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How to Serialize classes, then read them with a modified version of that same class in Java

I am developing a Minecraft plugin which uses a class that I made called customPlayer. When I save the plugin data from a running instance, I put all of these objects into a HashMap<String,customPlayer> and save them with ObjectOutputStream. Loading these classes back into the same version of the plugin works great, but my problem arises when I modify the class and try to read the object using that modified class (usually associated with a new version of my plugin).
I thought about it for a bit, and thought I came up with a clever solution. My idea was to just include the old class files as an External Library inside the new version of the plugin, cross my fingers and hope it worked. It didn't.
Is there a better way to do this? I'm new to serialization and this kind of stuff, so any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Below I will include a few Screenshots of the customPlayer class and the crash log of the server. Ideally any solution that is presented should be able to be used easily with future modifications to the class (Updates to the Jar downloaded Via a Github repo).
Instance Variables and Constructor of customPlayer.java

Is there a better way to do this?
There certainly is. Stop using Serialization and ObjectOutputStream. These classes are a disaster (even OpenJDK core team effectively agrees with this assessment). The output they generate is not particularly efficient (it's more bytes than is needed), it is not human readable, nor (easily) read by anything except java code, and it results in such hairy situations as you ran into.
Instead use e.g. Jackson to turn your objects into JSON, or use google's protobuf to turn it into efficient binary blobs.
You can read this JSON or these binary blobs in any language you want and you'll have your pick of the litter as far as libraries go. You will need to write some explicit code to 'save' an object (turn it into JSON / protobuf), and to 'read' one, but now you are free to change your code.
If you insist on continuing with serialization, you need to add a field named serialVersionUID, and set up readObject and writeObject. it's convoluted rocket science that's hard to get right. The details are in the javadoc of java.io.Serializable.
Do yourself a favour though. Don't do it.

Generating Java from WSDL for use on Android with ksoap2-android SOAP client?

I have to access a existing SOAP webservice from an Android application. I have been provided some WSDL files describing the webservice. Reading some other answers here on SO, it seems ksoap2-android is the way to go, with respect to which SOAP client to use.
The next issue is then how to generate the Java classes needed from the WSDL files, and this is where I am coming up short. As far as I can see there are the following options:
AXIS2 code generator
WSDL2ksoap
JAX-WS wsimport tool
I initially tried #1, with the AXIS2 eclipse plugin for wsdl2code generator. The wizard did successfully generate a lot of Java code, however it also changed my android project to some kind of webservice project, and I was never able to get anything that was generated to compile, let alone work with ksoap2-android. Has anybody has success with this?
I am not able to run wsdl2ksoap successfully, as it seems to require a running webservice, and all I have at the current point in time is WSDL files. Likewise from reading the webpage, it seems to be a project in its initial stages, and not really ready for prime time.
JAX-WS wsimport I have not had a chance to try yet. However I am unsure if what it generates will work with ksoap2-android?
Question: How can I generate Java files from WSDL files, for use on Android with ksoap2-android SOAP client library?
Thanks a lot in advance.
(PS: Yes, the choice is SOAP, it is suboptimal for Android use, but I cannot change that.)

I found this tool to auto generate wsdl to android code,
http://www.wsdl2code.com/example.aspx
Here is the code:
public void callWebService() {
SampleService srv1 = new SampleService();
Request req = new Request();
req.companyId = "1";
req.userName = "userName";
req.password = "pas";
Response response = srv1.ServiceSample(req);
}

I had similar situation (I had only wsdl file without working webservice). I've used
http://easywsdl.com/
to generate classes for android without any problem. This tool uses ksoap library. The great thing with this tool is that it supports WCF extensions and types like data contract with IsReference attribute or Guid.

