Embedded Resources

You can embed images in Vaadin UIs with the Image component, Adobe Flash graphics with Flash, and other web content with BrowserFrame. There is also a generic Embedded component for embedding other object types. The embedded content is referenced as resources, as described in “Images and Other Resources”.

The following example displays an image as a class resource loaded with the class loader:

Java

  1. Image image = new Image("Yes, logo:",
  2.     new ClassResource("vaadin-logo.png"));
  3. main.addComponent(image);

The caption can be given as null to disable it. An empty string displays an empty caption which takes a bit space. The caption is managed by the containing layout.

You can set an alternative text for an embedded resource with setAlternateText(), which can be shown if images are disabled in the browser for some reason. The text can be used for accessibility purposes, such as for text-to-speech generation.

Embedded Image

The Image component allows embedding an image resource in a Vaadin UI.

Java

  1. // Serve the image from the theme
  2. Resource res = new ThemeResource("img/myimage.png");
  4. // Display the image without caption
  5. Image image = new Image(null, res);
  6. layout.addComponent(image);

The Image component has by default undefined size in both directions, so it will automatically fit the size of the embedded image. If you want scrolling with scroll bars, you can put the image inside a Panel that has a defined size to enable scrolling, as described in “Scrolling the Panel Content”. You can also put it inside some other component container and set the overflow: auto CSS property for the container element in a theme to enable automatic scrollbars.

Generating and Reloading Images

You can also generate the image content dynamically using a StreamResource, as described in “Stream Resources”, or with a RequestHandler.

If the image changes, the browser needs to reload it. Simply updating the stream resource is not enough. Because of how caching is handled in some browsers, you can cause a reload easiest by renaming the filename of the resource with a unique name, such as one including a timestamp. You should set cache time to zero with setCacheTime() for the resource object when you create it.

Java

  1. // Create the stream resource with some initial filename
  2. StreamResource imageResource =
  3.     new StreamResource(imageSource, "initial-filename.png");
  5. // Instruct browser not to cache the image
  6. imageResource.setCacheTime(0);
  8. // Display the image
  9. Image image = new Image(null, imageResource);

When refreshing, you also need to call markAsDirty() for the Image object.

Java

  1. // This needs to be done, but is not sufficient
  2. image.markAsDirty();
  4. // Generate a filename with a timestamp
  5. SimpleDateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyyMMddHHmmssSSS");
  6. String filename = "myfilename-" + df.format(new Date()) + ".png";
  8. // Replace the filename in the resource
  9. imageResource.setFilename(makeImageFilename());

Adobe Flash Graphics

The Flash component allows embedding Adobe Flash animations in Vaadin UIs.

Java

  1. Flash flash = new Flash(null,
  2.     new ThemeResource("img/vaadin_spin.swf"));
  3. layout.addComponent(flash);

You can set Flash parameters with setParameter(), which takes a parameter’s name and value as strings. You can also set the codeBase, archive, and standBy attributes for the Flash object element in HTML.

BrowserFrame

The BrowserFrame allows embedding web content inside an HTML <iframe> element. You can refer to an external URL with ExternalResource.

As the BrowserFrame has undefined size by default, it is critical that you define a meaningful size for it, either fixed or relative.

Java

  1. BrowserFrame browser = new BrowserFrame("Browser",
  2.     new ExternalResource("http://demo.vaadin.com/sampler/"));
  3. browser.setWidth("600px");
  4. browser.setHeight("400px");
  5. layout.addComponent(browser);

Notice that web pages can prevent embedding them in an <iframe>.

Generic Embedded Objects

The generic Embedded component allows embedding all sorts of objects, such as SVG graphics, Java applets, and PDF documents, in addition to the images, Flash graphics, and browser frames which you can embed with the specialized components.

For example, to display a Flash animation:

Java

  1. // A resource reference to some object
  2. Resource res = new ThemeResource("img/vaadin_spin.swf");
  4. // Display the object
  5. Embedded object = new Embedded("My Object", res);
  6. layout.addComponent(object);

Or an SVG image:

Java

  1. // A resource reference to some object
  2. Resource res = new ThemeResource("img/reindeer.svg");
  4. // Display the object
  5. Embedded object = new Embedded("My SVG", res);
  6. object.setMimeType("image/svg+xml"); // Unnecessary
  7. layout.addComponent(object);

The MIME type of the objects is usually detected automatically from the filename extension with the FileTypeResolver utility in Vaadin. If not, you can set it explicitly with setMimeType(), as was done in the example above (where it was actually unnecessary).

Some embeddable object types may require special support in the browser. You should make sure that there is a proper fallback mechanism if the browser does not support the embedded type.