I'm trying to generate a set of objects inside another object using a one-to-many relationship as follows:

<class name="Message" table="message">
<id name="recordId" column="record_id" type="int"/>
<property name="deviceId" column="device_id" type="string" />
<set name="workers">
<key column="device_id" />
<one-to-many class="Worker" />
</set>
</class>

<class name="Worker" table="worker">
<id name="workerId" column="worker_id" type="string" />
<property name="deviceId" column="device_id" type="string" />
</class>

The problem is whenever I do queries that involve the Message object, instead of referencing the device_id of the Message object, it passes the record_id.

What I really want it to do is this:
Select * From message Left Join worker on message.device_id = worker.device_id

along with my other query.

Is there any way to make this work?

Thanks.

Well, you're getting the identifier, as specified in the mapping file, so it's working as it's supposed to.

Why not just do a criteria query? It would make life so much easier, and it would allow you to work with your objects - you could just call the getRecordId or getMessageId or whatever method/property call that you want on the object returned by the Hibernate Session.

Here's a little tutorial I put together on working with one to may associations with Hibernate:

Mapping One-to-Many Associations with Hibernate3

And here's another little learning guide to quickly get you up to speed on the Hibernate Criteria API:

Examples of the Hibernate3 Criteria API: A Tutorial

Hope this help you out and gives you some ideas!