Swing Examples - Add Tooltip to Header of table

Following example showcase how to add tooltip to the headers of a table in a Java Swing application.

We are using the following APIs.

• JTable(Object[][] data, String[] columnNames) − To create a table.

• JTable().createDefaultTableHeader() − Override the existing method to set the custom tooltip.

Example

import java.awt.FlowLayout;
import java.awt.GridLayout;
import java.awt.event.MouseEvent;
import java.awt.event.WindowAdapter;
import java.awt.event.WindowEvent;

import javax.swing.JFrame;
import javax.swing.JLabel;
import javax.swing.JPanel;
import javax.swing.JScrollPane;
import javax.swing.JTable;
import javax.swing.table.JTableHeader;

public class SwingTester {
   private JFrame mainFrame;
   private JLabel headerLabel;
   private JLabel statusLabel;
   private JPanel controlPanel;

   public SwingTester(){
      prepareGUI();
   }
   public static void main(String[] args){
      SwingTester swingControlDemo = new SwingTester();      
      swingControlDemo.showTableDemo();
   }
   private void prepareGUI(){
      mainFrame = new JFrame("Java Swing Examples");
      mainFrame.setSize(500,400);
      mainFrame.setLayout(new GridLayout(3, 1));

      mainFrame.addWindowListener(new WindowAdapter() {
         public void windowClosing(WindowEvent windowEvent){
            System.exit(0);
         }        
      });    
      headerLabel = new JLabel("", JLabel.CENTER);        
      statusLabel = new JLabel("",JLabel.CENTER);    
      statusLabel.setSize(350,100);

      controlPanel = new JPanel();
      controlPanel.setLayout(new FlowLayout());

      mainFrame.add(headerLabel);
      mainFrame.add(controlPanel);
      mainFrame.add(statusLabel);
      mainFrame.setVisible(true);  
   }
   private void showTableDemo(){
      headerLabel.setText("Control in action: JTable"); 

      String[] columnNames = {"Name", "Salary"};
      Object[][] data = {
         {"Ramesh Raman", 5000},
         {"Shabbir Hussein", 7000}
      };
      final String[] columnToolTips = {
         "Name of the person",    
         "Salary of the Person"
      };
      JTable table = new JTable(data, columnNames){
         //Implement table header tool tips.
         protected JTableHeader createDefaultTableHeader() {
            return new JTableHeader(columnModel) {
               public String getToolTipText(MouseEvent e) {
                  int colIndex = columnModel.getColumnIndexAtX(e.getPoint().x);
                  int index = columnModel.getColumn(colIndex).getModelIndex();
                  return columnToolTips[index];
               }
            };
         }
      };

	  table.setAutoCreateRowSorter(true);
      JScrollPane scrollPane = new JScrollPane(table);
      scrollPane.setSize(300, 300);
      table.setFillsViewportHeight(true);
      controlPanel.add(scrollPane);      
      mainFrame.setVisible(true);     
   } 
}

Output