JavaFX TableView

The JavaFX TableView enables you to display table views inside your JavaFX applications. The JavaFX TableView is represented by the class javafx.scene.control.TableView . Here is a screenshot of a JavaFX TableView :

JavaFX TableView Example

Here is a full, but simple JavaFX TableView code example:

import javafx.application.Application;
import javafx.scene.Scene;
import javafx.scene.control.TableColumn;
import javafx.scene.control.TableView;
import javafx.scene.control.cell.PropertyValueFactory;
import javafx.scene.layout.VBox;
import javafx.stage.Stage;

public class TableViewExample extends Application {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        launch(args);
    }

    @Override
    public void start(Stage primaryStage) {

        TableView tableView = new TableView();

        TableColumn<String, Person> column1 = new TableColumn<>("First Name");
        column1.setCellValueFactory(new PropertyValueFactory<>("firstName"));


        TableColumn<String, Person> column2 = new TableColumn<>("Last Name");
        column2.setCellValueFactory(new PropertyValueFactory<>("lastName"));


        tableView.getColumns().add(column1);
        tableView.getColumns().add(column2);

        tableView.getItems().add(new Person("John", "Doe"));
        tableView.getItems().add(new Person("Jane", "Deer"));

        VBox vbox = new VBox(tableView);

        Scene scene = new Scene(vbox);

        primaryStage.setScene(scene);

        primaryStage.show();
    }

}

Here is the Person class used in this example:

public class Person {

    private String firstName = null;
    private String lastName = null;

    public Person() {
    }

    public Person(String firstName, String lastName) {
        this.firstName = firstName;
        this.lastName = lastName;
    }

    public String getFirstName() {
        return firstName;
    }

    public void setFirstName(String firstName) {
        this.firstName = firstName;
    }

    public String getLastName() {
        return lastName;
    }

    public void setLastName(String lastName) {
        this.lastName = lastName;
    }
}

Create a TableView

In order to use a JavaFX TableView component you must first create a TableView instance. Here is an example of creating a JavaFX TableView instance:

TableView tableView = new TableView();

Add TableColumn to the TableView

Having created a TableView you need to add one or more TableColumn instances to the TableView instance. A TableColumn represents a vertical column of values. Each value is displayed on its own row, and is typically extracted from the list of objects being displayed in the TableView . Here is an example of adding two TableColumn instances to a JavaFX TableView instance:

TableView tableView = new TableView();

TableColumn<String, Person> firstNameColumn = new TableColumn<>("First Name");
firstNameColumn.setCellValueFactory(new PropertyValueFactory<>("firstName"));

TableColumn<String, Person> lastNameColumn = new TableColumn<>("Last Name");
lastNameColumn.setCellValueFactory(new PropertyValueFactory<>("lastName"));

TableColumn Cell Value Factory

A TableColumn must have a cell value factory set on it. The cell value factory extracts the value to be displayed in each cell (on each row) in the column. In the example above a PropertyValueFactory is used. The PropertyValueFactory factory can extract a property value (field value) from a Java object. The name of the property is passed as a parameter to the PropertyValueFactory constructor, like this:

PropertyValueFactory factory = new PropertyValueFactory<>("firstName");

The property name firstName will match the getter getter method getFirstName() of the Person objects which contain the values are displayed on each row.

In the example shown earlier, a second PropertyValueFactory is set on the second TableColumn instance. The property name passed to the second PropertyValueFactory is lastName , which will match the getter method getLastName() of the Person class.

Add Data to TableView

Once you have added TableColumn instances to the JavaFX TableView , you can add the data to be displayed to the TableView . The data is typically contained in a list of regular Java objects (POJOs). Here is an example of adding two Person objects (class shown earlier in this JavaFX TableView tutorial) to a TableView :

tableView.getItems().add(new Person("John", "Doe"));
tableView.getItems().add(new Person("Jane", "Deer"));