This book has four distinct authors. In an attempt to remain consistent throughout the book, the authors have chosen to adopt the following conventions regarding terminology:
Persistence capable class: This term is used to indicate a class that implements the PersistenceCapable interface specified in the JDO API.
Persistent object: This term indicates an instance of a persistence capable class that is persistent.
Java object: This term indicates the general concept of a Java object instance. The object may or may not follow the standard JavaBeans conventions.
Transient instance: This term is indicates an instance of any class.
Field: The term is used to refer to the instance variables of a class. Rather than calling them members , member variables, or attributes, they are generically referred to as fields.
Datastore: This term is used to refer to the persistent mechanism used by a JDO implementation. The terms datastore and underlying datastore are used interchangeably. The term database is used only in the context of talking specifically about a relational database or object database.
JDO implementation: Rather than JDO runtime or JDO vendor , the term JDO implementation refers to an implementation of the JDO specification.