A simple class for converting any Java object to XML string

A simple class for converting any Java object to XML string
In need to save XML representation of your Java object? Here is a simple 200-line class that will do this using reflection. But don't worry, there is some very powerful caching going on, so that the performance will be very good.

Thanks to comments for pointing out the isAssignableFrom() function in Class. Also, now the resulting XML is valid with all the special characters (&, <, >, &apos; and ").

package own;

import java.lang.reflect.*;
import java.util.*;

public class OptimizedReflectionMarshaller {
  // cache for getters
  private static HashMap gettersMap = new HashMap();

  // cache for storing info on whether certain class implements Collection
  private static HashMap collectionsMap = new HashMap();

  private static final String JAVA = "java.";
  private static final String JAVAX = "javax.";
  
  private static final Class[] EMPTYPARAMS = new Class[0];
  
  /**
   * Info on a single field and the corresponding getter method
   */
  private static class FieldMethodPair {
    private String fieldName;

    private Method getterMethod;

    public FieldMethodPair(String fieldName, Method getterMethod) {
      this.fieldName = fieldName;
      this.getterMethod = getterMethod;
    }

    public String getFieldName() {
      return fieldName;
    }

    public Method getGetterMethod() {
      return getterMethod;
    }
  }

  /**
   * Returns the marshalled XML representation of the parameter object
   */
  public static String marshal(Object obj) {
    StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
    Class clazz = obj.getClass();

    // get class name in lower letters (w/o package name)
    String className = clazz.getName();
    int lastDotIndex = className.lastIndexOf(".");
    if (lastDotIndex >= 0)
      className = className.substring(lastDotIndex + 1);
    className = className.toLowerCase();

    sb.append("<" + className + ">");
    marshal(obj, sb);
    sb.append("
  
  


Feel free to use and modify.



Enjoy

Kirill