How do I apply AOP advice to a ConstraintValidator<A,T> in Spring?

Question

I am attempting to write my own Validator (as per the JSR-303 specification) under Spring 3.0.x.

I annotated the isValid(Serializable, CosntraintValidatorContext) method with @Transactional, but it seems that transactional advice is not being applied to this method - when the isValid() method is invoked, a call to sessionFactory.getCurrentSession() creates the Exception:

org.hibernate.HibernateException: No Hibernate Session bound to thread, and configuration does not allow creation of non-transactional one here

I have an @Autowired sessionFactory in the same Validator bean which is injected without issues. My current workaround is to use openSession() instead of getCurrentSession(), but that involves manual transaction management which I would prefer to avoid.

Doing a stack trace in the constructor of my validator bean, it seems that my Validator bean is being constructed via a call to the o.s.b.f.s.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBean(). I assume this means that the factory is capable of populating @Autowired fields in my Validator, but it seems that it is not applying any transactional advice?

Thanks in advance for any help on this matter.

EDIT: If it is of any help, I have included a partial stacktrace (via create new Exception()) that is logged in the constructor:

at com.mydomain.validators.UniqueValidator.<init>(UniqueValidator.java:49) ~[UniqueValidator.class:na]
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method) [na:1.6.0_20]
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:39) [na:1.6.0_20]
at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:27) [na:1.6.0_20]
at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:513) [na:1.6.0_20]
at org.springframework.beans.BeanUtils.instantiateClass(BeanUtils.java:126) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.SimpleInstantiationStrategy.instantiate(SimpleInstantiationStrategy.java:74) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.instantiateBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:958) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBeanInstance(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:911) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.doCreateBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:485) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:456) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:286) [spring-beans-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.validation.beanvalidation.SpringConstraintValidatorFactory.getInstance(SpringConstraintValidatorFactory.java:50) [spring-context-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ConstraintTree.createAndInitializeValidator(ConstraintTree.java:192) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ConstraintTree.getInitializedValidator(ConstraintTree.java:171) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ConstraintTree.validateConstraints(ConstraintTree.java:113) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.metadata.MetaConstraint.validateConstraint(MetaConstraint.java:121) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ValidatorImpl.validateConstraint(ValidatorImpl.java:334) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ValidatorImpl.validateConstraintsForRedefinedDefaultGroup(ValidatorImpl.java:278) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ValidatorImpl.validateConstraintsForCurrentGroup(ValidatorImpl.java:260) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ValidatorImpl.validateInContext(ValidatorImpl.java:213) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.hibernate.validator.engine.ValidatorImpl.validate(ValidatorImpl.java:119) [hibernate-validator-4.0.2.GA.jar:4.0.2.GA]
at org.springframework.validation.beanvalidation.SpringValidatorAdapter.validate(SpringValidatorAdapter.java:86) [spring-context-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.validation.DataBinder.validate(DataBinder.java:692) [spring-context-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.support.HandlerMethodInvoker.doBind(HandlerMethodInvoker.java:807) [spring-web-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.support.HandlerMethodInvoker.resolveHandlerArguments(HandlerMethodInvoker.java:359) [spring-web-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.web.bind.annotation.support.HandlerMethodInvoker.invokeHandlerMethod(HandlerMethodInvoker.java:171) [spring-web-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.annotation.AnnotationMethodHandlerAdapter.invokeHandlerMethod(AnnotationMethodHandlerAdapter.java:426) [spring-webmvc-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]
at org.springframework.web.servlet.mvc.annotation.AnnotationMethodHandlerAdapter.handle(AnnotationMethodHandlerAdapter.java:414) [spring-webmvc-3.0.5.RELEASE.jar:3.0.5.RELEASE]

Transactional configuration appears to be correct (the STS IDE reports that the isValid() method is properly advised by the transactional manager by org.springframework.transaction.interceptor.TransactionInterceptor.invoke (with an @Component annotation on the Validator itself)), but my understanding is that if the validation bean is created outside the normal lifecycle of the Spring container, then the advice will not be properly applied when validation is done during data binding.

Answer 1

have you added the

<tx:annotation-driven/>

code into your configuration?