Attribute to a JAXB Element

Question

I'm using JAXB for creating xml. I want to set attribute 'lang' on elements PrimaryValue and AlternativeSpelling.

<AgencyOrUnit>
    <PrimaryValue lang="el">ΓΑΔΑ</PrimaryValue>
    <AlternativeSpelling lang="en">Athens General Police Directorate</AlternativeSpelling>
</AgencyOrUnit>

Here's my code:

@XmlRootElement(name = "OwnerReference")
@XmlType(propOrder = { "primaryValue", "alternativeSpelling"})
public class AgencyOrUnit {

    private String PrimaryValue;
    private String AlternativeSpelling;

    public String getPrimaryValue() {
        return PrimaryValue;
    }

    public void setPrimaryValue(String PrimaryValue){
        this.PrimaryValue = PrimaryValue;
    }

    public String getAlternativeSpelling() {
        return AlternativeSpelling;
    }

    public void setAlternativeSpelling(String AlternativeSpelling){
        this.AlternativeSpelling = AlternativeSpelling;
    }
}

Here's process of marshalling:

 AgencyOrUnit agencyOrUnit = new AgencyOrUnit();
 agencyOrUnit.setPrimaryValue("ΓΑΔΑ");
 agencyOrUnit.setAlternativeSpelling("General Police");

The problem is that I don't know how to set property with value on elements primaryValue and alternativeSpelling?

Answer 1

You can use annotations @XmlValue & @XmlAttribute but you need to create a new class to hold both lang and the original value string. Something like this:

@Setter
@AllArgsConstructor
public class LocaleString {

    private String lang;
    private String value;

    @XmlAttribute
    public String getLang() {
        return lang;
    }

    @XmlValue
    public String getValue() {
        return value;
    }
}

Then modify your AgencyOrUnit accordingly:

@XmlRootElement(name = "OwnerReference")
@XmlType(propOrder = { "primaryValue", "alternativeSpelling"})
@Getter @Setter
public class AgencyOrUnit {
    private LocaleString PrimaryValue;
    private LocaleString AlternativeSpelling;
}

Test it:

@Test
void test() throws JAXBException {
    AgencyOrUnit agencyOrUnit = new AgencyOrUnit();
    agencyOrUnit.setPrimaryValue(new LocaleString("el", "ΓΑΔΑ"));
    agencyOrUnit.setAlternativeSpelling(new LocaleString("en", "General Police"));

    JAXBContext ctx = JAXBContext.newInstance(AgencyOrUnit.class);

    Marshaller marshaller = ctx.createMarshaller();
    marshaller.setProperty(Marshaller.JAXB_FORMATTED_OUTPUT, Boolean.TRUE);

    marshaller.marshal(agencyOrUnit, System.out);
}

and you should see this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<OwnerReference>
    <primaryValue lang="el">ΓΑΔΑ</primaryValue>
    <alternativeSpelling lang="en">General Police</alternativeSpelling>
</OwnerReference>