Java servlet - Session cleanup (HttpServletRequest)

Question

General question about java servlets and the best way to handle requests. If I hit my doGet method from a remote server request:

protected void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException
{
  ....
  <do work here>
  ....
  kill(request);
}

private void kill(HttpServletRequest request) {
//How do I kill the user session here?
}

After I process the request at my end and generate my output to the requester, I want to basically "kill" their session. Currently, that session lingers and thus eats up memory. Then once the max is reached, all other calls are timed out.

I tried creating a HttpSession object using the request object, but got the same results:

HttpSession session = request.getSession();
session.invalidate();

Answer 1

HttpSession session = request.getSession(false);
if (session != null) {
    session.invalidate();
}

is the proper way to go as suggested by the documentation. A new session will be created once the client sends a new request.

You mentioned that your sessions still take up memory. Do you have any other references to those objects on the session?

You also might want to have a look at: Servlet Session behavior and Session.invalidate