Using custom codecs

The mapper can take advantage of custom codecs to apply custom conversions to mapped columns and fields.

Declaring codecs

Let’s assume you have a table containing a timestamp column:

create table user(id int primary key, birth timestamp);

You’ve created a custom class, and the codec to convert it:

public class MyCustomDate { ... }

public class MyCustomDateCodec extends TypeCodec<MyCustomDate> {
    public MyCustomDate() {
        super(DataType.timestamp(), MyCustomDate.class);
    }
    ...
}

Pre-registered codecs

If you register your codec with the mapper’s underlying Cluster, it will be automatically available to the mapper:

Cluster cluster = Cluster.builder()
    .addContactPoint("127.0.0.1")
    .withCodecRegistry(
        new CodecRegistry().register(new MyCustomDateCodec())
    ).build();

MappingManager mappingManager = new MappingManager(cluster.connect());

You can normally create your mapped classes using your custom type, without any additional configuration:

@Table(name = "user")
public class User {
  @PartitionKey
  private int id;
  private MyCustomDate birth;

  ... // getters and setters
}

This also works in accessors:

@Accessor
interface UserAccessor {
  @Query("update user set birth = :b where id = :i")
  void updateBirth(@Param("i") int id,
                   @Param("b") MyCustomDate birth);
}

One-time declaration

Sometimes you might want to use your codec only for one particular column/field. In that case you won’t register it when initializing the Cluster:

Cluster cluster = Cluster.builder()
    .addContactPoint("127.0.0.1")
    .build();

MappingManager mappingManager = new MappingManager(cluster.connect());

Instead, reference the codec’s class in the @Column annotation:

@Table(name = "user")
public class User {
  @PartitionKey
  private int id;
  @Column(codec = MyCustomDateCodec.class)
  private MyCustomDate birth;

  ... // getters and setters
}

The class must have a no-arg constructor. The mapper will create an instance (one per column) and cache it for future use.

This also works with @Field and @Param annotations.

Implicit UDT codecs

The mapper uses custom codecs internally to handle UDT conversions: when you register an entity, the mapper inspects the type of all fields to find classes annotated with @UDT (this works recursively with nested UDTs and collections). For each class, the mapper creates a codec and registers it with the underlying Cluster.

@UDT(name = "address")
public class Address { ... }

@Entity(name = "user")
public class User {
  ...
  private Address address;
  ...
}

Mapper<User> userMapper = mappingManager.mapper(User.class);

// Codec is now registered for Address <-> CQL address

A nice side-effect is that you can now use the @UDT-annotated class with any driver method, not just mapper methods:

Row row = session.execute("select address from user where id = 1").one();
Address address = row.get("address", Address.class);

If you don’t use entity mappers but still want the convenience of the UDT codec for core driver methods, the mapper provides a way to create it independently:

mappingManager.udtCodec(Address.class);

// Codec is now registered