[Chapter 10] Java Beans

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| Chapter 10 |

# 10. Java Beans

Contents:
Bean Basics
A Simple Bean
A More Complex Bean
Custom Events
Specifying Bean Information
Defining a Simple Property Editor
Defining a Complex Property Editor
Defining a Bean Customizer
Naming Patterns and Conventions

The JavaBeans API provides a framework for defining reusable, embeddable, modular software components. The JavaBeans Specification includes the following definition of a bean: "a reusable software component that can be manipulated visually in a builder tool." As you can see, this is a rather loose definition; beans can take a variety of forms. At the simplest level, individual AWT components (in Java 1.1) are all beans, while at a much higher level, an embeddable spreadsheet application might also function as a bean. Most beans, however, will probably fall somewhere between these two extremes.

One of the goals of the JavaBeans model is interoperability with similar component frameworks. So, for example, a native Windows program can, with an appropriate bridge or wrapper object, use a Java bean as if it were a COM or ActiveX component. The details of this sort of interoperability are beyond the scope of this chapter, however.

Beans can be used at three levels, by three different categories of programmers:

- If you are developing GUI editors, application builders, or other "beanbox" tools, you need the JavaBeans API to manipulate beans within these tools. beanbox is the name of the sample bean manipulation program provided by Sun in its Beans Development Kit (BDK). The term is a useful one, and I'll use it to describe any kind of graphical design tool or application builder that manipulates beans.

- If you are writing actual beans, you need the JavaBeans API to write code that can be used in any conforming beanbox.

- If you are writing applications that use beans developed by other programmers, or using a beanbox tool to combine those beans into an application, you do not actually need to be familiar with the JavaBeans API. You only need to be familiar with the documentation for individual beans that you are using.

This chapter explains how to use the JavaBeans API at the second level, or in other words, it describes how to write beans. It covers the following topics:

- Basic bean concepts and terminology

- Requirements for the simplest beans

- Packaging beans in JAR files

- Providing additional information about beans with the `BeanInfo` class

- Defining property editors to allow custom editing of bean properties

- Defining bean customizers to allow customization of an entire bean

- The various naming conventions and requirements imposed by the JavaBeans model

## 10.1 Bean Basics

We begin our discussion of beans with some basic concepts and terminology. Any object that conforms to certain basic rules can be a bean; there is no `Bean` class that all beans are required to subclass. Many beans are AWT components, but it is also quite possible, and often useful, to write "invisible" beans that do not have an on-screen appearance. (Just because a bean does not have an on-screen appearance in a finished application does not mean that it won't be visually manipulated by a beanbox tool, however.)

A bean exports properties, events, and methods. A property is a piece of the bean's internal state that can be programmatically set and queried, usually through a standard pair of `get` and `set` accessor methods. A bean may generate events in the same way that an AWT component, such as a `Button`, generates `ActionEvent` events. The JavaBeans API uses the same event model as the Java 1.1 AWT does. See Chapter 7, Events, for a full discussion of this model. A bean defines an event if it provides methods for adding and removing event listener objects from a list of interested listeners for that event. Finally, the methods exported by a bean are simply any `public` methods defined by the bean, excluding those methods used to get and set property values and register and remove event listeners.

In addition to the regular sort of properties described above, the JavaBeans API also provides support for "indexed properties," "bound properties," and "constrained properties." An indexed property is any property that has an array value and for which the bean provides methods to get and set individual elements of the array, as well as methods to get and set the entire array. A bound property is one that sends out a notification event when its value changes, while a constrained property is one that sends out a notification event when its value changes and allows the change to be vetoed by listeners.

Because Java allows dynamic loading of classes, beanbox programs can load arbitrary beans. The beanbox tool determines the properties, events, and methods a bean supports by using an "introspection" mechanism that is based on the `java.lang.reflect` reflection mechanism for obtaining information about the members of a class. A bean can also provide an auxiliary `BeanInfo` class that provides additional information about the bean. The `BeanInfo` class provides this additional information in the form of a number of `FeatureDescriptor` objects, each one describing a single feature of the bean. `FeatureDescriptor` has a number of subclasses: `BeanDescriptor`, `PropertyDescriptor`, `IndexedPropertyDescriptor`, `EventSetDescriptor`, `MethodDescriptor`, and `ParameterDescriptor`.

One of the primary tasks of a beanbox application is to allow the user to customize a bean by setting property values. A beanbox defines "property editors" for commonly used property types, such as numbers, strings, fonts, and colors. If a bean has properties of more complicated types, however, it may need to define a `PropertyEditor` class that enables the beanbox to let the user set values for that property.

In addition, a complex bean may not be satisfied with the property-by-property customization mechanism provided by most beanboxes. Such a bean may want to define a `Customizer` class, which creates a graphical interface that allows the user to configure a bean in some useful way. A particularly complex bean may even define customizers that serve as "wizards" that guide the user step-by-step through the customization process.

Advanced Serialization |  | A Simple Bean