javahibernatehibernate-mappinghibernate-annotations

How can I mark a foreign key constraint using Hibernate annotations?


I am trying to use Hibernate annotation for writing a model class for my database tables.

I have two tables, each having a primary key User and Question.

@Entity
@Table(name="USER")
public class User
{
    @Id
    @Column(name="user_id")
    @GeneratedValue(strategy=GenerationType.AUTO)
    private Long id;

    @Column(name="username")
    private String username;

    // Getter and setter
}

Question Table.

@Entity
@Table(name="QUESTION")
public class Questions extends BaseEntity{

    @Id
    @Column(name="question_id")
    @GeneratedValue(strategy=GenerationType.AUTO)
    private int id;

    @Column(name="question_text")
    private String question_text;

    // Getter and setter
}

And I have one more table, UserAnswer, which has userId and questionId as foreign keys from the above two tables.

But I am unable to find how I can reference these constraints in the UserAnswer table.

@Entity
@Table(name="UserAnswer ")
public class UserAnswer
{
    @Column(name="user_id")
    private User user;

    //@ManyToMany
    @Column(name="question_id")
    private Questions questions ;

    @Column(name="response")
    private String response;

    // Getter and setter
}

How can I achieve this?


Solution

  • @Column is not the appropriate annotation. You don't want to store a whole User or Question in a column. You want to create an association between the entities. Start by renaming Questions to Question, since an instance represents a single question, and not several ones. Then create the association:

    @Entity
    @Table(name = "UserAnswer")
    public class UserAnswer {
    
        // this entity needs an ID:
        @Id
        @Column(name="useranswer_id")
        @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.AUTO)
        private Long id;
    
        @ManyToOne
        @JoinColumn(name = "user_id")
        private User user;
    
        @ManyToOne
        @JoinColumn(name = "question_id")
        private Question question;
    
        @Column(name = "response")
        private String response;
    
        //getter and setter 
    }
    

    The Hibernate documentation explains that. Read it. And also read the javadoc of the annotations.