My conclusion after quite a bit of researching is that there is no such (mature) tool available, unfortunately. Neither AXIS2 or JAX-WS will work on Android, and WSDL2ksoap is simply too immature for any real use.
However there is a proprietary tool called wsclient++ that will do the job really well. (Read update below, when put to real use, it does not stand the distance at all.) It does not use the ksoap2-android client library, it has it's own.
The client library is a bit crude as it has a hard dependency on the http transport, making (unit) testing a bit complicated. But it can be modified quite easily to allow DI, as the source is available in the distributed jar file.
The wsdl to java generator however works just perfect, and will save us tons of time.
Update
After working with wsclient++ for a while, it is clear that the generated classes are really crude, and does not handle error cases at all. (Every method declares throws Exception).
We are no longer using wsclient++, and I would not recommend anyone to use it!
We have not really found any working alternative, unfortunately. :/
In the end we converted our WSDL files using AXIS2, and then wrote a bunch of custom script to strip and transform the generated java files to something that will build on android using ksoap2-android library. Very hackish, and needs tons of manual labor to run. Unfortunately. If you find a better way, or one comes up, please provide a new answer.

I use Apache CXF tool just to create dto, and i wrote a class to perform a basic unmarshalling based on name of elements

A bit late on this, but there is a ksoap2 stub generator under development, and I successfully used it to create the stubs.
http://ksoap2-stub-gen.sourceforge.net/
Also someone made it availabe as an online service (i.e. you give your WSDL's URL and the service will return a zip file containing the stubs).
http://www.davidgouveia.net/2011/04/online-stub-generator-for-android-applications-using-ksoap2/

I have used for iPhone too some auto-generated classes I wanted to see here too.
wsdl2code is one of the similar what I have used at iPhone. Give an url with wsdl file you will get some classes to download. For me the hardest part it was to download the required parts. It took more than 2 minutes of searching :) ksoap2-android-assembly-3.0.0-jar-with-dependencies.jar needed to download ad drag-and-drop to ADT ( Eclipse) . It is super easy, especially if you have used the counterpart at iPhone. - a similar tool I have used.
However in my case I am not happy at all with the solution, because I see I am using cannon, a set of cannons to shot a sparrow. In my case it should be used a HTTP Post and not including dependencies from other libraries.
To be honest I don't care to much, because once the server side believe we have unlimited battery power and unlimited data plan, than I close my eyes and I don't care about marshaling-unmarshaling overheads, which use the CPU ( battery ) increase the data transmitted over network.
In worse case it should be a JSON + HTTP POST not SOAP for mobiles...
I would suggest to talk at server side guys and explain for they why it will not good if they do 2 click on wizards and we do other click on forms to get the generated code. At least while the application is not a huge one, even than should be budget to optimise for mobile a few interfaces implementations.

Automatic sitemap generation

We have recently installed a Google Search Appliance in order to power our internal search (via the Java API), and all seems to be well, however I have a question regarding 'automatic' site-map generation that I'm hoping you guys may know the answer to.
We are aware of the GSA's ability to auto-generate site maps for each of its collections, however this process is rather manual, and considering that we have around 10 regional sites that need to be updated as often as possible, its not ideal to have to log into the admin interface on a regular basis in order to export them to the site root where search engines can find them.
Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any API support for this, at least none that I can find, so I was wondering if anyone had any ideas for a solution/workaround or, if all else fails, the best alternative.
At present I'm thinking that if we can get the full index back from the API in the form of a list, then we can write an XML file out using that the old fashioned way using a chronjob or similar, however this seems like a bit of a clumsy solution - any better ideas.

You could try the GSA Admin Toolkit, or simply write some code yourself which just logs in on the administration page and then uses that session to invoke the sitemap export URL (which is basically what the Admin Toolkit does).

Executing Constantly Changing Logic

I writing a dynamic HTML parsers functionality.
I will want to modify existing parsers and also would want to add more parsers (I expect parsers will be modified as sites a remodified and new parsers will be needed for new sites).
I started writing a generic functionality which use a XML with conditions and rules for each site but as this works fine for now, I'm pretty sure it will need constant modifications...
The parsers will parse and write the data to a DB.
My application runs on JBOSS 4.
Any known best practice for that?
Thanks,
Rod
Thanks for your answer. Maybe I was unclear. I realized that imm. from the rate my question got. What I am writing feature that manage parsers execution. Each parser will parse a different text document structure. Documents structure might change from time to time and more new structured document will be added to be parsed. I dont want to recompile build deploy my application for each arser change.
I want to manage the execution of each parser as theymight be executed in parralel or according to execution rules.
Does Using Java ScriptingEngine might be a good option?

