Re: [Simple-support] Possible enhancements

[Niall G. <gal...@ya...>]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the feedback regarding your mails on the tutorial. With regards to the improvements suggested:

1) Default the element/attribute name to the method or field name

I have already started on this and it should be in the next release.

2) Use the generic parameter type for collections and the component type for arrays

This is something I will investigate further for collections. With regard to arrays this is already done

3) Add in the targets for the annotations

Yes, I initially held off on this as only fields were supported in earlier releases. I think I will also make @Root inherited.

Thanks,
Niall

----- Original Message ----
From: Mike Quilleash  <mik...@su...>
To: sim...@li...
Sent: Tuesday, May 1, 2007 11:26:20 AM
Subject: [Simple-support] Possible enhancements



 

Hi 
all,

 

First off, nice 
project!  I've finally got fed up at navigating around dom4j nodes so was 
looking around for xml binding stuff.  Started looking at JAXB but I'm not 
sure I've ever seen a more complicated way of doing something that should be so 
simple.  My next stop was google search "xml binding simple" which brought 
me here.

 

I really like the 
annotation approach to doing this as it's quick and easy to understand.  
The tutorial was also excellent as I could actually start coding in 
<5 minutes, bit of a novelty after spending an hour poring over JAXB 
APIs.

 

I have some 
suggestions to maybe enhance/simplify some areas regarding the 
annotations.  Please don't take this as any form of criticism, just some 
ideas :)

 

 

1) Default the 
element/attribute name to the field/method it is on (not sure if the annotations 
are supported on methods)

 

e.g.

 

    
@Attribute( name = "path" )
    private String 
path;


The name = "path" 
seems pretty redundant to me in this case.  Could just 
be

 


    
@Attribute
    private String 
path;



 

 

2) Derive types from 
generics/array types where possible.

 

 

    @ElementList( name = "schemas", type 
= Schema.class)
    private List< Schema > 
schemas;


OR

 

    @ElementArray( name = "schemas", 
type = Schema.class)
    private Schema[] 
schemas;


I believe the type/class can be derived from the 
generic type of the array type.

 

field.getType().getComponentType().

 

Generics you can use

 

((ParameterizedType)field.getGenericType()).getActualTypeArguments()[ 
0 ].

 

 

Combined with 1) above makes the above 
examples

 



 

    @ElementList
    
private List< Schema > schemas;


OR

 

    @ElementArray
    
private Schema[] 
schemas;




 

 

3) Make the annotations limited 
on what they can be applied to.  Minor point, but at the moment I can 
use @Attribute on a class if I really want to.  I imagine nothing would go 
wrong, it would just be ignored, but it adds another piece of implicit 
documentation.

 

@Target( FIELD, METHOD 
)

@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
public @interface Attribute 
{


 

 

 

Cheers.

 

Mike.
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