Hibernate entity interceptor triggerd but set values not saving

Question

I'm working with a spring configured hibernate application. There is transactionmanagement and an auditInterceptor defined as entityInterceptor. When I debug the code I'm entering the entityInterceptors methods and the date's are being set, however at the end of the save they are not in the database :(.

Consider following configuration

    <bean id="sessionFactory"
        class="org.springframework.orm.hibernate3.annotation.AnnotationSessionFactoryBean">     
        <property name="dataSource" ref="dataSource" />
        <property name="hibernateProperties">
            <value>
                hibernate.dialect=${hibernate.dialect}
                hibernate.show_sql=${hibernate.show_sql}
                hbm2ddl.auto=${hbm2ddl.auto}
            </value>
        </property>
        <property name="schemaUpdate">
            <value>true</value>
        </property>
        <property name="annotatedClasses">
            <list>
                                .. bunch of annotatedClasses" ...
            </list>
        </property>
    </bean>

<bean name="auditInterceptor" class="com.mbalogos.mba.dao.AuditInterceptor" />

    <bean id="transactionManager"
        class="org.springframework.orm.hibernate3.HibernateTransactionManager">
        <property name="sessionFactory" ref="sessionFactory" />
        <property name="entityInterceptor" ref="auditInterceptor"/>
    </bean>

    <bean id="namedQueryDao" class="com.mbalogos.mba.dao.NamedQueryDaoImpl">
        <property name="sessionFactory" ref="sessionFactory" />
    </bean>

and following entityInterceptor

public class AuditInterceptor extends EmptyInterceptor{

    /**
     * 
     */
    private static final long serialVersionUID = -8374988621501998008L;

    @Override
    public boolean onSave(Object entity, Serializable id, Object[] state,
            String[] propertyNames, Type[] types) {
        if(entity instanceof DomainObject){
            Timestamp date = new Timestamp(new Date().getTime());
            ((DomainObject)entity).setCreationDate(date);
            ((DomainObject)entity).setModificationDate(date);
        }       
        return true;
    }

    @Override
    public boolean onFlushDirty(Object entity, Serializable id,
            Object[] currentState, Object[] previousState,
            String[] propertyNames, Type[] types) {
        if(entity instanceof DomainObject){
            DomainObject domainObject = (DomainObject)entity;
            Timestamp date = new Timestamp(new Date().getTime());
            domainObject.setModificationDate(date);             
        }
        return true;
    }

    @Override
    public void onDelete(Object entity, Serializable id, Object[] state,
            String[] propertyNames, Type[] types) {
        super.onDelete(entity, id, state, propertyNames, types);
    }

    @SuppressWarnings("rawtypes")
    @Override
    public void preFlush(Iterator entities) {
        super.preFlush(entities);
    }

    @SuppressWarnings("rawtypes")
    @Override
    public void postFlush(Iterator entities) {
        super.postFlush(entities);
    }
}

following save method, sessionFactory is injected in the class

public <T extends DomainObject> T save(T objectToSave) {
    Session currentSession = null;
    try {
        currentSession = sessionFactory.getCurrentSession();
        currentSession.save(objectToSave);

        return objectToSave;
    } catch (Exception ex) {
        logger.error(ex);
    }
    return null;
}

Anyone has any idea why this behaviour is happening. Oh I also tried putting the entityInterceptor in the sessionFactory instead of the transactionmanager that was my first try , same behaviour :(

Answer 1

I managed to figure it out, I had to play with the propertynames and their states not the entity object ... Weird though why supply the entity object if you can't play with it :(

@Override
public boolean onFlushDirty(Object entity, Serializable id,
        Object[] currentState, Object[] previousState,
        String[] propertyNames, Type[] types) {
    return audit(currentState, propertyNames);              
}

@Override
public boolean onSave(Object entity, Serializable id, Object[] state,
        String[] propertyNames, Type[] types) {
    return audit(state, propertyNames);
}

private boolean audit(Object[] currentState, String[] propertyNames) {
    boolean changed = false;
    Timestamp timestamp = new Timestamp(new Date().getTime());
    for(int i=0;i<propertyNames.length;i++){
        if("creationDate".equals(propertyNames[i])){
            Object currentDate = currentState[i];
            if(currentDate == null){
                currentState[i] = timestamp;
                changed = true;
            }
        }

        if("modificationDate".equals(propertyNames[i])){
            currentState[i] = timestamp;
            changed = true;
        }
    }
    return changed;
}

Answer 2

Thanks Kenny, I was also facing the same problem. In my case, interceptors are working for some entities and for the rest, they are not working.
Some possible optimizations might be:
* If you are done with searching both properties, then break the loop.
* If you want to apply audit method with only DomainObject then filter this method with if(entity instanceof DomainObject)

Still I am curious about, why setting attributes directly on entity object was not working for some entities. If you or anybody know the reason, then please post it here.