Hello,

I'm having trouble definig a converter for a class with embedded id.

It's simple to return an object and a string of the id for entities with single ids,
but I don't know how to implement a custom converter for a class with composite id and return properly as object and as string.

I've been searching a lot for examples but I couldn't find.

What I want to do is to ser this custom converter for a class with a composite id in order to properly setup a h:selectItem.

I'm using Seam 2.1.2GA with Tomcat 6.0.18 and MySQL 5.x.

Everything is working fine, I'm just stuck at this converter issue.

Anyone has an example or could give me some clue?

Follow some relevant code:

// The Service class which has an @EmbeddedId

@Entity
@Name("service") 
@Table(name="scf_service")
public class Service implements Serializable {

     private static final long serialVersionUID = 6496138369915841462L;

     private ServicePk pk = new ServicePk();

     public Service() {
     }
     
     @EmbeddedId
     public ServicePk getPk() {
          return this.pk;
     }
     
     @Transient
     public Product getProduct() {
          return this.pk.getProduct();
     }     

     @Transient
     public User getUser() {
          return this.pk.getUser();
     }

     public void setPk(ServicePk pk) {
          this.pk = pk;
     }     
     
     @Transient
     public void setProduct(Product product) {
          this.pk.setProduct(product);
     }     
     
     @Transient
     public void setUser(User user) {
          this.pk.setUser(user);
     }     
     ...
}

// The EmbeddedId class

public class ServicePk implements Serializable {

     private static final long serialVersionUID = 7943185356676494310L;

     private Product product;     
     private User user;
     
     public ServicePk() {
     }
     
    @ManyToOne
    @JoinColumn(name="product_id", nullable=false)
     @ForeignKey(name="fk_service_product")
     public Product getProduct() {
          return product;
     }
     
     @ManyToOne
     @JoinColumn(name="user_id", nullable=false)
     @ForeignKey(name="fk_service_user")     
     public User getUser() {
          return user;
     }

     public void setProduct(Product product) {
          this.product = product;
     }
     
     public void setUser(User user) {
          this.user = user;
     }     
     ...
}

// The converter

@Name("serviceConverter")
@org.jboss.seam.annotations.faces.Converter(forClass=Service.class)
@BypassInterceptors
public class ServiceConverter implements Converter, Serializable {

     private static final long serialVersionUID = -1115108812204913185L;
     
     @Logger 
     private Log log;

     public Object getAsObject(FacesContext context, UIComponent component, String value) {
          
          log.debug("converting service as object...");
          
          log.debug("value: " + value);
          
          // I don't know how to properly retrieve the Service since I get a String as a value, and my primary key is a ServicePk (EmbeddedId)
          
          log.debug("result is null");
          
          return null;
     }

     public String getAsString(FacesContext context, UIComponent component, Object value) {
          
          log.debug("converting service as string...");
          
          if (value instanceof Service) {
               
               Service service = (Service) value;
               
               return String.valueOf("i don't know the proper way to return the composite id as string");               
          } 
          
          log.debug("result is null");
               
          return null;
     }
}

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Rodrigo