How to use ObservableLists in JavaFX - model-view-controller

I'm trying to use ObservableLists to help me orchestrate an MVC framework in a new application I'm building. I have a LineData object that contains the information necessary to draw a line on screen, and I want to maintain a list of LineData in the backend of my program. Then, I want corresponding lines to be drawn on screen via the front end whenever the list of LineData is drawn in the backend. I believe that to do this, I need to have a list in the front end that is bound to the list in the backend, and then I need to have some sort of listener on this list that triggers new data to be turned into lines and drawn? I'm just confused on how to do this -- any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

You can do this "by hand", registering a listener with the ObservableList<LineData> and adding or removing elements from the child list of a Pane as needed. So something like
public class Model {
// ...
public ObservableList<LineData> getLineData() { ... }
// ...
}
And then
public class MyController {
Model model ;
#FXML
private Pane pane ; // contains lines...
public void initialize() {
model.getLineData().addListener((ListChangeListener.Change change) -> {
while (change.next()) {
if (change.wasAdded()) {
change.getAddedSubList().stream()
.map(this::createLineForLineData)
.forEach(pane.getChildren()::add);
} else if (change.wasRemoved()) {
change.getRemoved().forEach(lineData ->
pane.getChildren().removeIf((Line line) -> lineMatchesLineData(line, lineData));
}
}
});
// ...
}
// ...
private Line createLineForLineData(LineData lineData) {
// create Line matching data in lineData and return it
}
private boolean lineMatchesLineData(Line line, LineData lineData) {
// return true if line's state matches data in lineData, false otherwise
}
}
Note though that the EasyBind framework has built-in functionality for this:
public class MyController {
Model model ;
#FXML
private Pane pane ;
public void initialize() {
Bindings.bindContent(pane.getChildren(),
EasyBind.map(model.getLineData(), this::createLineForLineData));
// ...
}
private Line createLineForLineData(LineData lineData) { ... }
}

Related

Prism - moving data between viewmodels

I'm struggling to find the best implementation.
I'm using Prism and I have a View (ParentView), which has a small region within it. Depending on the item in a ddl, another smaller view (ChildView) gets injected into the region of the ParentView.
The ChildView will just have some properties which I would like to access from the ParentView.
So I realize I can use a Publish/Subscribe method to move data between viewmodels, but the issue is I have nothing to hang the Publish on. The view is made up of TextBoxes and no event triggers. The ChildView can be vastly different based on the selection of the ddl. I like the clean separation of each ChildView being it's own view injected inside the ParentView.
What is the best way to achieve this?
One solution can be to implement the interface INavigationAware in your viewmodels. After that you can use the methods onNavigatedFrom(), onNavigatedTo() and onNavigatingTo() to register your event.
EDIT:
If you want launch the event when a field in the child is changed you can do something like this:
private string _yourField;
public string YourField
{
get { return _yourField; }
set { SetProperty(ref _yourField, value);
//Here you can launch the event
}
}
In this case when YourField change the event is launched.
I tried a few implementations, but the one that worked was creating a singleton instance of the ChildView (childviewmodel) and then gaining access to the properties through the instance. It may not be pretty, but it works.
private static ChildViewModel _instance = new ChildViewModel ();
public static ChildViewModel Instance { get { return _instance; } }
#region Properties
private ChildModel _childModel= new ChildModel ();
public ChildModel _childModel
{
get { return _instance._childModel; }
set
{
SetProperty(ref _instance._childModel, value);
}
}
private string _childProperty1;
public string ChildProperty1
{
get { return _childProperty1; }
set
{
SetProperty(ref _childProperty1, value);
ChildModel.ChildProperty1= _childProperty1;
}
}
In reality - there were many childproperties. I only listed one for demo. And then I call it in ParentView
var _instance = ChildViewModel.Instance;
var _cm = _instance.ChildModel;
_parentModel = new ParentModel
{
Property1= ParentViewProperty1,
Property2= _cm.ChildProperty1,
};
Hope that helps someone else.

How to get selected items from a SWT Table using RxJava?

