Need help with Hibernate? Read this first:
http://www.hibernate.org/ForumMailingli ... AskForHelp

Hibernate version: 3.0

Mapping documents:
<class name="Incident" table="OPR_INCIDENTS">
<meta attribute="extends" inherit="false">BaseBusinessObject</meta>
<id name="id" type="java.lang.Long">
<column name="SEQUENCE_ID" length="18" not-null="true" unique="true" sql-type="NUMBER" />
<generator class="hibernate.OpRiskKeyGenerator">
<param name="sequence">OPR_PRIMARYKEYGEN</param>
<param name="max_lo">100</param>
</generator>
</id>

<timestamp column="MODIFIED_TMSP" name="modifiedTmsp" />

<property name="incidentId" type="java.lang.String">
<column name="INCIDENT_ID" length="30" not-null="true" unique="true" sql-type="VARCHAR2" />
</property>
<property name="name" type="java.lang.String">
<column name="NAME" length="40" not-null="true" sql-type="VARCHAR2" />
</property>
<property name="descr" type="java.lang.String">
<column name="DESCR" length="3000" not-null="true" sql-type="VARCHAR2" />
</property>
<component name="costPayingOu" class="model.type.Ou" >
<property name="department" type="java.lang.String">
<column name="COST_PAYING_OU_DEPARTMENT" length="20" not-null="false" sql-type="VARCHAR2" />
</property>
<property name="uwi" type="java.lang.String">
<column name="COST_PAYING_OU_UWI" length="40" not-null="false" sql-type="VARCHAR2" />
</property>
</component>
</class>

Full stack trace of any exception that occurs:
org.hibernate.hql.ast.QuerySyntaxError: expecting EQ, found '.' near line 1, column 33 [update Incident set costPayingOu.department=:newValue where costPayingOu.uwi=:uwiName]
at org.hibernate.hql.ast.ErrorCounter.throwQueryException(ErrorCounter.java:63)
at org.hibernate.hql.ast.QueryTranslatorImpl.parse(QueryTranslatorImpl.java:215)
at org.hibernate.hql.ast.QueryTranslatorImpl.doCompile(QueryTranslatorImpl.java:127)
at org.hibernate.hql.ast.QueryTranslatorImpl.compile(QueryTranslatorImpl.java:83)
at org.hibernate.impl.SessionFactoryImpl.getQuery(SessionFactoryImpl.java:427)
at org.hibernate.impl.SessionImpl.getQueries(SessionImpl.java:884)
at org.hibernate.impl.SessionImpl.executeUpdate(SessionImpl.java:865)
at org.hibernate.impl.QueryImpl.executeUpdate(QueryImpl.java:89)
at batch.OEStructureImport.searchOpRiskUpdateOE(OEStructureImport.java:213)
at batch.OEStructureImport.execute(OEStructureImport.java:159)
at batch.OpriskBatchBase.run(OpriskBatchBase.java:47)
at batch.OEStructureImport.main(OEStructureImport.java:111)
Caused by: line 1:33: expecting EQ, found '.'
at antlr.Parser.match(Parser.java:211)
at org.hibernate.hql.antlr.HqlBaseParser.assignment(HqlBaseParser.java:400)
at org.hibernate.hql.antlr.HqlBaseParser.setClause(HqlBaseParser.java:338)
at org.hibernate.hql.antlr.HqlBaseParser.updateStatement(HqlBaseParser.java:183)
at org.hibernate.hql.antlr.HqlBaseParser.statement(HqlBaseParser.java:133)
at org.hibernate.hql.ast.QueryTranslatorImpl.parse(QueryTranslatorImpl.java:209)
... 10 more

The generated SQL (show_sql=true):
2005-09-06 08:41:20,655 INFO NOPID update Incident set costPayingOu.department=:newValue where costPayingOu.uwi=:uwiName ; OEStructureImport
08:41:20,935 ERROR PARSER - *** ERROR: line 1:33: expecting EQ, found '.'

Explanation:
I'm trying to perform a bulk update but am always receiving a parser exception. It is no DB exception, it doesn't even get that far. Is it not possible to update attributes within a composite?

Post the HQL behind this SQL.

Sorry, here's the HQL code:

String update = "update Incident set costPayingOu.department=:newValue where costPayingOu.uwi=:uwiName";
Query q = HibernateSessionManager.findHibernateSession().createQuery(update);
q.setString("newValue", "abc");
q.setString("uwiName", uwi);

int count = q.executeUpdate();

What does this do?

String update = "update Incident costPayingOu set costPayingOu.department=:newValue where costPayingOu.uwi=:uwiName";

That's the problem, it doesn't do anything. If you see the stacktrace there is a problem with the HQL statement.
What I want to do is update all Incidents. Set the department attribute to a new value where the uwi is equals "abc".
The standard sql would be:

update OPR_INCIDENTS set COST_PAYING_OU_DEPARTMENT="abc" where COST_PAYING_OU_UWI=?

There seems to be a problem referencing the composite property costPayingOu.department

The Error is (provided in the Stacktrace): expecting EQ, found '.' near line 1, column 33. That is exactly the position where I reference the department property of the component costPayingOu.

Any ideas?

Just a quick check, you did notice the slight change to your code, right?

Well, if all else fails, pass that SQL to Session.createSQLQuery()

Yeah, I'm aware of the change, thankx.

Sorry, can't use SQL, only selects are supported, that's why I have to use HQL.

Any ideas why the statement fails?

No ideas, but thanks for the heads up on SELECTs only.

Try two things:

(1) use an alias in the query
(2) use Hibernate 3.1 beta 2

Thankx for the reply.

Unfortunetly option 1 doesn't work and I'm not able to use 3.1, standards!
I'm ging to have to iterate over all objects one by one.