I am looking for a method to dynamically add to the existing hibernate-mapping XML configuration files BEFORE Hibernate initializes, so they can be used by the application.

Besides our normal mapping files, we have customer submitted jars that we would like to just "drop in" to the war (before the application starts). There are many of these jars and they (and their associated files) change frequently, so we don't want to have to update the configuration files each time a change is made.

Some had suggested using the criteria API ( http://docs.jboss.org/hibernate/orm/3.3/reference/en/html/querycriteria.html ). However, our queries are already in hibernate-mapping XML format, which is easier to manage and review. If it was possible to dynamically generate the queries from the hibernate-mapping XML, this *might* be an option.

P.S. I was hoping to build a hot-deploy environment where a "dropped in" module would dynamically update the existing Hibernate SessionFactory with queries/etc. after it had initialized. However, that is apparently not possible since SessionFactory is effectively immutable.

Currently in use: Spring 2.5.x and Hibernate 3.2.x (although we may be open to new versions if necessary)

I was able to subclass Hibernate's LocalSessionFactoryBean class, overriding the postProcessMappings method to dynamically pull in additional Hibernate-mapping xml definition files from the classpath. I then modified my Spring configuration to use it when initializing Hibernate's SessionFactory bean. This still must happen before the Hibernate SessionFactory is instantiated.

For reference, here's a simplified version:

P.S. Hibernate's insistence on making SessionFactory immutable is perplexing. As long as a user understands there will be a (temporary) performance penalty related to reinitializing the environment, this should be allowed whenever desired.