Is it possible to alias bean class names in Spring? - spring

Question

I have a string property which looks similar to the following example:
<property name="mappingData">
<list>
<bean class="com.company.product.longNamingStandard.migration.extractor.FieldMapping">
<property name="elementName" value="entitlement.user"/>
<property name="mapping" value="DocUsers"/>
</bean>
<bean class="com.company.product.longNamingStandard.migration.extractor.FieldMapping">
<property name="elementName" value="entitlement.contributor"/>
<property name="mapping" value="DocContributors"/>
</bean>
</list>
</property>
The long class name(s) effect readability & also create a refactoring overhead.
Is it possible to alias the class name and use a short name to declare the beans? Or is there an alternate best practice I'm missing?

Answer 1

Probably a bit late for you, but hopefully useful for others:
You can use parent beans to accomplish this.
First declare a parent bean as a template:
<bean id="FieldMapping" class="com.company.product.longNamingStandard.migration.extractor.FieldMapping"/>
Then use it elsewhere, using the parent attribute.
<property name="mappingData">
<list>
<bean parent="FieldMapping">
<property name="elementName" value="entitlement.user"/>
<property name="mapping" value="DocUsers"/>
</bean>
<bean parent="FieldMapping">
<property name="elementName" value="entitlement.contributor"/>
<property name="mapping" value="DocContributors"/>
</bean>
</list>
</property>
Please note my convention here is to use upper case id's here for the parent template beans.

Answer 2

each <bean/> comes with an attribute of name and id to help you reference those beans later in your configuration.
I would suggest using the id for declaring the bean.
your config could look like:
<bean id="fooBean" class="com.example.foo"/>
<bean id="barBean" class="com.example.bar"/>
<list>
<ref>fooBean</ref>
<ref>barBean</ref>
</list>

Answer 3

You may try to represent your mapping in some short form, and then convert it to the list of FieldMappings. For example, mappings from your snippet may be represented as a map.
As a theoretic exercise in Spring 3 you can do this with Spring Expression Language (if FieldMapping has the apropriate constructor):
<util:map id = "m">
<entry name = "entitlement.user" value = "DocUsers" />
<entry name = "entitlement.contributor" value = "DocContributors" />
</util:map>
...
<property name = "mappingData"
value = "#{m.![new com.company.product.longNamingStandard.migration.extractor.FieldMapping(key, value)]}" />
If this expression is too obscure, you may implement a FactoryBean to take a short form of your mapping data (for example, a map, as in this example) and return a configured list of FieldMappings:
<property name = "mappingData">
<bean class = "FieldMappingListFactoryBean">
<property name = "mappings">
<map>
<entry name = "entitlement.user" value = "DocUsers" />
<entry name = "entitlement.contributor" value = "DocContributors" />
</map>
</property>
</bean>
</property>
However, if your field mappings are some kind of reusable DSL, you may try to think about implementing a namespace extension.

Answer 4

I found a way to simulate an effect similar to a "import com.Foo;" in java code. The best option I could find was to use a PropertyPlaceholderConfigurer with local properties defined. Using your example, here's the configuration that you would put at the top of your spring config file to define a "class_FieldMapping" property:
<bean
class="org.springframework.beans.factory.config.PropertyPlaceholderConfigurer">
<description>Define properties equivalent to "import foo;" in java source</description>
<property name="properties">
<props>
<prop key="class_FieldMapping">com.company.product.longNamingStandard.migration.extractor.FieldMapping</prop>
</props>
</property>
</bean>
Then, you can use that property within your beans:
<property name="mappingData">
<list>
<bean class="${class_FieldMapping}">
...
</bean>
<bean class="${class_FieldMapping}">
...
</bean>
</list>
</property>
This has the benefit that use can also use it for things where you actually need the class name, and can't reference an instance of an object:
<util:constant static-field="${class_FieldMapping}.MYSTATICVAR" />

Answer 5

Why not declare those inner beans as separate top-level beans with their own names, and then reference them in the list ?

Answer 6

If I use PropertyPlaceholderConfigurer it leads to several exceptions in debug log. It works, but it seems it doesn't work on the first try.