Java Reference
In-Depth Information
Another good reason comes from Blueprint. Wiring beans from the same
bundle together needs to be done using bean references instead of services.
Otherwise, a circular dependency is created, where the Blueprint container
for the bundle won't initialize until it's found all the unsatisfied service refer-
ences. Because the unsatisfied service references are supposed to get regis-
tered by the waiting Blueprint container, this doesn't usually end well.
6.3.2
Values
Blueprint allows you to declare a wide variety of Java objects using relatively simple
XML
.
These values can be passed to beans using
<property>
and
<argument>
elements.
SPECIAL TYPES
Lists, sets, arrays, maps, and properties objects can also be specified in
XML
. To define
a map of foods and prices, you could use the following
XML
:
<map>
<entry key="Bananas"
value="1.39" />
<entry key="Chocolate ice cream">3.99</entry>
</map>
The two forms of the
<entry>
element are equivalent. To define the same relationship
as a
Properties
object, the
XML
would be
<props>
<prop key="Bananas"
value="1.39" />
<prop key="Chocolate ice cream">3.99</prop>
</props>
Null can be specified using
<null>
.
TYPE CONVERSION
Beans can be instantiated with simple Java types or references to more complex Blue-
print-managed classes. The container will try to construct an appropriate object to
pass to the class's setter object from the
XML
parameters. It will automatically convert
XML
strings into Java primitives, and it can initialize arbitrary Java classes if they have a
constructor that takes a simple
String
. Most impressively, Blueprint can use generic
type information to perform implicit type conversion for collection types. For exam-
ple, the following snippet calls a
setShopClosedDates(List<Date>
dates)
method
that expects a
List
of
Date
objects:
<property
name="shopClosedDates">
<list>
<value>November 6, 1980</value>
<value>February 14, 1973</value>
</list>
</property>
When implicit conversion isn't good enough (or if you have nongeneric code), you
can explicitly specify types:
