A unidirectional one-to-many association on a join table
is much preferred. Notice that by specifying unique="true",
we have changed the multiplicity from many-to-many to one-to-many.
<class name="Person">
<id name="id" column="personId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
<set name="addresses" table="PersonAddress">
<key column="personId"/>
<many-to-many column="addressId"
unique="true"
class="Address"/>
</set>
</class>
<class name="Address">
<id name="id" column="addressId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
</class>
create table Person ( personId bigint not null primary key )
create table PersonAddress ( personId not null, addressId bigint not null primary key )
create table Address ( addressId bigint not null primary key )
A unidirectional many-to-one association on a join table is quite common when the association is optional.
<class name="Person">
<id name="id" column="personId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
<join table="PersonAddress"
optional="true">
<key column="personId" unique="true"/>
<many-to-one name="address"
column="addressId"
not-null="true"/>
</join>
</class>
<class name="Address">
<id name="id" column="addressId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
</class>
create table Person ( personId bigint not null primary key )
create table PersonAddress ( personId bigint not null primary key, addressId bigint not null )
create table Address ( addressId bigint not null primary key )
A unidirectional one-to-one association on a join table is extremely unusual, but possible.
<class name="Person">
<id name="id" column="personId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
<join table="PersonAddress"
optional="true">
<key column="personId"
unique="true"/>
<many-to-one name="address"
column="addressId"
not-null="true"
unique="true"/>
</join>
</class>
<class name="Address">
<id name="id" column="addressId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
</class>
create table Person ( personId bigint not null primary key )
create table PersonAddress ( personId bigint not null primary key, addressId bigint not null unique )
create table Address ( addressId bigint not null primary key )
Finally, we have a unidirectional many-to-many association.
<class name="Person">
<id name="id" column="personId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
<set name="addresses" table="PersonAddress">
<key column="personId"/>
<many-to-many column="addressId"
class="Address"/>
</set>
</class>
<class name="Address">
<id name="id" column="addressId">
<generator class="native"/>
</id>
</class>
create table Person ( personId bigint not null primary key )
create table PersonAddress ( personId bigint not null, addressId bigint not null, primary key (personId, addressId) )
create table Address ( addressId bigint not null primary key )