TimeField Swing Component

This is a proof of concept, designed to demonstrate a possible solution to initial requirements, which was used to gain feedback and drive actual development

Some time ago I had a client that was unimpressed with JFormattedTextField and JSpinner when it came to entering in time values. Coming from a pre-existing text based system, they wanted to be able to at least replicate the functionality that the pre-existing system had, if not exceed it.

The field needed to provide:

• Formatting in hh:mm a or HH:mm
• Real time validation
  • This would mean limiting what the user could enter based on a series of rules including, if set to 12 hour time, if the user typed 1 in the hour field, they could only enter 0, 1 or 2, with simular restrictions on the minutes and seconds fields
• Simple navigation, moving from the hours portion to the seconds portion when the user exceeds the number of digits for the field (ie typing 03 in the hour portion should move the user to the minutes portion without them needing to do anything), they should also be able to arrow key back and forwards like a normal field, moving between the different time portions.

The implementation also provided

• The ability to [Tab] between field portions
• Use the [:] to move from the hour to seconds portions, which allowed for a more natural typing experience (1:52 for example)

A further enhancement was made later to introduce a concept of a DurationField which allowed the entry of any number of hours, but which still restricted the minutes (and potentially seconds)

The code is intended to demonstrate the possibilities for a time/duration field based on some basic requirements.

Future enhancements would include:

• The ability to configure seconds and milliseconds
• The ability to change the time separators based on localization