JavaFX Get ComboBox from ChoiceDialog

I have a javafx.scene.control.ChoiceDialog object in my JavaFX project. When the dialog opens, I want to set the focus to the underlying ComboBox. However, I can’t figure out how to get the underlying ComboBox control. With a TextInputDialog, there is a method called getEditor(). Is there any way (other than reflectively accessing the private comboBox member) to get the underlying ComboBox?

Answer

To set the focus to the ComboBox you can use a dirty hack, which triggers updateGrid of the ChoiceDialog after it is shown:

ChoiceDialog<String> choiceDialog = new ChoiceDialog<>("test", getData());
choiceDialog.showingProperty().addListener((ov, b, b1) -> {
    if (b1) {
        choiceDialog.setContentText("");
    }else {
        choiceDialog.setContentText(null);
    }

    //or 
    if (b1) {
        Node comboBox = choiceDialog.getDialogPane().lookup(".combo-box");
        comboBox.requestFocus();
    }
});

---

Obtaining the ComboBox instance using the style class is useful to override the default keyboard navigation:

final var options = (ComboBox) getDialogPane().lookup( ".combo-box" );
options.setOnKeyPressed( ( event ) -> {
  // When the user presses the down arrow, open the drop-down. This prevents
  // navigating to the cancel button.
  if( event.getCode() == KeyCode.DOWN && !options.isShowing() ) {
    options.show();
    event.consume();
  }
} );

When the above changes in place, pressing the down arrow key will open the combo box instance instead of navigating to the Cancel button.