<p>I'm teaching Java EE at the university, and this was a question a student asked. I said "no", but I wasn't really sure, so I thought I might ask you mighty developers. :)</p>

<p>Basically, what I'd like to do is to use entities if they were in my context: cat getters, setters, etc, so like normal POJOs. if I use an EJB using its remote inferface, the entities gets decoupled from the core infrastructure, so that's a no-go.</p>

<p>I thought about writing a layer such as this in my MSc thesis. If it's a dead idea, feel free to tell me. If it's not, tell me if you'd like one.</p>

<p>Or if there is such a tool out there, let me know!</p>

One alternative is
the Spring Framework
.  Spring provides its own support for binding entity objects to the view and handles the getting/setting for you once it is wired up.  There are many Spring modules to pick and choose from.  Spring MVC and Spring Webflow are both worth checking out.  Spring MVC (IMO) is simpler to get started with, but Sring Webflow allows for more complex navigation and more scope options (ex: flow scope).  If you're looking for a book
Spring In Action
is descent.  There are some concepts you will need to tackle (such as dependency injection) in order to use Spring but it is well worth the time.