Retrieve the path of an ImageIcon

Question

Is it possible to get the location of the file that an ImageIcon was created from?

Internally ImageIcon has a transient private URL of its location, which when debu

Answer 1

You can use reflection to access the private field, but if the ImageIcon wasn't created with a URL the field will be null. If you are creating the ImageIcons yourself you could keep track of the URLs in a map.

ImageIcon icon = ...
Class<? extends ImageIcon> clazz = icon.getClass();
Field urlField = clazz.getDeclaredField("location");
urlField.setAccessible(true);

URL location = (URL) urlField.get(icon);

It is also worth considering that the field name may change in future versions, which may produce exceptions.

Answer 2

Have you tried getDescription()?

I only say so because in the documentation for public ImageIcon(String filename) it lists getDescription() under "See Also".

Note: see Jeffrey's comment.