Chapter 1. Introduction

Table of Contents

1. What is the JDatePicker Suite
2. Requirements
3. How to Install
4. IDE Integration
4.1. NetBeans
4.2. Borland JBuilder
4.3. IntelliJ IDEA
5. What's New
5.1. Version 4.3 (January 8, 2007)
5.2. Version 4.2 (May 1, 2006)
5.3. Version 4.1 (October 19, 2005)
5.4. Version 4.0 (April 7, 2005)
5.5. Version 3.3 (December 17, 2004)
5.6. Version 3.2 (October 12, 2004)
5.7. Version 3.1 (August 30, 2004)
5.8. Version 3.0 (June 18, 2004)
5.9. Version 2.4 (May 3, 2004)
5.10. Version 2.3.1 (April 15, 2004)
5.11. Version 2.3 (March 25, 2004)
5.12. Version 2.2 (February 23, 2004)
5.13. Version 2.1 (February 2, 2004)
5.14. Version 2.0.1 (January 21, 2004)
5.15. Version 2.0 (December 15, 2003)
6. Known Issues
6.1. Instantiation fails on applet reload
6.2. ColorUIResource NPE
6.3. JGoodies Plastic LF integration
7. Frequently Asked Questions
8. More Help

Date input and selection is an important operation in most desktop applications. As the Java language gained strong popularity and support, it started to be used intensively for the development of such applications. However, the Swing library does not contain components for such operations. With the JDatePicker suite you can solve this shortage as it contains components to suit even the most complex date selection operations.

1. What is the JDatePicker Suite

JDatePicker is a suite of powerful date components for Swing. The dates available for selection can be restricted according to a specified pattern. Users can also do single or multiple date selection. So far, the available components are an editable date picker, a date/time field, a multiple month calendar and a month component. The components can be internationalized, have support for mouse and keyboard and they can be used with any look and feel (Metal, Motif, Windows, Aqua and custom ones).

The calendar component is perhaps the most important component because it makes it easier for the users to view and select dates by means of an intuitive interface.

The date field can be used as a date/time editor in applications where users make extensive use of the keyboard. The date field can be customized to use shortcut strings for dates.

The date picker component displays date information and acts as an interface through which a date can be modified. Users can change dates using the built-in editor or the drop down calendar.