IBM BPM, V8.0.1, All platforms > Programming IBM BPM > Business objects programming > Programming techniques > Use Any data types

Use AnySimpleType for simple types

AnySimpleType is handled by the business object API in a manner that is similar to other simple types (such as string, int, boolean, and so on).

The only differences between anySimpleType and the other simple types are in which instance data can be mapped to or from the field and how this instance data is serialized.

If a string type were to have a set(...) method called on it, the data would first be converted to a string, and the original data type would be lost: 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsd:schema xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" 
	targetNamespace="http://StringType">
  <xsd:complexType name="StringType">
    <xsd:sequence>
      <xsd:element name="foo" type="xsd:string"/>
	</xsd:sequence>
  </xsd:complexType>
</xsd:schema>

	DataObject stringType = ...

	// Set the data to a String
	stringType.set("foo", "bar");

	// The instance data will always be type String, regardless of the data set 	// Displays "java.lang.String"
	System.out.println(stringType.get("foo").getClass().getName());

	// Set the data to an Integer
	stringType.set("foo", new Integer(42));

	// The instance data will always be type String, regardless of the data set 	// Displays "java.lang.String"
	System.out.println(stringType.get("foo").getClass().getName());

If anySimpleType were to have a set(...) method called on it, the original data would not be lost. 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsd:schema xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" 
	targetNamespace="http://AnySimpleType">
  <xsd:complexType name="AnySimpleType">
    <xsd:sequence>
      <xsd:element name="foo" type="xsd:anySimpleType"/>
	</xsd:sequence>
  </xsd:complexType>
</xsd:schema>

	DataObject anySimpleType = ...

	// Set the data to a String
	anySimpleType.set("foo", "bar");

	// The instance data will always be of the type of data used in the set 	// Displays "java.lang.String"
	System.out.println(anySimpleType.get("foo").getClass().getName());

	// Set the data to an Integer
	anySimpleType.set("foo", new Integer(42));

	// The instance data will always be of the type of data used in the set 	// Displays "java.lang.Integer"
	System.out.println(anySimpleType.get("foo").getClass().getName());

This data type is also preserved across serialization and deserialization by xsi:type. Consequently, any time you serialize an anySimpleType element, it will have an xsi:type that matches that defined in the SDO specification based on its Java™ type:

In the following example, you serialize the business object so that the data would look like this: 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<p:StringType xsi:type="p:StringType"
 xmlns:xsi=http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance
 xmlns:xsd=http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema 
 xmlns:p="http://StringType">
  <foo xsi:type="xsd:int">42</foo>
<p:StringType></p:StringType>

The xsi:type will be used during deserialization to load the data as the appropriate Java instance class. If no xsi:type is specified, the default deserialization type will be string.

For the other simple types, determining how the data can be mapped is a constant. For instance, a boolean can always map to a string. AnySimpleType can contain any of the simple types, however, so whether a mapping is possible is based on the instance data in the field.

Use the property Type URI and Name to determine if a property is of type anySimpleType. They will be "commonj.sdo" and "Object". To determine if data is valid to be inserted into anySimpleType, check to see if it is not an instance of a DataObject. Data that can be represented as a string and that is not a DataObject can be set in an anySimpleType field.

This leads to the following mapping rules:

Use Any data types


Related information:
Assigning from and to xs:any