+1

I'll simply check at boot time if all collections will use valid names. We can then see about the exact wording of the error message, but I'll certainly suggest to use @Table .

This would probably be a good idea for any type (non-inner classes) too, to prevent people to use a dollar sign in an explicit entity name.

we can throw the exception and change approach if someone asks

By "ask" you mean configuration or someone coming to JIRA? Just wondering if you still think I should add the global configuration properties, they seem redundant if we validate and provide a nice error message.