java.awt.font
Class LineBreakMeasurer

java.lang.Object
  |
  +--java.awt.font.LineBreakMeasurer

public final class LineBreakMeasurer

extends Object

The LineBreakMeasurer class allows styled text to be broken into lines (or segments) that fit within a particular visual advance. This is useful for clients who wish to display a paragraph of text that fits within a specific width, called the wrapping width.

LineBreakMeasurer is constructed with an iterator over styled text. The iterator's range should be a single paragraph in the text. LineBreakMeasurer maintains a position in the text for the start of the next text segment. Initially, this position is the start of text. Paragraphs are assigned an overall direction (either left-to-right or right-to-left) according to the bidirectional formatting rules. All segments obtained from a paragraph have the same direction as the paragraph.

Segments of text are obtained by calling the method nextLayout, which returns a TextLayout representing the text that fits within the wrapping width. The nextLayout method moves the current position to the end of the layout returned from nextLayout.

LineBreakMeasurer implements the most commonly used line-breaking policy: Every word that fits within the wrapping width is placed on the line. If the first word does not fit, then all of the characters that fit within the wrapping width are placed on the line. At least one character is placed on each line.

The TextLayout instances returned by LineBreakMeasurer treat tabs like 0-width spaces. Clients who wish to obtain tab-delimited segments for positioning should use the overload of nextLayout which takes a limiting offset in the text. The limiting offset should be the first character after the tab. The TextLayout objects returned from this method end at the limit provided (or before, if the text between the current position and the limit won't fit entirely within the wrapping width).

Clients who are laying out tab-delimited text need a slightly different line-breaking policy after the first segment has been placed on a line. Instead of fitting partial words in the remaining space, they should place words which don't fit in the remaining space entirely on the next line. This change of policy can be requested in the overload of nextLayout which takes a boolean parameter. If this parameter is true, nextLayout returns null if the first word won't fit in the given space. See the tab sample below.

In general, if the text used to construct the LineBreakMeasurer changes, a new LineBreakMeasurer must be constructed to reflect the change. (The old LineBreakMeasurer continues to function properly, but it won't be aware of the text change.) Nevertheless, if the text change is the insertion or deletion of a single character, an existing LineBreakMeasurer can be 'updated' by calling insertChar or deleteChar. Updating an existing LineBreakMeasurer is much faster than creating a new one. Clients who modify text based on user typing should take advantage of these methods.

Examples:

Rendering a paragraph in a component

 public void paint(Graphics graphics) {

     Point2D pen = new Point2D(10, 20);

     // let styledText be an AttributedCharacterIterator containing at least
     // one character

     LineBreakMeasurer measurer = new LineBreakMeasurer(styledText);
     float wrappingWidth = getSize().width - 15;

     while (measurer.getPosition() < fStyledText.length()) {

         TextLayout layout = measurer.nextLayout(wrappingWidth);

         pen.y += (layout.getAscent());
         float dx = layout.isLeftToRight() ?
             0 : (wrappingWidth - layout.getAdvance());

         layout.draw(graphics, pen.x + dx, pen.y);
         pen.y += layout.getDescent() + layout.getLeading();
     }
 }
 

Rendering text with tabs. For simplicity, the overall text direction is assumed to be left-to-right

 public void paint(Graphics graphics) {

     float leftMargin = 10, rightMargin = 310;
     float[] tabStops = { 100, 250 };

     // assume styledText is an AttributedCharacterIterator, and the number
     // of tabs in styledText is tabCount

     int[] tabLocations = new int[tabCount+1];

     int i = 0;
     for (char c = styledText.first(); c != styledText.DONE; c = styledText.next()) {
         if (c == '\t') {
             tabLocations[i++] = styledText.getIndex();
         }
     }
     tabLocations[tabCount] = styledText.getEndIndex() - 1;

     // Now tabLocations has an entry for every tab's offset in
     // the text.  For convenience, the last entry is tabLocations
     // is the offset of the last character in the text.

