Description Shaun Smith 2008-05-12 09:03:21 EDT

Created attachment 99696 [details]
Null table and column messages

When a OneToMany is defined as a simple List with no content type, e.g.

public class Publisher { 
  @OneToMany
  private List titles;
...

Dali produces error messages like (see screenshot):

  Column "null" cannot be resolved
  Join table "null" cannot be resolved

These messages do not help the developer resolve the problem and guide them to suppling the missing target entity information.  It would be better, when the join table name is to be derived and validated against the schema that, if the join table cannot be determined due to a missing target entity, Dali provide a message along the lines of:

  Target Entity for Publisher.titles not defined - join table cannot be determined

"null" anywhere in a message indicates that we are not providing useful diagnostics to the developer.