Zooming in JavaFx: ScrollEvent is consumed when content size exceeds ScrollPane viewport

Question

I have an application that requires zoom inside a ScrollPane, but with my current approach I'm still facing 2 challenges. In order to replicate the problem, I have written a small application ZoomApp that you will find the code for underneath. Its' limited functionality allows zooming in and out (using Ctrl + Mouse Wheel) on some arbitrary shapes. When the zoomed content grows outside the bounds of the window, scroll bars should apperar.

Challenge 1. When the scroll bars appears as a consequence of innerGroup scales up in size, the ScrollEvent no longer reach my ZoomHandler. Instead, we start scrolling down the window, until it reaches the bottom, when zooming again works as expect. I thought maybe

scrollPane.setPannable(false);

would make a difference, but no. How should this unwanted behaviour be avoided?

Challenge 2. How would I go about to center innerGroup inside the scrollPane, without resorting to paint a pixel in the upper left corner of innerGroup with the desired delta to the squares?

As a sidenote, according to the JavaDoc for ScrollPane: "If an application wants the scrolling to be based on the visual bounds of the node (for scaled content etc.), they need to wrap the scroll node in a Group". This is the reason why I have an innerGroup and an outerGroup inside ScrollPane.

Any suggestions that guides me to the solution is much appreciated by this JavaFX novice.

import javafx.application.Application;
import javafx.event.EventHandler;
import javafx.scene.Group;
import javafx.scene.Node;
import javafx.scene.Scene;
import javafx.scene.SceneBuilder;
import javafx.scene.control.ScrollPane;
import javafx.scene.input.ScrollEvent;
import javafx.scene.layout.StackPane;
import javafx.scene.paint.Color;
import javafx.scene.shape.Rectangle;
import javafx.stage.Stage;

/**
 * Demo of a challenge I have with zooming inside a {@code ScrollPane}.
 * <br>
 * I am running JavaFx 2.2 on a Mac. {@code java -version} yields:
 * <pre>
 * java version "1.7.0_09"
 * Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.7.0_09-b05)
 * Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (build 23.5-b02, mixed mode)
 * </pre>
 * 6 rectangles are drawn, and can be zoomed in and out using either
 * <pre>
 * Ctrl + Mouse Wheel
 * or Ctrl + 2 fingers on the pad.
 * </pre>
 * It reproduces a problem I experience inside an application I am writing.
 * If you magnify to {@link #MAX_SCALE}, an interesting problem occurs when you try to zoom back to {@link #MIN_SCALE}. In the beginning
 * you will see that the {@code scrollPane} scrolls and consumes the {@code ScrollEvent} until we have scrolled to the bottom of the window.
 * Once the bottom of the window is reached, it behaves as expected (or at least as I was expecting).
 *
 * @author Skjalg Bjørndal
 * @since 2012.11.05
 */
public class ZoomApp extends Application {

    private static final int WINDOW_WIDTH = 800;
    private static final int WINDOW_HEIGHT = 600;

    private static final double MAX_SCALE = 2.5d;
    private static final double MIN_SCALE = .5d;

    private class ZoomHandler implements EventHandler<ScrollEvent> {

        private Node nodeToZoom;

        private ZoomHandler(Node nodeToZoom) {
            this.nodeToZoom = nodeToZoom;
        }

        @Override
        public void handle(ScrollEvent scrollEvent) {
            if (scrollEvent.isControlDown()) {
                final double scale = calculateScale(scrollEvent);
                nodeToZoom.setScaleX(scale);
                nodeToZoom.setScaleY(scale);
                scrollEvent.consume();
            }
        }

        private double calculateScale(ScrollEvent scrollEvent) {
            double scale = nodeToZoom.getScaleX() + scrollEvent.getDeltaY() / 100;

            if (scale <= MIN_SCALE) {
                scale = MIN_SCALE;
            } else if (scale >= MAX_SCALE) {
                scale = MAX_SCALE;
            }
            return scale;
        }
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        launch(args);
    }

    @Override
    public void start(Stage stage) throws Exception {

        final Group innerGroup = createSixRectangles();
        final Group outerGroup = new Group(innerGroup);

        final ScrollPane scrollPane = new ScrollPane();
        scrollPane.setContent(outerGroup);
        scrollPane.setOnScroll(new ZoomHandler(innerGroup));

        StackPane stackPane = new StackPane();
        stackPane.getChildren().add(scrollPane);

        Scene scene = SceneBuilder.create()
                .width(WINDOW_WIDTH)
                .height(WINDOW_HEIGHT)
                .root(stackPane)
                .build();

        stage.setScene(scene);
        stage.show();
    }

    private Group createSixRectangles() {
        return new Group(
                createRectangle(0, 0), createRectangle(110, 0), createRectangle(220, 0),
                createRectangle(0, 110), createRectangle(110, 110), createRectangle(220, 110),
                createRectangle(0, 220), createRectangle(110, 220), createRectangle(220, 220)
        );
    }

    private Rectangle createRectangle(int x, int y) {
        Rectangle rectangle = new Rectangle(x, y, 100, 100);
        rectangle.setStroke(Color.ORANGERED);
        rectangle.setFill(Color.ORANGE);
        rectangle.setStrokeWidth(3d);
        return rectangle;
    }
}

Answer 1

OK, so I finally found a solution to my problem.

By merely substituting the line

   scrollPane.setOnScroll(new ZoomHandler(innerGroup));

with

    scrollPane.addEventFilter(ScrollEvent.ANY, new ZoomHandler(innerGroup));

it now works as expected. No mystic Rectangle or other hacks are needed.

So the next question is why? According to this excellent article on Processing Events,

An event filter is executed during the event capturing phase.

while

An event handler is executed during the event bubbling phase.

I assume this is what makes the difference.