Can't get entityName to work using annotations

rained · **Joined:** Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:29 am **Posts:** 2

My problem is that now I am using annotations, I can't get the entityName to work as it did when I used Hibernate XML mapping files. I expected that by defining @Entity(name="MyEntityName") in my class I would be able to refer to the entity by the name "MyEntityName" rather than by the class name. Debugging various bits of hibernate code show me that the entity name for the class is my.package.MyClassName.

Hibernate 3.2.2 GA, Hibernate Annotations 3.3.0 GA

Using annotations

My annotated class...

Code:

package my.package;

import java.util.List;

import javax.persistence.CascadeType;
import javax.persistence.Column;
import javax.persistence.Entity;
import javax.persistence.JoinColumn;
import javax.persistence.JoinTable;
import javax.persistence.ManyToMany;
import javax.persistence.Table;

@Entity(name = "AccountManager")
@Table(name = "ACCOUNT_MANAGER")
public class AccountManager extends User {

methods and stuff...

}

Code between sessionFactory.openSession() and session.close():

Code:

getCurrentSession().get("AccountManager", -1);

Full stack trace of any exception that occurs:

Name and version of the database you are using:

Oracle 9

The generated SQL (show_sql=true):

N/A

The "Java Persistence with Hibernate" book says, on page 174, that...

"With annotations, you can give an entity an explicit name, if the short name would result in a collision in the JPA QL or HQL namespace:

@Entity (name="AuctionItem")
public class Item {....}"

I have debugged the code a bit and hunted around and found the following in the org.hibernate.cfg.annotations.EntityBinder class in the annotations jar

Code:

   public void bindEntity() {
      persistentClass.setAbstract( annotatedClass.isAbstract() );
      persistentClass.setClassName( annotatedClass.getName() );
      persistentClass.setNodeName( name );
      //persistentClass.setDynamic(false); //no longer needed with the Entity name refactoring?
      persistentClass.setEntityName( annotatedClass.getName() );

It looks like the entity name is being set to the class name by default, which isn't what the book suggests, nor what used to happen when using hbm.xml files.

I am using the correct Entity class (i.e. the javax.persistence.Entity class).
Can anyone tell me what I need to do to use entity names with annotations?

emmanuel · **Posted:** Wed Mar 28, 2007 11:44 pm

That would go against the spec

But I don't see the point of an entity name for an annotated class, you can't map the class twice through annotations

rained · **Joined:** Wed Dec 01, 2004 9:29 am **Posts:** 2

I suppose my problem is that it breaks my legacy code which had my DAOs using entity names.

It's not a big deal, it's just that the @Entity(name="MyEntity") format looks like it is defining an entity name, the book suggests that it is supported and the org.hibernate.cfg.annotations.EntityBinder class sets an entityName variable on the persistentClass instance to the class name rather than to the user defined entity name, which is available from the annotatedClass instance.

I take your point about it not being strictly necessary because you can't map the class twice with annotations, although I now have inconsistencies in my code where sometimes I can use "MyEntityName" and other times I have to use MyEntityClassName.class.

Thanks for your response, though. I'll stop using entity names from now on.