Common Java Interface for variant raw types

Question

There are several quite common classes like ResultSet or JsonObject and so on. Such Classes use functions as getInt, getString, setInt, setString to get or set raw type values to/from an Object.

I wondering, if there is a common interface that could handle such type maybe in a constructor like this:

public PoJo(IRawTypeInterface src)
{
   this.intField = src.getInt("nameOfIntStuff");
   this.strField = src.getString("nameOfStrStuff"); 
}

If ResultSet and JsonObject would implement such Interface it would be possible to create such PoJo class from an Recordset or JsonObject.

What I want to know is ...

• Is there already such Interface, and I didn't just know it?
• I or was there a plan to add such Interface to the java lib?
• What do you think about it?

Thanks

Answer 1

SQL's version of relations and the JSON single-rooted trees are very different models, and have different approaches to primitive types (even ignoring exception). There isn't much commonality.

You're better off with value types not depending upon JSON and SQL representations. I can't stress how important dependency management is. Therefore, use object mappers of some form that take defaults from the value type but also allow customisation of representation.

Your pojo constructor should be the simple Pojo(int nameOfIntStuff, String nameOfStrStuff), which will become even easier when we finally have records (for [shallow] immutable values). Adapting to external representations should be external to the class.