How to display a JFreeChart in a NetBeans project

Question

This is similar to a question I asked yesterday but more specific to the problem. What is the correct method to add a JFreeChart to a NetBeans project which already contains various widgets? My updateChart() hides the entire JFrame. I'd like to add the JFreeChart to the JFrame.

public class MyClass extends javax.swing.JFrame implements TableModelListener {
    public MyClass() {
        initComponents();
        ...
        updateChart();
    }
    private void updateChart() {
        XYDataset dataset = createXYdataset();
        JFreeChart chart = createChart(dataset);
        JPanel chartPanel = new ChartPanel(chart);
        setContentPane(chartPanel);
    }
    private XYDataset createXYdataset() {
        XYSeries series = new XYSeries("");
        int rows = jTable.getRowCount();
        if (rows > 0) {
            int ms = 0;
            for (int row = 0; row < rows; row++) {
                series.add(ms, 1);
                ms += Integer.parseInt(
                        jTable.getValueAt(row, PULSE_ON).toString());
                series.add(ms, 1);
                series.add(ms, 0);
                ms += Integer.parseInt(
                        jTable.getValueAt(row, PULSE_OFF).toString());
                series.add(ms, 0);
            }
        }
        XYSeriesCollection dataset = new XYSeriesCollection();
        dataset.addSeries(series);
        return dataset;
    }
    private JFreeChart createChart(XYDataset dataset) {
        JFreeChart chart = ChartFactory.createXYLineChart(
            null,      // chart title
            "ms",                      // x axis label
            null,                      // y axis label
            dataset,                  // data
            PlotOrientation.VERTICAL,
            false,                     // include legend
            true,                     // tooltips
            false                     // urls
        );
        XYPlot plot = (XYPlot) chart.getPlot();
        plot.setDomainPannable(true);
        plot.setRangePannable(true);
        plot.setRangeGridlinesVisible(false);
        NumberAxis rangeAxis = (NumberAxis) plot.getRangeAxis();
        rangeAxis.setStandardTickUnits(NumberAxis.createIntegerTickUnits());
        return chart;
    }
}

Corrected code:

private void updateChart() {
    XYDataset dataset = createXYdataset();
    JFreeChart chart = createChart(dataset);
    JPanel chartPanel = new ChartPanel(chart);
    chartPanel.setSize(jPanel1.getSize());
    jPanel1.add(chartPanel);
    jPanel1.getParent().validate();
}

Answer 1

My updateChart() hides the entire JFrame.

JFreeChart chart = createChart(dataset); 
JPanel chartPanel = new ChartPanel(chart); 
setContentPane(chartPanel); 

That would be because you are replacing the content pane of your frame with the panel from free chart.

I don't know what layout manager you are using, but you need to "ADD" the free chart panel to the panel that contains all the other components. So maybe when you design the general form in Netbeans you add an empty panel to the place where you want the free chart panel to be added. Then when you add the free chart panel the code would be something like:

emptyFreeChartPanel.add( chartPanel );
emptyFreeChartPanel.getParent().validate();

The validate tells Swing that components have been added so the layout manager will be invoked.