[Rails-devel] The UI

[Brett L. <wak...@ea...>]

As I'm mucking about attempting to acquaint myself with AWT and Swing, I'm=
 faced with the following unpleasantness:

My options for implementing a stock market GUI seem to end up in two=
 categories:

1. I can use the existing widgets, such as JTable, JButton, etc. to cobble=
 together something vaguely resembling a stockmarket. The downside being=
 that there are inherent limitations to these widgets because they are=
 generic widgets and weren't specially crafted just for me.

2. I can use something like java.awt.Graphics2D to explicitly draw every=
 element in the stock chart. The advantage being, I've got full control=
 over _everything_. The downside being that I then get to explicitly define=
 and implement _everything_, which seems like a rather large and daunting=
 task.

Seeing as how I have the sneaking suspicion that when we get to working on=
 the hexmap we'll need to use option #2, I'm rather reluctant to use it for=
 the stockmarket as well (despite the seemingly obvious need for it).

It didn't really help matters much that when I dug into the source of=
 Colossus for inspiration, I saw that they're making heavy use of=
 Graphics2D to draw damn near everything. On the up side, the Colossus=
 source does use one concept that will be important for the hexmap:=
 entrances and exits from a hex. I think we'll be able to use their ideas,=
 if not their code, for dealing with route calculation. However, I think=
 that whole discussion needs to wait until after the stockmarket is "done"=
 and/or somebody starts working on implementing the map.

So, assuming that we take the long road and use Graphics2D for the stock=
 market GUI, here's how I'm thinking on doing it:

1. Use a square ( or rectangle ) for each location on the stockmarket.
2. Make the whole stockmarket reside in (extend) a JPanel, possibly within=
 a JTable.
2. Use the drawString() methods to render the values of each location onto=
 the square itself.
3. Create a circle object (chit) for representing each company's position=
 on the stockmarket; extends a JPanel.
4. Draw the chit (JPanel) on top of the location object. Use the layout=
 manager to achieve overlaying a JPanel on top of another JPanel.
5. Moving the chit ought to be a matter of moving the x,y location of the=
 chit and calling repaint().


Now, if only actually implementing it were so simple...    :-)


---Brett.