Mapping type of characters is wrong in reverse engineering

[deege]

Hi,

I've reverse engineered a database, and then tried to create the basic web app. When I run the app using "mvn tomcat:run", I get an error and the web app is not loaded. The long stack trace ends with

Caused by: org.hibernate.HibernateException: Wrong column type in PDR.ATTR for column attr_abbr. Found: char, expected: varchar2(16)
	at org.hibernate.mapping.Table.validateColumns(Table.java:284)
	at org.hibernate.cfg.Configuration.validateSchema(Configuration.java:1174)
	at org.hibernate.tool.hbm2ddl.SchemaValidator.validate(SchemaValidator.java:139)
	at org.hibernate.impl.SessionFactoryImpl.<init>(SessionFactoryImpl.java:389)
	at org.hibernate.cfg.Configuration.buildSessionFactory(Configuration.java:1385)
	at org.hibernate.cfg.AnnotationConfiguration.buildSessionFactory(AnnotationConfiguration.java:954)
	at org.hibernate.ejb.Ejb3Configuration.buildEntityManagerFactory(Ejb3Configuration.java:891)
	... 55 more

The datatype in the Oracle database is CHAR(16).

CREATE TABLE ATTR (
		ATTR_ID NUMBER NOT NULL,
		ATTR_NAME VARCHAR2(255) NOT NULL,
		ATTR_ABBR CHAR(16),
		ATTR_DESC VARCHAR2(4000),
		STRG_TYPE_ID CHAR(1),
		REQD_CHK CHAR(1),
		LOV_CHK CHAR(1),
		RNGE_CHK CHAR(1),
		RNGE_MIN_N_VAL NUMBER(5 , 2),
		RNGE_MAX_N_VAL NUMBER(5 , 2),
		PREC_N_VAL NUMBER(5 , 2),
		PRNT_TYPE_ID NUMBER,
		INDX_ID NUMBER,
		CNST_ID NUMBER
	)
	PCTFREE 0
	PCTUSED 0
	LOGGING;

The generated code by roo is

@Column(name = "ATTR_ABBR", length = 16)
    private String Attr.attrAbbr;

Below are the roo commands I've run.

project --topLevelPackage org.neoninc.pdr 
persistence setup --provider HIBERNATE --database ORACLE 
database properties set --key database.username --value pdr
database properties set --key database.password --value *******
database properties set --key database.url --value jdbc:oracle:thin:@dpdb003:1521:dev_pdr
database reverse engineer --schema PDR --package org.neoninc.db
controller all --package  ~.web
perform package
perform eclipse

I'm just running the code roo is generating, and I'm not making any other modifications. Do I need to modify the code roo generates to get it to work?

DJ Spiess

[Alan Stewart]

I saw this same issue while working on ROO-1735 for you, but there's nothing I can do here. The column is mapped as a String field which is correct - is that what you expected? The Oracle column is CHAR(16), so it since it is greater than one character, it can't be mapped as a Character or char.

Even without DBRE, and typing the fields in by hand, unless you allow Hibernate to create the tables and columns for you when you first spin up unit tests or a web app, I don't believe you will have any luck with an existing database like this.

If you can push-in the fields and refactor them and their JPA annotations so that it works with your existing table, I may then be able to do something. My suggestion is to use EclipseLink, or change the column type to VARCHAR2(16) if you still want to use Hibernate.
Alan

[deege]

Why would roo generate

@Column(name = "ATTR_ABBR", length = 16)
private String Attr.attrAbbr;

instead of

@Column(name = "ATTR_ABBR", length = 16, columnDefinition = “char”)
private String Attr.attrAbbr;

Is there a reason this isn't valid? I tried changing it manually, but roo keeps regenerating the file.

[Jack Punt]

deege,
if you want to change the annotation, copy the field definition and annotation into your Attr.java file (probably also include @RooJavaBean on the class)

@Column(name = "ATTR_ABBR", length = 16, columnDefinition = “char”)
private String attrAbbr;

roo will 'manage' the Attr_Roo_DbManaged.aj removing the ITD, so whatever you define in the .java will be used.
[That is what Alan means by 'push-in' the field...]

[deege]

Thanks @Jack. I'll go that route if I can't get the DBA to change the datatypes in the database. Luckily it's possible to alter the schema now, but it won't be when the database gets filled.

I'm not sure what people are doing for cases where the database is already in use.

[Alan Stewart]

If the columnDefinition fixes your problem, I can easily add this attribute.

[deege]

Moving the field to the java file and adding the columnDefinition to the attribute "fixed" the exception.

I put it in quotes because the next offending char column now throws the exception. It will take some time to go through all of the classes to verify, but it does look like adding the columnDefinition to the attribute fixes the exception.

I think we're going to go the route of changing the columns to varchar, but you might want to investigate it more since I'm sure it will come up again.

[lmgracia]

I'm using the DBRE support intensively on a project with many tables.
The solution of adding the attribute to the class implies to review all the entities generated.

It would be very useful to include ColumnDefinition in the annotation Column in the next version of the Addon (in fact I was thinking making the change over the last code but it would be a stopgap measure)

[Alan Stewart]

columnDefinition was already added to @Column in ROO-1735 on Dec 7 2010!

[lmgracia]

Hello again,

I found that the problem is that the attributes ColumnDefinition and length of the Annotation @Column are not added on Primary Keys of type CHAR..

If the attribute is of type CHAR but it is not PK then the annotation is well in the aspect Roo_DbManaged. Is in eht Roo_Entity aspect when the problem happens.