It is my pleasure to announce a major update of JXLayer component. The new version is hosted on its own java.net project jxlayer.dev.java.net, where I will also provide links to all my blogs about this component.

So, why I encourage everybody to try out the new JXLayer?
Actually to answer this question I am going to write several more blogs, here is a short answer:

1. more consistent and efficient API
2. easier to use
3. new functionality

The JXLayer 3.0 API is a bit different from the previous version and I had good reasons to make it this way. The good news is that I am very happy with the current API and I am not gonna introduce incompatible changes in the future. So, if you are using the previous JXLayer, it won't take much time to adjust your code for the new one, if you haven't tried it yet, it's high time to have a look.

JXLayer is the universal decorator for Swing components, it means that you have a flexible way to enrich the visual appearance of your components and control the input events for the whole component's hierarchy.

Just wrap your component with JXLayer and set a LayerUI which implements the required functionality. On jxlayer.dev.java.net you'll find demos of several carefully tested and ready to use LayerUI's implementations. In this entry we are going to see how to create your own ones.

Here is a simple example how to create and use LayerUI which paints translucent foreground over the layer:

        // wrap your component
        JXLayer<JComponent> layer = new JXLayer<JComponent>(myComponent);

        // create custom LayerUI
        AbstractLayerUI<JComponent> layerUI = new AbstractLayerUI<JComponent>() {

            @Override  
            protected void paintLayer(Graphics2D g2, JXLayer<JComponent> l) {
                // this paints layer as is
                super.paintLayer(g2, l);
                // custom painting:
                // here we paint translucent foreground
                // over the whole layer
                g2.setColor(new Color(0, 128, 0, 128));
                g2.fillRect(0, 0, l.getWidth(), l.getHeight());
            }
        };

        // set our LayerUI
        layer.setUI(layerUI);

        // add the layer as a usual component
        frame.add(layer);

BufferedLayerUI provides more functionality, since it paints the layer to the double buffer image, it allows filtering the image with the BufferedImageOp subclasses. With it you can invert colors of a layer, blur it apply any other fancy effects.

For the Rainbow project I used BufferedLayerUI to implement the image editor dialog.
(Here are some more Rainbow screenshots)

Let's see how to apply the grayScale effect to a layer:

        // wrap you component
        JXLayer<JComponent> layer = new JXLayer<JComponent>(myComponent);

        // here we use BufferedLayerUI which can work with BufferedImageOps  
        BufferedLayerUI<JComponent> bufferedLayerUI = new BufferedLayerUI<JComponent>();
        
        // create a ColorConvertOp to apply grayScale effect
        BufferedImageOp grayScaleOp = 
                new ColorConvertOp(ColorSpace.getInstance(ColorSpace.CS_GRAY), null);

        // create a BufferedImageOpEffect with the provided BufferedImageOp 
        BufferedImageOpEffect imageOpEffect = new BufferedImageOpEffect(grayScaleOp);
        
        // set BufferedImageOpEffect to the bufferedLayerUI
        bufferedLayerUI.setLayerEffects(imageOpEffect);
        
        // set the bufferedLayerUI to the layer 
        layer.setUI(bufferedLayerUI);

        // add the layer as a usual component
        frame.add(layer);

And now is the very important news: with JXLayer 3.0 you can catch layer's input events as easy as implement a custom painting. AbstractLayerUI introduces several methods: processFocusEvent, processMouseEvent, processMouseMotionEvent, etc...
The names of the methods speak for themselves. If you'd like to catch all mouseEvents for all components inside your layer - just override processMouseEvent in your custom AbstractLayerUI subclass.

MouseDrawingDemo combines painting and mouse events processing together.

In this demo you can paint over the layer with your mouse, just like you do in any other image editor.
Note that components are alive when you paint over them.

I hope this short overview will help you to invent your own ways of using JXLayer in your projects.
See you one the JXLayer forum

With best wishes
alexp