What is 'HIBERNATE'?

Hibernate does three main things for the Java programmer. It provides

• a persistence layer for Java objects, with automatic dirty checking, lazy loading, etc.
• an object to relational mapping capability
• a powerful (SQL-like) object query language

Hibernate is usually deployed in a middle-tier container with pooled database connections, such as Tomcat. You can then access Hibernate using its query language, HQL, from a JSP page or from some other client program.

Hibernate has a LGPL license and is a fast way for your Java client to get an object view of your relational data. Sure, there's a learning curve to configure Hibernate for more complex data structures, but, hey, it's still a whole lot easier than doing all that hard persistence and O-R mapping stuff yourself. There's also an active forum on the Hibernate website that may help resolve issues.

For a more detailed account, take a look at this introduction to Hibernate.

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