Jaxb: how to unmarshall xs:any XML-string part?

by

@XmlAnyElement(lax = true) means in plain English something like:

Dear JAXB! If you have a mapping for this element, please unmarshal it
into a Java object. If you don’t know this element, just leave it as a
DOM element.

This is exactly what is happening in your case. So if you want to actually unmarshal the content of this lax any, provide JAXB context with a mapping for the element you wish to unmarshal. The easiest way to do this is to annotate your class with @XmlRootElement

@XmlRootElement(name="foo", namespace="urn:bar")
public class MyClass { ... }

Now when you create your JAXB context, add MyClass into it:

JAXBContext context = JAXBContext.newInstance(A.class, B.class, ..., MyClass.class);

In this case, if JAXB meets the {urn:bar}foo element in the place of that xs:any, it will know that this element is mapped onto MyClass and will try to unmarshal MyClass.

If you are creating JAXB context based on the package name (you probably do), you can still add you class (say, com.acme.foo.MyClass) to it. The easiest way is to create a com/acme/foo/jaxb.index resource:

com.acme.foo.MyClass

And the add your package name to the context path:

JAXBContext context = JAXBContext.newInstance("org.dar.gee.schema:com.acme.foo");

There are other ways with ObjectFactory etc., but the trick with jaxb.index is probably the easiest one.

Alternatively, instead of unmarshalling everything in one run, you can leave the content of xs:any as DOM and unmarshal it into the target object in a second unmarshalling with anothe JAXB context (which know your MyClass class). Something like:

JAXBContext payloadContext = JAXBContext.newInstance(MyClass.class);
payloadContext.createUnmarshaller().unmarshal((Node) myPayload.getAny());

This approach is sometimes better, especially when you have a combination of container/payload schemas which are relatively independent. Depends on the case.

All said above applies to marshalling as well. It’s all neatly bidirectional.

More Related Contents:

  1. JAXB: how to marshall map into value
  2. JAXB: How to ignore namespace during unmarshalling XML document?
  3. JAXB/Moxy Unmarshalling assigns all field values to Map rather than the specific field provided for it
  4. Using JAXB to cross reference XmlIDs from two XML files
  5. JAXB Marshalling Unmarshalling with CDATA
  6. Stax XMLStreamReader check for the next event without moving ahead
  7. JAXB: How should I marshal complex nested data structures?
  8. JAXB :Need Namespace Prefix to all the elements
  9. A message body writer for Java class java.util.ArrayList…and MIME media type text/xml was not found
  10. @XmlPath has no impact during the JAXB Marshalling
  11. How do I parse this XML in Java with JAXB?
  12. How do you customize how JAXB generates plural method names?
  13. XML element with attribute and content using JAXB
  14. Converting XML to Java objects [closed]
  15. no suitable HttpMessageConverter found for response type
  16. JAXB inheritance, unmarshal to subclass of marshaled class
  17. Java/JAXB: Unmarshall XML attributes to specific Java object attributes
  18. Dynamic tag names with JAXB
  19. JAXB filtered parsing
  20. Using StAX to create index for XML for quick access
  21. Use JAXB to create Object from XML String
  22. javax.xml.bind.UnmarshalException: unexpected element (uri:””, local:”Group”)
  23. Simple conversion between java.util.Date and XMLGregorianCalendar
  24. Marshalling LocalDate using JAXB
  25. Where I can find a detailed comparison of Java XML frameworks? [closed]
  26. JAXB, XJC -> create multiple class files
  27. Java XML Binding [closed]
  28. JAXB annotations for nested element lists
  29. Controlling namespace prefixes in JAXB
  30. How to generate JAXB classes from just XML

Leave a Comment