     LineBreakMeasurer measurer = new LineBreakMeasurer(styledText);
     int currentTab = 0;
     float verticalPos = 20;

     while (measurer.getPosition() < styledText.getEndIndex()) {

         // Lay out and draw each line.  All segments on a line
         // must be computed before any drawing can occur, since
         // we must know the largest ascent on the line.
         // TextLayouts are computed and stored in a Vector;
         // their horizontal positions are stored in a parallel
         // Vector.

         // lineContainsText is true after first segment is drawn
         boolean lineContainsText = false;
         boolean lineComplete = false;
         float maxAscent = 0, maxDescent = 0;
         float horizontalPos = leftMargin;
         Vector layouts = new Vector(1);
         Vector penPositions = new Vector(1);

         while (!lineComplete) {
             float wrappingWidth = rightMargin - horizontalPos;
             TextLayout layout =
                     measurer.nextLayout(wrappingWidth,
                                         tabLocations[currentTab]+1,
                                         lineContainsText);

             // layout can be null if lineContainsText is true
             if (layout != null) {
                 layouts.addElement(layout);
                 penPositions.addElement(new Float(horizontalPos));
                 horizontalPos += layout.getAdvance();
                 maxAscent = Math.max(maxAscent, layout.getAscent());
                 maxDescent = Math.max(maxDescent,
                     layout.getDescent() + layout.getLeading());
             } else {
                 lineComplete = true;
             }

             lineContainsText = true;

             if (measurer.getPosition() == tabLocations[currentTab]+1) {
                 currentTab++;
             }

             if (measurer.getPosition() == styledText.getEndIndex())
                 lineComplete = true;
             else if (horizontalPos >= tabStops[tabStops.length-1])
                 lineComplete = true;

             if (!lineComplete) {
                 // move to next tab stop
                 int j;
                 for (j=0; horizontalPos >= tabStops[j]; j++) {}
                 horizontalPos = tabStops[j];
             }
         }

         verticalPos += maxAscent;

         Enumeration layoutEnum = layouts.elements();
         Enumeration positionEnum = penPositions.elements();

         // now iterate through layouts and draw them
         while (layoutEnum.hasMoreElements()) {
             TextLayout nextLayout = (TextLayout) layoutEnum.nextElement();
             Float nextPosition = (Float) positionEnum.nextElement();
             nextLayout.draw(graphics, nextPosition.floatValue(), verticalPos);
         }

         verticalPos += maxDescent;
     }
 }
 

See Also:

TextLayout

Constructor Summary

LineBreakMeasurer(AttributedCharacterIterator text, BreakIterator breakIter, FontRenderContext frc)
Constructs a LineBreakMeasurer for the specified text.

LineBreakMeasurer(AttributedCharacterIterator text, FontRenderContext frc)
Constructs a LineBreakMeasurer for the specified text.

Method Summary

void	deleteChar(AttributedCharacterIterator newParagraph, int deletePos) Updates this LineBreakMeasurer after a single character is deleted from the text.
int	getPosition() Returns the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.
void	insertChar(AttributedCharacterIterator newParagraph, int insertPos) Updates this LineBreakMeasurer after a single character is inserted into the text.
TextLayout	nextLayout(float maxAdvance) Returns the next layout, and updates the current position.
TextLayout	nextLayout(float wrappingWidth, int offsetLimit, boolean requireNextWord) Returns the next layout, and updates the current position.
int	nextOffset(float maxAdvance) Returns the position at the end of the next layout.
int	nextOffset(float wrappingWidth, int offsetLimit, boolean requireNextWord) Returns the position at the end of the next layout.
void	setPosition(int newPosition) Sets the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.

Methods inherited from class java.lang.Object

clone, equals, finalize, getClass, hashCode, notify, notifyAll, toString, wait, wait, wait

Constructor Detail

LineBreakMeasurer

public LineBreakMeasurer(AttributedCharacterIterator text,
                         FontRenderContext frc)

Constructs a LineBreakMeasurer for the specified text.