I have a table and a button and I want to emit an event ItemsSelected with the selected items of the table when the button is clicked.
The button should not know the table and it should remain only as a stream of clicks.
So this solution is discarded:
final ETable table = ...
PublishSubject<ItemSelected> selected = PublishSubject.create();
button.addSelectionListener(new SelectionListener(){
#Override
public void widgetSelected(SelectionEvent e) {
for (TableItem item : table.getSelection()) {
selected.onNext(new ItemSelected(item));
}
}
});
I would prefer a way to compose the click stream of the button with the item selection stream of the table in order to keep loose coupling between this two elements.
Because the table allows multiple selection I must first scan the items selected in order to emit an event with all the items. Something like:
public static class ItemsSelected<T> {
final List<T> items = new ArrayList<T>();
}
public abstract static class ItemSelection<T> {
public abstract void apply(ItemsSelected<T> selection);
}
public static class ItemUnselected<T> extends ItemSelection<T> {
final T item;
public ItemUnselected(T item) {
this.item = item;
}
public void apply(ItemsSelected<T> selection) {
selection.items.remove(item);
}
}
public static class ItemSelected<T> extends ItemSelection<T> {
final T item;
public ItemSelected(T item) {
this.item = item;
}
public void apply(ItemsSelected<T> selection) {
selection.items.add(item);
}
}
public static class ObservableTable<T> extends Table {
private PublishSubject<ItemSelection<T>> clicks = PublishSubject.create();
public Observable<ItemsSelected<T>> selection = clicks.scan(new ItemsSelected<T>(),
new Func2<ItemsSelected<T>, ItemSelection<T>, ItemsSelected<T>>() {
#Override
public ItemsSelected<T> call(ItemsSelected<T> t1, ItemSelection<T> t2) {
// breaking events immutability
t2.apply(t1);
return t1;
}
});
public ObservableTable(Composite parent, int style) {
super(parent, style);
this.addSelectionListener(new SelectionListener() {
#SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
#Override
public void widgetSelected(SelectionEvent e) {
if (((TableItem) e.item).getChecked())
clicks.onNext(new ItemSelected<T>((T) e.item.getData()));
else
clicks.onNext(new ItemUnselected<T>((T) e.item.getData()));
}
#Override
public void widgetDefaultSelected(SelectionEvent e) {
}
});
}
}
Then, I must combine the table.selection stream with the button.clicks stream in a selectionForAction stream. The idea is that when a ButtonClick is emitted, an SelectionForAction will be emitted if and only if an ItemSelected was previously emitted.
-------S1--U1-----S2---S3--------- table.clicks
(scan)
-------(1)--()---(2)---(2,3)------ table.selection
----O----------O-------------O---- button.clicks
(?)
-----------------------------(2,3) selectionForAction
So, wich operation should I use?
Zip: It doesn't work because if I click the button and later select an item, it should not do nothing, but with zip it will emit an event.
Join: I end up with a "solution" using join but it doesn't seem to be a good one. Somethinkg like:
table.selection.join(button.clicks, new Func1<ItemsSelected,Observable<Long>>() {
#Override
public Observable<Long> call(ItemsSelected t) {
// it doesn't seem a good idea
return Observable.timer(1, TimeUnit.DAYS);
}
}, new Func1<ClickEvent, Observable<Long>>() {
#Override
public Observable<Long> call(ClickEvent t) {
// this makes the ClickEvent be dropped if there is no previous ItemsSelected event emitted
return Observable.timer(1, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
}
}, new Func2<ItemsSelected, ClickEvent, SelectionForAction>() {
#Override
public SelectionForActioncall(ItemsSelected t1, ClickEvent t2) {
return new SelectionForAction(t1.items);
}
});
Any idea?
I've found the operator that I needed to achieve the join behaviour with a very large time unit (DAYS in the example) and a very small one (MILLISECONDS).
With a variant of sample that takes another Observable as the sampler I could emit an event A only after an event of B would be emitted.
In my example the click acts as the sampler and the stream selection emits the events that I'm interested in. (This also requires to ignore the last event that is being emitted when the stream completes).
Another possible solution will be use the buffer(boundary):
The clicks stream would act as the boundary and I could avoid the scan operator because the list of items selected is created by the buffer operator. However with this solution I would not be considering unselection.
So, with sample I've achieved my original goal, however, I'm not happy with the way I handle items unselection and the final list of items selected.
In this case I need to maintain the state of the items selected in order to perform some operation on all of them when a ClickEvent occurs.
I could subscribe to the items selection/unselection and maintain a List of the items selected but then I'll have lost the possibility of compose the clicks observable with the selection observable.
With scan I maintain state and also keep the composability of observables, but representing the list of current selection as an event seems a little forced, in fact this represents a new issue: if I select x items and then click the button, an event with the selection is being emitted as expected, but if neither the items are unselected nor a new one is selected and then click again the button, nothing happens. So, it seems that selection doesn't fit as an event.

