How to find out which object currently has focus

Question

I have a few TextFields in my Frame. I want to know which TextField currently has focus. How can I find this information?

Answer 1

getFocusOwner() will return the child component which is currently focused.

But you have to check to see if it is a JTextField. Other components like buttons might be focused if they exist in your frame as well.

Answer 2

You could also listen for the appropriate property change in keyboard focus manager:

KeyboardFocusManager.getCurrentKeyboardFocusManager().addPropertyChangeListener("focusOwner", new PropertyChangeListener() {
    @Override
    public void propertyChange(PropertyChangeEvent evt) {
        System.out.println(evt.getNewValue());
    }
});

This outputs focus owner as you interact with Swing components and is useful for debugging focus issues in general.

Answer 3

Also have a look at the javax.swing.FocusManager