A sample how to implement a custom propertyeditor for Spring 2.x which allows you to configure bean references with string literals. The propertyeditor tries to resolve the referenced beans given by their id.
Example
<bean id="foo" class="com.sample.Foo">
<property name="list" value="barA,barB"/>
</bean>
<bean id="barA" class="com.sample.Bar"/>
<bean id="barB" class="com.sample.Bar"/>
Inspired by http://www.mkyong.com/spring/spring-how-to-pass-a-date-into-bean-property-customdateeditor/