RxJava subscription does not unsubscribe correctly

I have an MVC application in which I have to update the view with the current value of a stream.
In the model I have this method:
public Observable<Integer> getStreamInstance(){
if(stream == null){
this.stream = Observable.create((Subscriber<? super Integer> subscriber) -> {
new HeartbeatStream(frequence,subscriber).start();
});
}
return stream;
}
which I use in the controller to get the stream. Then, in the controller I have these two methods:
public void start(){
this.sb = stream.subscribe((Integer v) -> {
view.updateCurrValue(v);
});
}
public void stop(){
this.sb.unsubscribe();
}
With the start method I simply update a label in the view with the current value.
This works fine until I try to stop the updating with the unsubscribing; infact, when I press the button "stop" in the view, the label keeps updating with the current value and, if I press "start" again, the label shows the values from two different streams, the one that I first created with the first "start" and the second that seems has been created with the second pressing of "start".
Where am I wrong?
EDIT:
public class HeartbeatStream extends Thread{
private Subscriber<? super Integer> subscriber;
private int frequence;
private HeartbeatSensor sensor;
public HeartbeatStream(int freq, Subscriber<? super Integer> subscriber){
this.frequence = freq;
this.subscriber = subscriber;
sensor = new HeartbeatSensor();
}
public void run(){
while(true){
try {
subscriber.onNext(sensor.getCurrentValue());
Thread.sleep(frequence);
} catch (Exception e) {
subscriber.onError(e);
}
}
}
This is the HeartbeatStream class. HeartbeatSensor is a class that periodically generates a value that simulates the heartbeat frequence.
I'm guessing you tried to periodically signal some event that triggers the screen update. There is an operator for that:
Observable<Long> timer = Observable.interval(period, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS,
AndroidSchedulers.mainThread());
SerialSubscription serial = new SerialSubscription();
public void start() {
serial.set(timer.subscribe(v -> view.updateCurrValue(v)));
}
public void stop() {
serial.set(Subscriptions.unsubscribed());
}
public void onDestroy() {
serial.unsubscribe();
}
Observable by design unsubscribe your observer once that all items are emitted and onComplete callback is invoked.
Look this example https://github.com/politrons/reactive/blob/master/src/test/java/rx/observables/creating/ObservableSubscription.java
I guess you're not handling the unsubscribe - although I can't see what's going on in your HeartbeatStream class.
If you're creating an Observable with Observable.create then you need to handle unsubscribing explicitly with subscriber.isUnsubscribed().
Where possible use some of the utility methods to create an Observable - they handle this all for you eg Observable.just() or Observable.from().
If this doesn't help, please post your HeartbeatStream class.
See the the docs for more details:
https://github.com/ReactiveX/RxJava/wiki/Creating-Observables
https://github.com/ReactiveX/RxJava/wiki/Async-Operators

