This test worked for me
Query query = pm.newQuery(Employee.class); query.setFilter("lastName.startsWith(lastNameParam)"); query.setOrdering("lastName, firstName, hireDate desc"); query.declareParameters("String lastNameParam"); List<Employee> results = (List<Employee>) query.execute(lastname); if (results.size()>0) { for (Employee e : results) { //e } the .startsWith(...) was in effect the same as .matches(...) because I was NOT allowed to have wildchars as a prefix anyway -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Google App Engine for Java" group. To post to this group, send email to google-appengine-j...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to google-appengine-java+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/google-appengine-java?hl=en.