What is a JavaBean exactly?

Question

I understood, I think, that a \"Bean\" is a Java class with properties and getters/setters. As much as I understand, it is the equivalent of a C struct. Is that true?

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Answer 1

In practice, Beans are just objects which are handy to use. Serializing them means to be able easily to persist them (store in a form that is easily recovered).

Typical uses of Beans in real world:

• simple reusable objects POJO (Plain Old Java Objects)
• visual objects
• Spring uses Beans for objects to handle (for instance, User object that needs to be serialized in session)
• EJB (Enterprise Java Beans), more complex objects, like JSF Beans (JSF is old quite outdated technology) or JSP Beans

So in fact, Beans are just a convention / standard to expect something from a Java object that it would behave (serialization) and give some ways to change it (setters for properties) in a certain way.

How to use them, is just your invention, but most common cases I enlisted above.