Bean Serialization

Abstract

In some situations it is desirable to save the state of a bean instance. For example, once we have set the properties on a Counter bean (for example by setting the Alarm bean message to “Egg-Timer” and providing a new icon for the Alarm bean) we might want to reuse this configuration many times. We do not want to have to reset the Alarm bean’s properties every time. So how do we manage this (remember that if you have purchased a bean from a bean vendor, you may not have access to its source code)? In JavaBeans this is achieved by serializing the bean; that is, storing the bean to a file in a format which allows it to be restored at a later stage. This chapter explains the concept of serialization and illustrates how it can be used with JavaBeans.