Bind an object to a choice box

Question

Is there a way to bind a list of objects to a choice box or at least a name value pair?
For instance, I have a drop down that lists the user roles. Each role has a specific id.
Now in my FXML I would like to display the role on the screen, but however when user selects a role, I would like to see the role id in my action method.
This is how my FXML looks:
<VBox fx:id="vboxInner" spacing="30">
    <children>
     <HBox spacing="30">
         <children>
          <Label text="*Password:" prefWidth="115.0"/>
          <PasswordField promptText="Password" prefHeight="30.0" prefWidth="200.0" fx:id="password" />
         </children>
     </HBox>
     <HBox spacing="30">
         <children>
          <Label text="*Repeat Password:" prefWidth="115.0"/>
          <PasswordField promptText="Repeat Password" prefHeight="30.0" prefWidth="200.0" fx:id="repeatPassword" />
         </children>
     </HBox>
     <HBox spacing="30">
         <children>
          <Label text="*User Role:" prefWidth="115.0"/>
          <ChoiceBox fx:id="userRoles"></ChoiceBox>
         </children>
     </HBox>
     <Label text="* indicates mandatory" textFill="red"/>
    </children>
</VBox>And my controller:
@FXML
private ChoiceBox userRoles;
@Override
public void initialize(URL location, ResourceBundle resources) {
         userRoles.setItems(retrieveUserRoles());
private ObservableList<String> retrieveUserRoles() {
     ObservableList<String> userRolesList = null;
     try {
         ServiceLocator serviceLocator = ServiceLocator.getInstance();
         LoginAuthenticateSLBeanRemote loginRemoteBean = serviceLocator.retrieveLoginAuthenticateEJB();
         ArrayList<UserRole> roles = loginRemoteBean.retrieveUserRoles();
         ArrayList<String> strRoles = new ArrayList<String>();
         for(UserRole role : roles){
          strRoles.add(role.getUserRole());
         userRolesList = FXCollections.observableArrayList(strRoles);
         Logger.getLogger(LoginController.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, "Roles Size::{0}", roles.size());
     } catch (Exception ex) {
         Logger.getLogger(LoginController.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, ex.getMessage(), ex);
     return userRolesList;
}UserRole object contains both role and roleId.
Any hints on implementing this would be highly appreciated.
Thanks.

Answer 1

Thanks jsmith.
overriding the toString method took care of my problem and I can now bind my entire object to the dropdown item.
Thanks.
jsmith wrote:
You can see an examples of doing something similar to this (without fxml) here:
https://gist.github.com/1422104 "JavaFX ChoiceBox control backed by Database IDs"
A previous thread discussing this is:
ChoiceBox  containing 2 values
On the thread Richard also suggests "What about using a custom selection model that has methods on it to select an item by id or by name?" which is a route I haven't explored.
For JavaFX 2.1 there are some new implementations which may assist this task (both of which I haven't really used, so I can't really advise on them):
1. StringConvertors which can be applied to ChoiceBox items
2. More functional ComboBox control.