JAXB - Can XJC compile appinfo into the class structure?

Question

I have a schema which is read by a few different applications for form generation; one of them uses JAXB/XJC to compile its class structure. The schema contains appinfo information for friendly names of fields, eg:

<xs:element name="HomeAddress" type="xs:string">
  <xs:annotation>
    <xs:appinfo>Home address</xs:appinfo>
  </xs:annotation>
</xs:element>

Is there some way to get XJC to compile this information in?

Answer 1

I am not aware of a way to do this using the XJC tool that comes with the JAXB reference implementation. However, XJC does allow you to create custom plugins that may let you do need to:

• http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E17802_01/webservices/webservices/docs/2.0/jaxb/developPlugins.html

Answer 2

You can use the Annotate plugin to add arbitrary Java annotations into your schema-derived classes. With this plugin you can manage a syntax like:

<xs:element name="HomeAddress" type="xs:string">
  <xs:annotation>
    <xs:appinfo>
      <ann:annotate xmlns:ann="http://annox.dev.java.net/com.acme.foo"&gt;
        <my:Label value="Home address"/>
      </ann:annotate>
    </xs:appinfo>
  </xs:annotation>
</xs:element>

An you'll get something like:

@Label("Home address") // FQCN is com.acme.foo.Label
public String getHomeAddress(...) {}