And sorry, I forgot: I'm using Seam 2.2.0.GA, deploying as an EAR onto JBoss 5.1.0.GA.

During my days(!) of searching for a solution, I've come across several other incidents of this same error. Unfortunately, either no one ever posted a solution or pointers, or the solution and pointers turned out to be either irrelevant or simply didn't work.

Here is a case of my exact problem, down to the code and the issue he is having:
http://community.jboss.org/message/480784

Unfortunately he never received any helpful responses, and he never posted his solution (if he found one).

I'd absolutely appreciate any suggestions, tips, pointers, references, etc. that would help me out here. I'm at a deadend.

Hi omid, thanks for replying.

Unfortunately, I can't use EntityHome because we cannot use Hibernate or even JPA on this project. We're stuck using JDBC. If it was up to me, we'd be using Hibernate and I wouldn't have had to create a JSF converter because I could've used the <s:convertEntity/> tag instead.

But I digress...

The create() method is the method that is invoked when a user clicks Create New Client. But since I originally posted this I've made quite a few changes to the class, and I got it working. But as you can see from the code below I have, among other things, changed the class's scope to SESSION. I would however like to avoid this and use CONVERSATION if possible. Any ideas?

@Name("manageClient")
@Scope(ScopeType.SESSION)
public class ManageClientAction implements Serializable
{
     private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;

     @Logger
     Log log;

     @Out
     private boolean editing;

     @In(create=true)
     @Out(required=false)
     private ClientFilter clientFilter;

     @DataModel(scope=ScopeType.PAGE)
     private List<Client> clients;

     @DataModelSelection("clients")
     @In(required=false)
     @Out(required=false)
     private Client client;

     @DataModel
     List<SubClient> subClients;

     @DataModel
     List<User> users;


     @Factory("clients")
     public void findClients()
     {
          log.debug("findClients() invoked!");

          log.debug("clientFilter.clientId = " + clientFilter.getClientId());
          log.debug("clientFilter.name = " + clientFilter.getName());
          log.debug("clientFilter.status = " + clientFilter.getStatus());
          log.debug("clientFilter.readOnly = " + clientFilter.getReadOnly());

          if(clientFilter == null)
          {
               clients = ClientDB.findAll();
          }
          else
          {
               clients = ClientDB.findByFilter(clientFilter);
          }
     }

     @Begin
     public String create()
     {
          log.debug("create()");

          client = new Client();
          client.setStatus(getDefaultStatus());

          return "/admin/clients/edit.xhtml";
     }

     @Begin
     public String edit()
     {
          log.debug("edit()");

          log.debug("Client GUID = " + client.getGuid());
          log.debug("Client ID = " + client.getClientId());
          log.debug("Client name = " + client.getName());
          log.debug("Client status = " + client.getStatus().getStatus());
          log.debug("Client readonly = " + client.isReadOnly());

          client = ClientDB.findByGuid(client.getGuid());
          editing = true;

          return "/admin/clients/edit.xhtml";
     }

     @Begin
     public String view()
     {
          log.debug("view()");

          client = ClientDB.findByGuid(client.getGuid());

          subClients = SubClientDB.findByClientGuid(client.getGuid());
          users = UserDB.findByClientGuid(client);

          log.debug("Client GUID = " + client.getGuid());
          log.debug("Client ID = " + client.getClientId());
          log.debug("Client name = " + client.getName());
          log.debug("Client status = " + client.getStatus().getStatus());
          log.debug("Client readonly = " + client.isReadOnly());

          return "/admin/clients/view.xhtml";
     }

     @End
     public String save()
     {
          log.debug("save() invoked!");

          if((client.getGuid() != null) && (client.getGuid().length() > 0))
          {
               ClientDB.save(client);
          }
          else
          {
               ClientDB.add(client);
          }

          return "/admin/clients/view.xhtml";
     }

     @End
     public String delete()
     {
          log.debug("delete()");

          ClientDB.delete(client);

          return close();
     }

     @End
     public String toggleActivation()
     {
          client = ClientDB.findByGuid(client.getGuid());

          client.setStatus(getOppositeStatus(client.getStatus()));
          ClientDB.save(client);

          return close();
     }

     @End
     public String cancel()
     {
          log.debug("cancel()");

          editing = false;

          return ((client != null) && (client.getGuid() != null)) ? "/admin/clients/view.xhtml" : close();
     }

     @End
     public String close()
     {
          log.debug("close()");

          return "/admin/clients/index.xhtml";
     }

     /**
      * Factory method that finds and returns a {@link List} of possible {@link Status}ess to populate the "Status" select box.
      */
     @Factory("clientStatuses")
     public List<Status> getStatuses()
     {
          ...
     }

     /**
      * Factory method that finds and returns a {@link List} of possible {@link Status}es to populate the "Status" select box.
      */
     @Factory("validClientStatuses")
     public List<Status> getValidStatuses()
     {
          ...
     }

     /**
      * Utility method that figures and returns the opposite {@link Status} of a given status.
      * @param status The {@link Status} whose opposite to find and return
      * @return The opposite status of the one specified
      */
     private Status getOppositeStatus(Status status)
     {
          ...
     }

     /**
      * Helper method used to get a default {@link Status} object for the add client screen.
      * @return A {@link Status} appropriate for being the default
      */
     private Status getDefaultStatus()
     {
          ...
     }
}