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#XMLRootElement element or array name

I am currently trying to unmarshall a xml get response into one intricate java object. That java object has other classes as fields, so it goes very deep. Now, I am using the JaxbMarshaller2 for this job. So far everything has been going well, but now I am have a question:
Basically one of the tags in the XML stream is called "images" and contains an array of individual image items, each enclosed in the "item" tag.
<images>
<item>
<name></name>
</item>
<item>
<name></name>
</item>
</images>
Now, in my root java class, I have a property called images, which is a list of these image items (I made a custom class for these items.)
#XmlElement(name = "images")
private List<ProductImage> images;
Ok, now inside the ProductImage class, would the XML root element above the class name be #XmlRootElement(name="images") or #XmlRootElement(name="item")?
Thanks for your responses.

The #XmlRootElement annotation is only necessary for the root element of your xml file. Each parent always defines the names of the tags of its children. But since the root element has no parent, there is an additional annotation necessary to define its name (i.e. #XmlRootElement).
Option1:
Assuming that the <images> node is your root node of your xml file.
Create a class ProductImageCollection which has the #XmlRootElement(name="images") annotation.
Inside this class there should be a List<ProductImage> which has an annotation #XmlElement(name="image")
Option2:
Assuming that your <images> node is part of a bigger xml structure, which already has correct annotations.
Then you don't need any additional #XmlRootElement annotations. You can directly annotate your list with #XmlElementWrapper(name="images").

Jaxb: attribute fixed value in annotated class

I generate XML schema (XSD) from Java classes with JAXB. I wonder how to specify the value of a static attribute by using annotations.
For example I define an attribute like this
#XmlAttribute(name="tooltip")
private static final String TOOLTIP = "A string";
And I want to get in my XSD
<attribute name="tooltip" type="string" fixed="A string">
So, how can I force the generation of static attributes in XSD with JAXB?
Thanks !

As of JAXB 2.2, there isn't standard JAXB (JSR-222) metadata that can add to your model to cause the fixed attribute to appear in the generated XML Schema. The schema generation errs on the side of being too permissive rather than too restrictive. This means you can't do the following:
Mark a fixed value for an attribute
Mark a maxOccurs other than 1 or unbounded
etc.

What data type should be used to reference serialized objects by ID?

I have a bunch of classes that will be instantiated and passed between my JS front-end and Spring MVC.
I'm using Simple to serialize my object as XML for persistent storage and Jackson to pass it to my UI as JSON. Consequently I need to have an ID attribute that is used to reference an object, and this needs to be consistent in both the JSON, POJO and XML.
This means I need an ID attribute in my Java class. What type should I declare it as? I've seen int being used in the Simple library tutorial and I've also seen UUID being used here.
The Simple library creates id and ref attributes (or any other that you provide) to maintain references:
<parent name="john" id="1">
<children>
<child id="2" name="tom">
<parent ref="1"/>
</child>
</children>
</parent>
The accompanying Java to read it back in:
Strategy strategy = new CycleStrategy("id", "ref");
Serializer serializer = new Persister(strategy);
File source = new File("example.xml");
Parent parent = serializer.read(Parent.class, source);
The id isn't in the original Java object however, so it won't be passed with the JSON to the UI. Should I define a private UUID uid; and pass that, while also letting Simple generate the auxiliary id and ref attributes it uses, or is there a way to use a single Java attribue to do both?
EDIT: Hibernate has an #Id annotation, but I can't find something similar for Simple. Will this do?
#Attribute
private int id;
The problem is that I'll need to instantiate and pass it as JSON, but it needs to be unique as well (meaning it'd be easier to use UID). Also, will Simple use this id for its ref?
EDIT 2:
Using id as an attribute and then using the CycleStrategy causes it to use the value you define from the class and not the internal ones it uses in the XML which the ref point to... I'm using two attributes for now - a uuid I generate together with the id Simple uses internally.

JAXB: unmarshalling xml with multiple names for the same element

I figure this will be easy for someone who really understands JAXB binding files...
Basic Question
How do you configure JAXB to unmarshal multiple elements into the same class?
Note: I want to avoid adding another dependency to my project (like MOXy). Ideally, this can be accomplished with annotations or a custom bindings file.
Background
I have an XML document that contains lots of variations of the same element--each with the exact same properties. Using my example below, all I care about is "Employees" but the XML specifies "directors, managers and staff." For our purposes, these are all subclasses of the same parent and we only need to work with the parent type (Employee) and our object model doesn't have or need instances of the subclasses.
I want JAXB to bind any instance of director, manager, or staff elements into an Employee object.
Example
input:
<organization>
<director>
<fname>Dan</fname>
<lname>Schman</lname>
</director>
<manager>
<fname>Joe</fname>
<lname>Schmo</lname>
</manager>
<staff>
<fname>Ron</fname>
<lname>Schwan</lname>
</staff>
<staff>
<fname>Jim</fname>
<lname>Schwim</lname>
</staff>
<staff>
<fname>Jon</fname>
<lname>Schwon</lname>
</staff>
</organization>
output:
After unmarshalling this example, I would end up with an Organization object with one property: List<Employees> employees where each employee only has a firstName and lastName.
(Note: each employee would be of type Employee NOT Director/Manager/Staff. Subclass information would be lost when unmarshalling. We also don't care about marshaling back out--we only need to create objects from XML)
Can this be done without extensions like MOXy? Can a custom bindings.xjb file save the day?

This corresponds to a choice structure. You could use an #XmlElements annotation for this use case:
#XmlElements({
#XmlElement(name="director", type=Employee.class),
#XmlElement(name="manager", type=Employee.class)
})
List<Employee> getEmployees() {
return employees;
}
If you are starting from an XML schema the following will help:
http://blog.bdoughan.com/2011/04/xml-schema-to-java-xsd-choice.html

Mule ESB Create map payload

I need to transform inbound payload into map (java.util.Map). There are any way to create map in mule xml configs?
Regards
EDIT:
Payload type is com.novell.LDAPAttributeSet which is set of LDAPAttribute objects. LDAPAttribute object contains name and value fields. I need to extract name and value fields and convert them to map. Extracting fields will done with jxpath expressions. But I don't know how to create map from these fields.

I suggest you use a Groovy transformer:
<script:transformer>
<script:script engine="groovy">
[key1: payload.attr1,
key2: payload.attr2]
</script:script>
</script:transformer>
Where key1,key2 are your choice of keys to use in the map and attr1,attr2 are attributes of the LDAPAttributeSet (or any other valid expression that allows you to get the desired values out of this object).
PS. In case you wonder, the script namespace is declared that way:
xmlns:script="http://www.mulesoft.org/schema/mule/scripting"
xsi:schemaLocation="
http://www.mulesoft.org/schema/mule/scripting
http://www.mulesoft.org/schema/mule/scripting/3.1/mule-scripting.xsd"