We have been trying unsuccessfully to map abstract DataSource names in our hibernate.cfg.xml file to 'real' JNDI resources as configured on a WebSphere 7 server. We have read several articles and tutorials on the subject, and the only examples we can find show that the hibernate.connection.datasource property must exactly match the JNDI name of the resource as configured on the server.

The problem is that this reduces the portability of our configuration files. Take the example of a test, stage, and production environment. In the test environment, the JNDI name may be jdbc/TestDB. Likewise, in the stage environment, the JNDI name may be jdbc/StageDB. This requires us to maintain more than one hibernate.cfg.xml file for each of our applications, the only difference between them being the hibernate.connection.datasource value. Worse, if the configuration file is embedded in a JAR delivered by a developer, then we have to maintain separate JAR files for each environment. This really complicates the process of performing automated builds and code promotions.

Java EE supports the concept of resource-ref entries in an application's web.xml. These allow the application to request a 'generic' name during naming lookup, which gets mapped to a 'real' name within the application container at deploy-time. Thus, the hibernate configuration should be able to just specify 'MyConnection' as the hibernate.connection.datasource value, which the application server would know is mapped to 'jdbc/TestDB' in the test environment, or 'jdbc/StageDB' in the staging environment. This mechnanism works perfectly in our non-Hibernate applications.

Unfortunately this does not seem to be working within our Hibernate applications. If the hibernate.connection.datasource value does not exactly match the JNDI name of a resource on the target server, then a NamingException is thrown.

Is there a different property we need to use in our Hibernate configuration file to specify that lookups should be performed via a resource-ref? Can we substitute a class that Hibernate will use to do naming lookups via resource-refs? If someone could point us to an article or tutorial on the subject, we would certainly appreciate it.

Thanks in advance

- JP

hmmm ... no takers. Any WebSphere users in the house ? :)

Why not use the same JNDI name on all stages?

If that is not an option.. have you tried doing the lookup on the resource-ref yourself. I am not sure, what that would give you in return (a string with the _actual_ JNDI name to use)? What I have been successfully doing is adding properties to the hibernate configuration at runtime, when using a session factory. For your problem, this could look something like this:


Now, if you can lookup the dataSourceName from JNDI or if you can read it from a stage property file, you have almost build what hibernate should do on its own or rather what WebSphere should provide.