It seems that in FXML if you don't specify a ID (CSS) then the fx:id value is used by default. My previous understanding was the two were completely disjoint, ID for CSS and only CSS. fx:id for @FXML bindings in the controller.
This can be demonstrated with a small test - three buttons, first with ID, second with FX:ID, third with both types of ID.
<VBox maxHeight="-Infinity" maxWidth="-Infinity" minHeight="-Infinity" minWidth="-Infinity" prefHeight="400.0" prefWidth="600.0" xmlns="http://javafx.com/javafx/8" xmlns:fx="http://javafx.com/fxml/1">
<children>
<Button id="cssid0" mnemonicParsing="false" text="Button" />
<Button fx:id="fxid1" mnemonicParsing="false" text="Button" />
<Button id="cssid2" fx:id="fxid2" mnemonicParsing="false" text="Button" />
</children>
</VBox>
Using Node.lookup(cssSelector) allows selection by fx:id
@Override
public void start(Stage stage) throws Exception {
FXMLLoader loader = new FXMLLoader(getClass().getResource("/foo.fxml"));
Parent p = loader.load();
System.out.println(p.lookup("#cssid0")); // => Button[id=cssid0, styleClass=button]'Button'
System.out.println(p.lookup("#fxid1")); // => Button[id=fxid1, styleClass=button]'Button'
System.out.println(p.lookup("#fxid2")); // => null (if there is a CSS ID it takes precedent)
System.out.println(p.lookup("#cssid2")); // Button[id=cssid2, styleClass=button]'Button'
stage.setScene(new Scene(p, 200, 200));
stage.getScene().getStylesheets().add("/foo.css");
stage.show();
}
Also CSS allows selection by the fx:ID
#cssid0 {
-fx-color: red;
}
#fxid1 {
-fx-color: green;
}
#cssid2 {
-fx-color: blue;
}
This does not appear to be covered by existing question What's the difference between fx:id and id: in JavaFX?, Javadoc for Node.getId() or anywhere else I could find.
This feature is really useful as we only need to only specify a single fx:id which can be used for controllers, CSS and unit testing using test-FX.
Is it OK to use this approach or am I building assumptions on undocumented behaviour that might change in a later release? Or is it documented somewhere I'm missing?