There are lots of ways to have some code that can be modified without redeploying. Using groovy scripts to do the parsing is one. Is is a rather simple matter to check to see if the script has been modified and automatically reload it.

The design sounds convoluted to me, but IFF you prove to yourself there's not a much simpler way to accomplish the same task, you may want a rules engine like Drools...

Java SWIFT Library

I'm looking for a Java library for SWIFT messages. I want to
parse SWIFT messages into an object model
validate SWIFT messages (including SWIFT network validation rules)
build / change SWIFT messages by using an object model
Theoretically, I need to support all SWIFT message types. But at the moment I need MT103+, MT199, MT502, MT509, MT515 and MT535.
So far I've looked at two libraries
AnaSys Message Objects (link text)
Datamation SWIFT Message Suite (link text)
Both libraries allow to accomplish the tasks mentioned above but in both cases I'm not really happy.
AnaSys uses a internal XML representation for all SWIFT messages which you need to know in order to access the fields of a message. And you need to operate on the DOM of the XML representation, there is no way to say "get the contents of field '50K' of the SWIFT message".
And the Datamation library seems to have the nicer API but does not find all errors.
So does anyone know other SWIFT libraries to use?

Have you looked at WIFE? We use that in our application which translates SWIFT messages to an internal XML format and back again. We haven't had any problems with it. Also, it's licensed under the LGPL, so you can hack it up if you need to. Check it out.

SWIFT is releasing a "Standards Developer Kit" which includes an "MT/XML Schema Library".
From the doc:
"The MT/XML Schema Library is a complete set of XML schema definitions for MT messages, and software which shows how to convert messages from an MT format to an MT XML representation and back. This approach allows XML integration between applications while the MT (FIN) format will continue to be transported over the SWIFT network."
Java source code will also be made available, again from the doc:
"Working sample Java source code that converts a message in MT format to an XML instance and from an XML instance to a message in MT format."
See: http://www.swift.com/support/drc/develop/standards.page
This can be a great aid in dealing with FIN messages in XML syntax.

You can combine the open source implementation WIFE with the commercial validation component from http://www.prowidesoftware.com. It validates that the messages you create with the model or XML representation are good through SWIFT network validation rules.

There is a product call Volanté that make a great job. Their solution is certified by SWIFT and the integration is easy ( I sound like I'm working for them ... I'm not). I've been using it since a couple of month .
IBM is also offering a solution (cannot remember to name right now) but then you are committed to the big blue.

If your company is not comfortable with the LGPL license, You might want to check Progress Sonic ESB, or ArtixDS (recently acquired), TIBCO ActiveWhatever or Oracle/BEA Aqualogic. Chances are you are already using something from these companies and you can get decent discount.

Along with jodonnell, we also use WIFE. It works very well. I'm not sure if it does the network validation rules (#2 on your list) though.

paymentcomponents (http://www.paymentcomponents.com/) parser was easy to use and found all errors. Their site definitely needs work but if u look there, u'll find what u r looking for

I can not really help you out with a Java implementation. Microsoft of course, have their own Biztalk adapter for ISO15022 and 20022. And they will actually do the validation fairly well. But as you say you are actually looking for a java solution.
You might find, as I did when I researched this 6 years ago, that mapping FIN messages to XML and then to into objects, a standard library will only get you partly to your goal. You will have to integrate this with your backend application and whatever market practices you face in the particular messages you need to support.
I finally ended up writing a generic FIN parser /150022 class library in c++.
Anyway, good luck. An idea is to be more specific in your question. What types of messages do you need to support?

Datamation's libraries have evolved since then. If you need a corresponding solution in 2021, you can check FINaplo by PaymentComponents (formerly called Datamation), a multi-purpose implementation for financial messages.
It provides online validation/parse/translation/envelope services, Java SDKs, as well as REST solutions, all including error specifications. I am actually one of the authors.
A demo for a SWIFT MT Java library can be found in this GitHub link.