Need to know when get and set methods are being called :

I have a simple scenario :

I have a date field in database dateModified mapped to a field in my POJO

I have the following two methods :

private Date dateModified;

public void setDateModified(Date test)
{
this.dateModified = test;
}

public String getDateModified()
{
Format format = new SimpleDateFormat("MMMM, yyyy");
String cycleDate = format.format(dateModified);
return cycleDate;
}

I am getting error in the setter method when I try to pick data from the database. As I see it , select statement would only be on set method and get method does not have to do anything with the select statement. Correct me if I am wrong.

Thanks in advance.

Don't try to map the string property, nor to retrieve it via SQL.
Remember that Hibernate basically transforms your HQL, Criteria or load() into an SQL statement. No way the SimpleDateFormat part can be transformed into SQL.

But once you have the bean validly loaded, you can call the string getter on it.