Hi. I know there could be many ways of achieving that . But i would do this.
I would create my component. e.g TextField<String> username = new TextField<String>("username"); Then add validators to the textfield. e.g username.setRequired(true) ; //add the wicket validators e.g email validators,StringValidators etc then add a tooltip if the field is valid eg. if (username.isValid()){ username.add(new BeautyTipBehavior(username.getFeedbackMessage()). setPositionPreference(TipPosition.left))); } The BeautyTipBehavior is from visural-wicket project see http://wicket.visural.net/examples/app/tooltips NOTE: the code above is for illustration purposes. It may not be correct. Hope you get the idea. Josh.