Is it possible to implement a custom IdentifierGenerator for a table that uses an identify column for pk and have that generator work with a custom UserType?

Here's my current setup for a table:

<id name="id" column="message_log_id" type="edu.ucsd.som.hibernate.NumericString">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>

NumericString type is designed to simply convert a number into a string (e.g. 123456 becomes "123456")


Currently, if using "native" generator, I get "net.sf.hibernate.id.IdentifierGenerationException: this id generator generates long, integer, short." So, it looks like I need to write a custom generator. Any pointers on how to do it? I've read the docs and saw the example at http://hibernate.bluemars.net/50.html, but I'm still lost.


Thanks
Dmitry

I wonder why your primary key needs to be anything more than a primative. If you really can't use a primative or simple type could you just add a get/set method that takes whatever your database returns and use that to construct a edu.ucsd.som.hibernate.NumericString?

i have tables with two kinds of pk: auto_increment and string. I wanted to streamline the persistent object interface by abstracting the PK's type. Implementing this abstraction at Hibernate's layer seemed like a logical thing to do. I didn't think it would be so difficult (impossible?).

Have a look at Hibernate srcs net/sf/hibernate/id
Those implementations are quite simple.

I've already looked at the sources also. No help there. I tried returning, just like the IdentityGenerator, a null (earlier versions) or an empty string (later versions). Neither worked for me.

It is not possibly to use identity columns with a custom identifier type.

thanks, gavin. i wish i could find this out earlier (http://forum.hibernate.org/viewtopic.php?t=350) :D

This is not strictly true. I submitted a patch (HB-92) in may last year that supports using a custom identifier type with native generated identifiers but it has not yet been accepted/integrated.

Chris