Quick Start Guide

We know it can be hard to find the right help sometimes and search engines can be overwhelming, so we will try to put the most commonly asked for topics with some overview and links to more in-depth resources here for you to checkout, before wasting your time searching through our Documentation and Mailing Lists for help.

Runtime Dependencies

To use OpenJPA as a stand-alone Java component or with a lightweight non-Java EE framework, please refer to the following Build and Runtime Dependencies page for the supported levels of Java SE.

To use OpenJPA in a Java EE application server, please refer to the following Integration page for the known platforms that either include OpenJPA or have been tested with OpenJPA.

JPA Examples

OpenJPA provides some simple examples as part of the binary distribution on the Downloads page. The following Samples page provides quick start instructions on how to build and run these samples, along with pointers to other JPA samples from the Apache Geronimo project.

Enhancing Entities

The JPA spec requires some type of monitoring of Entity objects, but the spec does not define how to implement this monitoring. Some JPA providers auto-generate new subclasses or proxy objects that front the user's Entity objects at runtime, while others use byte-code weaving technologies to enhance the actual Entity class objects at build time. OpenJPA supports both enhancement methods, but strongly suggests only using the build time enhancement. The following Entity Enhancement page includes more details on both enhancement types, along with examples on how to setup build time enhancement in ANT, Maven and Eclipse environments.

Upcoming JPA 2.0 Features

If you really want to be on the bleeding edge, then checkout our JPA 2.0 Roadmap to see which new features of JSR-317 we have implemented on trunk.

Take the Red Pill

If you want to dive into the rabbit-hole (Hey, It's open source!), then checkout the Found a Bug page, which covers everything from posting questions to our mailing lists, to getting the source code and building it, and creating bug patches....