Hi,
If I am using the same String in a few annotations, are my better off defining that String as a static constant.
For example, suppose I use:

@OrderBy("primaryKey ASC")

in several places, should I do:

final static String PRIMARY_KEY_ASC = "primaryKey ASC".

and then

@OrderBy(PRIMARY_KEY_ASC)

My guess is that there is no memory saving here as in the former approach hibernate will treat the String as a literal. However, I may prevent some silly start up errors.

The examples use the former approach, so I fear I may be being pedantic here.

Any thoughs?

The latter approach is generally preferred as a programming practice overall.
It's easier to fix bugs that way as well (if you'd made a typo in the string one annotation and copied that a hundred times for example...).

It won't matter at runtime, as the compiler (if you declare the String as static final at least) will evaluate the expression and pull in the String literal for each place it is used.