Feature Request: Allows @ZeebeVariablesAsType in handler function

This feature should enable the possibility to get variables injected in a typed manner like this:

@ZeebeWorker(type = "foo", autoComplete = true)
public ProcessVariables handleFoo(@ZeebeTypedVariables ProcessVariables variables){
  // do whatever you need to do
  return variables;
}

Inspired by @berndruecker .

[berndruecker]

Thanks Falko - super helpful!

“So it wouldn’t make sense to have multiple such objects. Unless, each of them is only a partial mapping, which I’m wondering how this is handled by the mapper.” --> precisely, the mapper ignores everything that is not part of the variables class, so you could create classes containing partial mappings (not sure if this is a good idea though).

Let’s do this: I’ll merge the PR now and we will have the two annotations available. And then we wait a couple of months to see it used in reality, and then we can still define a shortcut to save annotations if we feel this is important. The other way round it would also mean to have a breaking chance - which we should not do.

[falko]

I’d love to avoid the @ZeebeVariable annotation in favor of a crisp readable syntax, especially when working with many variables. What confuses me is when you say to treat “all method parameters” as “VariablesAsType” because job.getVariablesAsType(ProcessVariables.class); maps all process variables to fields/properties of the provided class. So it wouldn’t make sense to have multiple such objects. Unless, each of them is only a partial mapping, which I’m wondering how this is handled by the mapper.

Thus, my suggestion would be to use an @VariablesAsType annotation for the variables to object mapper and rather make @ZeebeVariable optional to say that all method parameters that are

• not annotated by @ZeebeVariable
• not the ActivatedJob
• not the JobClient
• not annotated with @VariablesAsType

will be treated as individual variables to be casted to the respective parameter type, e.g.

@ZeebeWorker(type = "shipOrder", autoComplete = true)
public void shipOrder(String orderId, Boolean isGift) {
  // ship the package; wrap as gift if needed ;-)
}

The object mapper would thus stick to an annotation, which is less clutter in this case because it’s only one such parameter:

@ZeebeWorker(type = "shipOrder", autoComplete = true)
public ProcessVariables shipOrder(@ZeebeTypedVariables ProcessVariables variables){
  // do whatever you need to do
  return variables;
}

How do we know that the returned object must be mapped back to variables?