Parameters:

text - the text for which this LineBreakMeasurer produces TextLayout objects. The text must contain at least one character. If the text available through iter changes, further calls to this LineBreakMeasurer instance are undefined (except, in some cases, when insertChar or deleteChar are invoked afterward - see below).

frc - the FontRenderContext in which the text is measured

See Also:

insertChar(java.text.AttributedCharacterIterator, int), deleteChar(java.text.AttributedCharacterIterator, int)

LineBreakMeasurer

public LineBreakMeasurer(AttributedCharacterIterator text,
                         BreakIterator breakIter,
                         FontRenderContext frc)

Constructs a LineBreakMeasurer for the specified text.

Parameters:

text - the text for which this LineBreakMeasurer produces TextLayout objects. The text must contain at least one character. If the text available through iter changes, further calls to this LineBreakMeasurer instance are undefined (except, in some cases, when insertChar or deleteChar are invoked afterward - see below).

breakIter - the BreakIterator which defines line breaks

frc - the FontRenderContext in which the text is measured

See Also:

insertChar(java.text.AttributedCharacterIterator, int), deleteChar(java.text.AttributedCharacterIterator, int)

Method Detail

nextOffset

public int nextOffset(float maxAdvance)

Returns the position at the end of the next layout. Does NOT update the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.

Parameters:

maxAdvance - the maximum visible advance permitted for the text in the next layout

Returns:

an offset in the text representing the limit of the next TextLayout.

nextOffset

public int nextOffset(float wrappingWidth,
                      int offsetLimit,
                      boolean requireNextWord)

Returns the position at the end of the next layout. Does NOT update the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.

Parameters:

wrappingWidth - the maximum visible advance permitted for the text in the next layout

offsetLimit - the first character that can not be included in the next layout, even if the text after the limit would fit within the wrapping width. offsetLimit must be greater than the current position.

requireNextWord - if true, the current position that is returned if the entire next word does not fit within wrappingWidth. If false, the offset returned is at least one greater than the current position.

Returns:

an offset in the text representing the limit of the next TextLayout.

nextLayout

public TextLayout nextLayout(float maxAdvance)

Returns the next layout, and updates the current position.

Parameters:

maxAdvance - the maximum visible advance permitted for the text in the next layout

Returns:

a TextLayout, beginning at the current position, which represents the next line fitting within maxAdvance.

nextLayout

public TextLayout nextLayout(float wrappingWidth,
                             int offsetLimit,
                             boolean requireNextWord)

Returns the next layout, and updates the current position.

Parameters:

wrappingWidth - the maximum visible advance permitted for the text in the next layout

offsetLimit - the first character that can not be included in the next layout, even if the text after the limit would fit within the wrapping width. offsetLimit must be greater than the current position.

requireNextWord - if true, and if the entire word at the current position does not fit within the wrapping width, null is returned. If false, a valid layout is returned that includes at least the character at the current position.

Returns:

a TextLayout, beginning at the current position, that represents the next line fitting within maxAdvance. If the current position is at the end of the text used by this LineBreakMeasurer, null is returned.

getPosition

public int getPosition()

Returns the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.

Returns:

the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.

See Also:

setPosition(int)

setPosition

public void setPosition(int newPosition)

Sets the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer.

Parameters:

newPosition - the current position of this LineBreakMeasurer. The position should be within the text used to construct this LineBreakMeasurer (or in the text most recently passed to insertChar or deleteChar.

See Also:

getPosition()

insertChar

public void insertChar(AttributedCharacterIterator newParagraph,
                       int insertPos)

Updates this LineBreakMeasurer after a single character is inserted into the text.

Parameters:

newParagraph - the text after the insertion

insertPos - the position in the text at which the character is inserted

See Also:

deleteChar(java.text.AttributedCharacterIterator, int)

deleteChar

public void deleteChar(AttributedCharacterIterator newParagraph,
                       int deletePos)

Updates this LineBreakMeasurer after a single character is deleted from the text.

Parameters:

newParagraph - the text after the deletion

deletePos - the position in the text at which the character is deleted

See Also:

insertChar(java.text.AttributedCharacterIterator, int)