In the previous chapter, we discussed ways of using JDBC to access a database. In the context of object-oriented software design, it is often required to not only store simple values in a database but to also map the objects and their relations to the tables.
This chapter is an introduction to the concept of Object-relational mapping (ORM) and the Hibernate framework as an implementation of ORM. The first part describes the overall architecture of Hibernate, and gives guidelines for installing and configuring the framework.
Later in this chapter, the basic usage of Hibernate, such as performing CRUD operations, fetching strategies, and association mapping, will be covered.
Finally, the end of the chapter introduces advanced techniques such as caching, pooling, and using table partitioning in conjunction with Hibernate.