Problem with loginTimeout

Hi,

I am new to this list, so hello everyone.

I am having troubles with getConnection() and the loginTimeout property.

I am working with a 7.4.2 server and I was also using the 7.4 jdbc 
driver (build 215). Everything is under Red Hat RHEL 3, JDK 1.4.2.
My application is running under JBoss 3.2.6.

With this version, there was no support for timeout when using 
getConnection(), so sometimes it takes 3 minutes for getConnection() to 
send an exception. I have to connect to 35 databases one after an other 
so the delay is really too important (3 * 35 minutes = 1h45).
Looking at the mailing list archives, I saw posts concerning this 
problem and the solution of calling getConnection() in a separate Thread 
and dealing with the timeout (6 seconds) in the mail thread.
I implemented this fix, but stumbled into an other problem: when a first 
getConnection() is still running, following getConnection() won't return 
a connection until the first one is finished. This implies that once a 
getConnection() timedout (the 6 seconds timeout), every other attempt to 
use getConnection() will also time out (6 seconds) until the first 
getConnection() will definitely fail (3 minutes).
I don't see how I can find a solution for this problem, anyone can help me ?

I tried updating to the latest JDBC driver (8.2 build 504), and the 
problem seems to be fixed.
But then I am getting errors with my EJB Entities when trying to create 
new instances :
 Could not create entity
org.postgresql.util.PSQLException: ERROR: column "tab_alarme_emis_pcc" 
is of type boolean but expression is of type character
The corresponding field is defined as :
- in the EJB entity: with
     @ejb.persistence column-name="TAB_ALARME_EMIS_PCC"
     public abstract Boolean getEmisPcc();
- in the database: with tab_alarme_emis_pcc boolean

What is the problem ? Please help.
Is there a global setting to have the pgdriver behaving as it was in 7.4 ?

I spent almost the entire day on this problem and still haven't found a 
solution :(

Thanks,
Nicolas