Naresh i Technologies

Sathish

Annotations are java language feature introduced in java 5 version

Annotations can be used for Automatic generation of configuration
file(Deployment descriptor(web.xml),bean classes,etc)
Instead of describing the components with the Xml file we can describe
with the annotations in the java source file itself.
MetaData:Data about the data is called as MetaData. The mainpurpose of
Annotations in java apps to represent MetaData. to represent MetaData it
is possible to use comments directly. but commneted MetaData will be
eliminated by lexical-Analizer in compiler as part of compilation
process,as a result commented meta data will not be available in the
respective .class files.
In general to simplyfy debugging,Testing & to execute Enterprise app like
web-app,distributed app we have to bring the metadata upto runtime.
to achive this requirement we have to use Annotation over-comment.
In general to bring MetaData upto runtime it is possible to use
XmlDocument like web.xml file, to provide the mapping details b/w urlpatterns
& servlets to the servlet-container,struts-config.xml file to provide all the
Module respective configuration details etc..
To bring metadata upto runtime if we use above approach than all the java
devlopers has to aware xml tech separatly.
Conslusion:in java app to bring metadata upto run time purely in the form of java
alternative then we have to use Annotations.
in java app all the Annotations will be processed by Annotation processing
tool(APT) included internally in java Technology.
in java app Annotations will represent only metadata ,which will not give
any effect to java application execution.
to declare any Annotation we have to use the following syntax.
@interface Annotation-Name {
data -type var() default value;
------------------------------------------------------------------}
Ex:@interface Employee{
int eno();
String ename();
String eaddr() default"hyderabad";
}

Naresh i Technologies Annotations Notes

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Naresh i Technologies

Sathish

if we want to apply annotations along with java programming constructs

we have to provide the following syntax.
syntax:@Anntation_Name(member1=value1,memeber2=value2....)
EX
@Employee(eno=121,ename="aaa",eaddr="ban")
class Manager
{
--}
Every Annotation symbol is denoted by @ symbol.
Standard Annotattions:Standard Annotations are avilable in java.lang package
Standard Annotations are used to annotate our java code directly.
Standard Annotations
1)General-purpose Annotations:These are predeined annotations ,which will be used to describe some
metadata,for the simple programming constructs.
1.@Override
2.@Deprecated
3.@SuppressWarnings
2) Meta-Annotations:Annotations about the annotations is called as
Meta Annotations . In general Meta Annotations can be used to declare
another annotations
Ex:1)@Inherited 2)@Documented
3) @Target 4) @Retention
@Override:The @Override annotation is used above methods that override methods
in a superclass. If the method does not match a method in the
superclass, the compiler will give you an error.
The @Override annotation is not necessary in order to override a method
in a superclass
Here is an example use of the @Override annotation:
public class MySuperClass {
public void doTheThing() {
System.out.println("Do the thing");
}
}
public class MySubClass extends MySuperClass{

Naresh i Technologies Annotations Notes

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Naresh i Technologies

Sathish

@Override
public void doTheThing() {
System.out.println("Do it differently");
}
}
In case the method doTheThing() in MySuperClass changes signature so
that
the same method in the supclass no longer overrides it, the compiler will
generate an error.
so A method annotated with @Override must override a method from
super class. other wise we will get Compiletime Error
SourceCode:@Target(ElementType.METHOD)
@Retention(RetentionPolicy.SOURCE)
public @interface Override
{
}
@Deprecated:java provides a mechanism to express deprecation . As new classes
invented its API changes naturally, method names are renamed for
consistenecy ,new and better methods are added may change. some
changes introduce problems ,
we need to keep the old API avilable until developers habituated
to new one.But we don't want to continue them in the future
The Word Deprecated generates a warring when we use deprecated
elements.
@Documented
@Retention(RetionPolicy:RUNTIME)
public @interface Deprecated{
}
@SuppressWarinings:SuppressWarinings annotation indicates to the compilerto suppress(or)
remove the warining messages.
Meta Annotation:1) @Inherited:In general in java app annotations are not inherited from super class to
sub-class by default. if we want make any annotation to inherit from
super to sub class we have to @Inherited Annotation.
Ex:@Inherited
@interface Table{
}
@Table

Naresh i Technologies Annotations Notes

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Naresh i Technologies

Sathish

class Emp{
}
class Manager extends Emp
{
}
2) Documented Annotation:In java app by default all annotations are not documented when we
prepare documentation for our java app.
if we want to make any annotation to incldue in the documentation we
have to use @Documented Annotation.
3) @Target
The mainpurpose of this annotation is to define the target elements for
the annotations at the time of declrations.
This annotation is multivalue annotation,it will take the following
constants from element type as parameter.
TYPE,FIELD,METHOD,PARAMETER,CONSTRUCTOR,LOCAL_VARIABLE,PACKA
GE. ALL
Ex:@Target(ElementType.METHOD,ElementType.TYPE,ElementType.FIELD)
4) Retention-Annotation:This annotation can be used to define a particular scope to some other
Annotation,here the scope of annotation may be source file(or) upto .class
file
(or) upto run time.
Ex:@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
Custom Annotations in Java
Creating custom annotation is similar to writing an interface, except that
it interface keyword is prefixed with @ symbol.
Example ://course.java
import java.lang.annotation.*;
@Inherited
@Documented
@Target(ElementType.METHOD)
@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
@interface Course{

Naresh i Technologies Annotations Notes

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Naresh i Technologies

Sathish

String id() default "cj";

String name() default "corejava";
int fee() default 750;
}
//Student.java
public class Student{
String sid;
String sname;
Student(String sid,String sname){
this.sid=sid;
this.sname=sname;
}
@Course(id="aj",name="Adv.java")
public void getStudentDetails()
{
System.out.println("Student-Details");
System.out.println("--------------");
System.out.println("Student Id :"+sid);
System.out.println("Student Name:"+sname);
}
}
Main.java
import java.lang.reflect.*;
class Main {
public static void main(String[] args)throws Exception{
Student s=new Student("s1","aaa");
s.getStudentDetails();
Class c=s.getClass();
Method m=c.getMethod("getStudentDetails");
Course crs=(Course)m.getAnnotation(Course.class);
/*to get the Annotation() we should use getAnnotation(Class cls);
method from Method Object
*/
System.out.println(crs.getClass());
System.out.println("Course-Details");
System.out.println("-----------------");
System.out.println("Course-Id.."+crs.id());
System.out.println("Course-Name.."+crs.name());
System.out.println("Course-Fee.."+crs.fee());
}
}

Naresh i Technologies Annotations Notes

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