XStream and Object class serialization

Question

I have beans which have Objects which can contain different types. Now when I create XML it will add class attribute to serialized object. I would like to change that for example class simple name.

Example Java:

public class MyParentClass {

private Object childObjectAttribute; // Can be any instance of any interface ...

// Getters & setters etc..

XStream initialization:

public XStream getXStream()
{
    XStream xstream = new XStream();
    Class<?>[] c = { MyInterfaceImpl.class }; // MyInterfaceImpl has of course @XStreamAlias("MyInterface")
    xstream.processAnnotations(c);
    xstream.alias(MyInterface.class.getSimpleName(), MyInterface.class, MyInterfaceImpl.class);
    return xstream;
}

Example XML:

<myParentClass>
    <childObjectAttribute class="com.example.PossibleClass"/>
</myParentClass>

I would like to change com.example.PossibleClass to PossibleClass or something else. Is that possible?

Answer 1

Yes you can! It's helps to reduce the size of generated document. It's a good practice to do so.
Use XStream.alias() method.

This works for me.

PersonX person = new PersonX("Tito", "George");
XStream xstream = new XStream();
xstream.alias("MyPerson", PersonX.class);
String str = xstream.toXML(person);
System.out.println(str);

Without alias

<co.in.test.PersonX>
  <firstName>Tito</firstName>
  <lastName>George</lastName>
</co.in.test.PersonX>

With alias

<MyPerson>
  <firstName>Tito</firstName>
  <lastName>George</lastName>
</MyPerson>

Is the below approach not working?

workxstream.alias("PossibleClass", PossibleClass.class);