Critique my JAXB object wrapper.

Question

Hello Ladies and Gents,
I have a question on wrapping a jaxb created class and would really like to hear your inputs.
My xsd looks a bit like:
<ComplexService>
<ComplexObject1>
<Element1></Element1>
<Parameter></Parameter>
</ComplexObject1>
<ComplexObject2>
<Element2> </Element2>
<Parameter> </Parameter>
</ComplexObject2>
<ComplexObject10>
<Element10> </Element10>
<Parameter> </Parameter>
</ComplexObjec10>The class created after running the above xsd through xjc looks a bit like :
public class ComplexService{
ComplexObject1 object1;
ComplexObject2 object2;
ComplexObject10 object10;
public static class ComplexObject1{
//Accessors and mutators on ComplexObject1
public static class ComplexObject2{
//Accessors and mutators on ComplexObject2
public static class ComplexObject10{
//Accessors and mutators on ComplexObject10
}Now I want to create a wrapper around these CompleObjects as well the ComplexService class.
public class WrappedComplexObject1{
private final ComplexObject1;
public WrappedComplexObject1(){
complexObject1 = new ComplexObject1();
//Delegate calls to the underlying ComplexObject1
public String getServiceName(){
return complexObject1.getServiceName();
}My questions are these:
1. Would the above way be the preferred way to wrap the class? My objectives are to not mess with the underlying classes created by xjc; to provide a better named api (Class as well as method names).
2. I also want to validate the data in these objects. Therefore I am thinking of using the decorator pattern to further wrap WrappedComplexObject1. Would this be a recommended approach?
3. Lastly, the xsd contains the element "Parameter" which is structurally the same (just contains one value field). However, when xjc created the ComplexService class, for every ComplexObject a new Parameter class was created.
Should I worry about just having one wrapper class for "Parameter" or should I simply create one Parameter wrapper classes per ComplexObject?
Any suggestions, ideas, code samples would be most helpful.
Thanks
Edited by: CaptainHastings on Oct 22, 2009 9:44 AM

Answer 1

CaptainHastings wrote:
Hello Ladies and Gents,
I have a question on wrapping a jaxb created class and would really like to hear your inputs.
My xsd looks a bit like:
<ComplexService>
<ComplexObject1>
<Element1></Element1>
<Parameter></Parameter>
</ComplexObject1>
<ComplexObject2>
<Element2> </Element2>
<Parameter> </Parameter>
</ComplexObject2>
<ComplexObject10>
<Element10> </Element10>
<Parameter> </Parameter>
</ComplexObjec10>
that doesn't look at all like xsd. is that your xml, perhaps?
My questions are these:
1. Would the above way be the preferred way to wrap the class? My objectives are to not mess with the underlying classes created by xjc; to provide a better named api (Class as well as method names).why not use xsd annotations to influence the generated classes?
2. I also want to validate the data in these objects. Therefore I am thinking of using the decorator pattern to further wrap WrappedComplexObject1. Would this be a recommended approach?are you talking validation above and beyond schema validation (because jaxb can do the schema validation for you)?
3. Lastly, the xsd contains the element "Parameter" which is structurally the same (just contains one value field). However, when xjc created the ComplexService class, for every ComplexObject a new Parameter class was created.did you define Parameter as a separate complextype which the other types utilize, or did you redefine it in every one?