String to class object

Question

Hello,
For example, if I have a public class named MY_info which has name and address fields, I want to store MY_info[] array into a string and then retrieve from the string. Is this possible. Otherwise is it possible to store MY_info[] in a cookie and retrieve the values back. Is it possible to use reflection on an array of objects.
My aim is to store MY_info[] array objects so as to retrieve in a different http req, response object rather than the one that populated the My_info[] object.
Thanks in advance for your help.

Answer 1

what you are searching for is the Interface Serializable
[Java Doc|http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/api/java/io/Serializable.html]
so your Class implements Serializable
public MY_info implements Serializable {
}then you can use the following functions to store and retrieve a serialized object:
public static void writeObject(String fileName, Object o) {
          // Serialize to a file
          ObjectOutput out;
          try {
               out = new ObjectOutputStream(new FileOutputStream(fileName));
               out.writeObject(o);
               out.close();
          } catch (Exception e) {
               System.err.print("FileUtil.writeObject() ");
               e.printStackTrace(System.err);
     public static Object readObject(String fileName) {
          try {
               // Deserialize from a file
               File file = new File(fileName);
               ObjectInputStream in = new ObjectInputStream(new FileInputStream(
                         file));
               // Deserialize the object
               Object imported = (Object) in.readObject();
               in.close();
               return imported;
          } catch (Exception e) {
               System.err.print("FileUtil.readObject() ");
               e.printStackTrace(System.err);
          return null;
     public static Object readObject(byte[] bytes) {
          try {
               // Deserialize from a byte array
               ObjectInputStream in = new ObjectInputStream(
                         new ByteArrayInputStream(bytes));
               Object o = (Object) in.readObject();
               in.close();
               return o;
          } catch (Exception e) {
               System.err.print("FileUtil.readObject() ");
               e.printStackTrace(System.err);
          return null;
     }