection.createStatement();
            ResultSet rs = stmt.executeQuery( sql );
            ResultSetMetaData md = rs.getMetaData();
            int columns = md.getColumnCount();
            //  Get column names
            for (int i = 1; i <= columns; i++)
                columnNames.addElement( md.getColumnName(i) );
            //  Get row data
            while (rs.next())
                Vector row = new Vector(columns);
                for (int i = 1; i <= columns; i++)
                    row.addElement( rs.getObject(i) );
                data.addElement( row );
            rs.close();
            stmt.close();
        catch(Exception e)
            System.out.println( e );
        //  Create table with database data
        JTable table = new JTable(data, columnNames)
               public Class getColumnClass(int column)
                    return getValueAt(0, column).getClass();
        JScrollPane scrollPane = new JScrollPane( table );
        getContentPane().add( scrollPane );
        JPanel buttonPanel = new JPanel();
        getContentPane().add( buttonPanel, BorderLayout.SOUTH );
    public static void main(String[] args)
        TableFromDatabase frame = new TableFromDatabase();
        frame.setDefaultCloseOperation( EXIT_ON_CLOSE );
        frame.pack();
        frame.setVisible(true);
}If you want to know when data has been changed in the table then you need to add a TableModelListener to your TableModel. This posting shows a simple example of of using a TableModelListener:
http://forum.java.sun.com/thread.jspa?threadID=527578&messageID=2535291