Hi all,
I just added Java 5.0 annotation support to ObjectDB, following the work that
was contributed by Andy (http://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/JDO-403).
Andy did a great job, but still there might be a little room for improvements.
Following are suggestions that might be considered.
1. Using simple annotations instead of complex attributes
For instance:
@PrimaryKey
instead of:
@Field(primaryKey=true)
(or simply @Id as in JPA).
And another example:
@Embedded / @Embedded(false)
Instead of:
@Field(embedded="true") / @Field(embedded="false")
which also solves the need to use boolean as string in order to get a third
state, which doesn't look good.
This could be done at least for the more common attributes.
Also, maybe @Index should be defined without unique option, by:
public @interface Indexed { boolean value() default true; }
or maybe even by:
public @interface Unique {}
and simply used with:
@Indexed
Do we really need so many different methods to define a unique index?
2. Discarding @Array, @Collection and @Map
It seems logical to move the attributes of @Array, @Collection and @Map to
@Element, @Key and @Value. The separation (whose origin is in the XML) is
unclear to me.
3. Merging all annotations to one package
Good separation seems to be very difficult. For instance - @Index, which is
currently in orm has both columns and fields as attributes. Fields are not
related to orm - just columns. If the separation remains, at least moving
@Index, @Indices, @Unique, @Uniques, @Element, @Key and @Value that contain
also non orm information should be pulled out to the main package.
4. Type attributes should be Class rather than String
For instance, in Field:
Class fieldType();
instead of:
String fieldType() default "";
5. RecursionDepth
Should be added somehow to the fields in @FetchGroup (and removed from @Field
if unused).
Regards,
Ilan Kirsh
ObjectDB Software
http://www.objectdb.com