How to pass textBlock control to a Class

say I have a textBlock control and I want to pass it to a class which controls the textBlock to display certain Message.
1) When I call a method in the class, I want textBlock to show message. Example " Checking connection...."
2) When the method complete the required task, the textBlock visibility become collapsed.
In the XAML : I have
a) textBlock name=textBlockMsg
b) a Button to call the class
Appreciate your help.
-- Update :
This class file inside project
public class GeoCalculation
{
public GeoCalculation() { }
public void CalculateDistance()
{
//- Begin -- want the textBlockMsg show : in progress......
--code
//-- when end-----, textBlockMsg visibility becom collapse
}
}
If you named you TextBox in the XAML with textBlockMsg, this will work
Edit
// I will not implement the whole INotifyPropertyChanged check how to do to it : implement
public class CalculationClass : INotifyPropertyChanged
{
public void CalculateDistance()
{
TextToBeBound = "in progress..."
--code
VisibilityToBeBound = Collapsed;
}
public string TextToBeBound
{ //... insert the implement of this property + NotifyPropertyChanged
get {...}
set {...}
}
public Visibility VisibilityToBeBound
{ //... insert the implement of this property + NotifyPropertyChanged
get {...}
set {...}
}
}
Then in the XAML add this :
<TextBlock x:Name="txtBlocMsg" Visibility={"Binding VisibilityToBeBound"} Text={Binding TextToBeBound"}/>
Don't forget to set the DataContext of the UI to your class (in my case CalculationClass
You should be good to go. If all this was new. I recommend you read about data Binding + MVVM pattern.
Edit
It's bad practice to pass UI element to model/business classes. You should use the MVVM pattern.
Hope this helps.
You can have a parameter to pass the TextBock:
public void CalculateDistance(TextBlock tb)
{
tb.Text = "in progress..."
--code
tb.Visibility = Visibility.Collapsed;
}
You coud use a the constructor of your class to inject the textblock it should handle
public class GeoCalculation
{
private TextBlock _tb;
public GeoCalculation(TextBlock tb)
{
_tb = tb;
}
public void CalculateDistance()
{
_tb.Text = "in progress..."
//code
_tb.Visibility = Visibility.Collapsed;
}
}
A ViewModel and using DataBinding would be better by the way!
There you could use our class (method) to provice the text for the ui (textbox)
But be aware:
There is a .net way to do this. The GeoCoordinate class contains a method "GetDistanceTo" to calculate the distance between two geo points. See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.device.location.geocoordinate.getdistanceto.aspx .

Using DataView as a dynamic search result table in Wicket 1.4

I'm fairly new to Wicket but I've already run into a very strange problem.
I'm creating a page with a pretty basic search form and a results table (a DataView) which is initially empty. When the user enters data into the fields and clicks "Search", the app calls some backend services which are then used to populate the DataView.
However the user has to click "Search" twice for the data to be displayed.
I finally tracked this down, and it's because Wicket is using zero for the number of items to be displayed for the first "Search" click. At the second click, the rows have already been added and Wicket has already calculated the proper number of rows to display, so it decides it will show the data.
In AbstractPageableView.getItemModels(), the size of the results to display is initially zero, because I don't load the table with any initial data probably.
I got around this problem by loading the DataView with empty rows on page load. This seems to trick the DataView into using the displaying the data for the first "Search" click.
My question is: am I doing this right? Is there another repeater that is better for this task? Is this a bug or something?
Finally cracked it: it was because I was loading the data in my data provider only in the iterator() method, and the data provider's size() method is usually called before the iterator() method is. I should have been loading the data in its own method and calling that method from iterator() and size(). Doing that fixed it.
Data Provider before (Splc is the DTO):
SearchResultsDataProvider implements IDataProvider<Splc> {
/**
* The list of search results
*/
private List<Splc> models;
#Override
public void detach() {
// Do nothing
}
#Override
public Iterator<Splc> iterator(int first, int count) {
// load the data into the list of models
models = service.getSplcModels();
return models.subList(....).iterator();
}
#Override
public IModel<Splc> model(Splc object) {
return new Model<Splc>(object);
}
#Override
public int size() {
return models.size();
}
}
Data Provider after:
SearchResultsDataProvider implements IDataProvider<Splc> {
private List<Splc> getModels() {
// load the data into the list of models
return service.getSplcModels();
}
#Override
public void detach() {
// Do nothing
}
#Override
public Iterator<Splc> iterator(int first, int count) {
return getModels().subList(....).iterator();
}
#Override
public IModel<Splc> model(Splc object) {
return new Model<Splc>(object);
}
#Override
public int size() {
return getModels().size();
}
}

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