Field stereotypes

Mateu lets you control how fields are rendered through @Stereotype.

Why this matters

A field is not only data.

It also has a presentation intent.

For example:

• a String might be rendered as regular text
• or as an email field
• or as a password field
• or as a textarea
• or as markdown
• or even as an image, color picker, slider, or rich text editor

@Stereotype lets you express that intent explicitly.

The annotation

@Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
@Target({ElementType.FIELD})
public @interface Stereotype {

  FieldStereotype value();
}

Example

@Stereotype(FieldStereotype.email)
String email;

@Stereotype(FieldStereotype.password)
String password;

@Stereotype(FieldStereotype.textarea)
String description;

@Stereotype(FieldStereotype.checkbox)
List<String> permissions;

This keeps the UI definition declarative while still giving you control over how specific fields are presented.

Available stereotypes

public enum FieldStereotype {
  regular,
  radio,
  checkbox,
  textarea,
  toggle,
  combobox,
  select,
  email,
  password,
  richText,
  listBox,
  html,
  markdown,
  image,
  icon,
  link,
  money,
  grid,
  color,
  choice,
  popover,
  slider,
  button,
  stars
}

Mental model

Use field types to express data.

Use stereotypes to express how that data should be presented.

Example use cases

Text-like fields

• regular
• textarea
• email
• password
• richText
• markdown
• html

Choice and selection

• radio
• checkbox
• toggle
• combobox
• select
• listBox
• choice

Visual and special-purpose fields

• image
• icon
• link
• money
• color
• slider
• stars
• button
• popover
• grid

In practice

A stereotype does not replace your data model.

It complements it.

For example, a field may still be a String, but @Stereotype(FieldStereotype.email) tells Mateu to render it as an email-oriented field instead of a generic one.