Proper way of handling database connections in a medium sized web application

Question

I'm currently maintaining a small-medium sized java web application (using only plain JSPs/Servlets) that an intern made for internal company use and I'm having some trouble with connections.

Sometimes just out of nowhere, we get errors like "Statement is closed" or "Connection is closed" and then the whole application would just stop working and the server has to be restarted.

I don't have a lot of experience and I don't have anyone to mentor or teach me regarding best practices, design patterns, etc. but I'm pretty sure this is not the right way to do this. I've read about stuff like DALs, DAOs, and DTOs. Our app has none of those.

The whole web application (ie. the servlets) are basically filled with calls similar to the following:

Database db = Database.getInstance();
db.execute("INSERT INTO SomeTable VALUES (a, b, c)");
db.execute("UPDATE SomeTable SET Col = Val");

SELECTs are done like so:

ArrayList<Model> results = Model.fetch("SELECT * FROM SomeTable");

Where Model is a class that extends HashMap and represents a single Row in a Table.

This is the code for Database.java and was wondering if someone can point out obvious things that are wrong (I'm pretty sure there are a lot), any quick fixes that can be done and some resources on best practices with regards to database connections / connection handling.

package classes;

import java.sql.Connection;
import java.sql.PreparedStatement;
import java.sql.ResultSet;
import java.sql.ResultSetMetaData;
import java.sql.SQLException;
import java.sql.Statement;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.HashMap;

import javax.naming.InitialContext;
import javax.naming.NamingException;
import javax.sql.DataSource;

public final class Database {

    public static Database getInstance() {
        if (Database.instance == null) {
            Database.instance = new Database();
        }
        return Database.instance;
    }

    // Returns the results for an SQL SELECT query.
    public ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>> fetch(String sql) {

        ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>> results = new ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>>();

        try {

            PreparedStatement stmt = this.connection.prepareStatement(sql, ResultSet.TYPE_FORWARD_ONLY, ResultSet.CONCUR_READ_ONLY, ResultSet.HOLD_CURSORS_OVER_COMMIT);
            ResultSet rs = stmt.executeQuery();
            this.doFetch(rs, results);
            stmt.close();

        } catch (SQLException e) {
            this.handleException(e, sql);
        }

        return results;
    }

    public ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>> fetch(String sql, ArrayList<Object> parameters) {

        ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>> results = new ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>>();

        try {

            // Bind parameters to statement.
            PreparedStatement pstmt = this.connection.prepareStatement(sql, ResultSet.TYPE_FORWARD_ONLY, ResultSet.CONCUR_READ_ONLY, ResultSet.HOLD_CURSORS_OVER_COMMIT);
            for (int i=0; i<parameters.size(); i++) {
                pstmt.setObject(i+1, parameters.get(i));
            }

            ResultSet rs = pstmt.executeQuery();
            this.doFetch(rs, results);
            pstmt.close();

        } catch (SQLException e) {
            this.handleException(e, sql, parameters);
        }

        return results;
    }

    public int execute(String sql) {
        int result = 0;
        try {
            Statement stmt = this.connection.createStatement();
            result = stmt.executeUpdate(sql);
            stmt.close();
        } catch (SQLException e) {
            this.handleException(e, sql);
        }
        return result;
    }

    public int execute(String sql, ArrayList<Object> parameters) {
        int result = 0;
        try {
            PreparedStatement pstmt = this.connection.prepareStatement(sql, ResultSet.TYPE_FORWARD_ONLY, ResultSet.CONCUR_READ_ONLY, ResultSet.HOLD_CURSORS_OVER_COMMIT);
            for (int i=0; i<parameters.size(); i++) {
                if (parameters.get(i) == null) {
                    pstmt.setNull(i+1, java.sql.Types.INTEGER);
                } else {
                    pstmt.setObject(i+1, parameters.get(i));
                }
            }
            result = pstmt.executeUpdate();
            pstmt.close();
        } catch (SQLException e) {
            this.handleException(e, sql, parameters);
        }
        return result;
    }

    public void commit() {
        try {
            this.connection.commit();
        } catch (SQLException e) {
            System.out.println("Failed to commit transaction.");
        }
    }

    public Connection getConnection() {
        return this.connection;
    }


    private static Database instance;
    private static DataSource dataSource = null;
    private Connection connection;

    private Database() {
        this.connect();
        this.execute("SET SCHEMA " + Constant.DBSCHEMA);
    }

    private void connect() {
        Connection connection = null;
        if (dataSource == null) {
            try {
                InitialContext initialContext = new InitialContext();
                dataSource = (DataSource)initialContext.lookup(
                        Constant.DEPLOYED ? Constant.PROD_JNDINAME : Constant.TEST_JNDINAME);
            } catch (NamingException e) {
                e.printStackTrace();
            }
        }
        try {
            connection = dataSource.getConnection();
        } catch (SQLException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
        this.connection = connection;
    }

    // Fetches the results from the ResultSet into the given ArrayList.

    private void doFetch(ResultSet rs, ArrayList<HashMap<String, Object>> results) throws SQLException {
        ResultSetMetaData rsmd = rs.getMetaData();

        ArrayList<String> cols = new ArrayList<String>();           
        int numCols = rsmd.getColumnCount();

        for (int i=1; i<=numCols; i++) {
            cols.add(rsmd.getColumnName(i));
        }

        while (rs.next()) {
            HashMap<String, Object> result = new HashMap<String, Object>();
            for (int i=1; i<=numCols; i++) {
                result.put(cols.get(i-1), rs.getObject(i));
            }
            results.add(result);
        }

        rs.close();
    }

    private void handleException(SQLException e, String sql) {
        System.out.println("SQLException " + e.getErrorCode() + ": " + e.getMessage());
        System.out.println("Statement: " + sql);
        ExceptionAdapter ea = new ExceptionAdapter(e);
        ea.setSQLInfo(e, sql);
        throw ea;
    }

    private void handleException(SQLException e, String sql, ArrayList<Object> parameters) {
        if (parameters.size() < 100) {
            System.out.println("SQLException " + e.getErrorCode() + ": " + e.getMessage());
            System.out.println("PreparedStatement: " + sql.replace("?", "[?]"));
            System.out.println("Parameters: " + parameters.toString());
        }
        ExceptionAdapter ea = new ExceptionAdapter(e);
        ea.setSQLInfo(e, sql, parameters);
        throw ea;
    }
}

Thanks!

Answer 1

The class does never, ever close a connection: this.connection.close(). As Database is a Singleton the application does not make use of the connection pool (the datasource). Only one connection is used for all incoming requests.

Rule of thumb: get one connection per method (maybe per SQL statement). dataSource.getConnection() is not expensive.

This is how I would refactor the class:

1. remove the public getConnection method, if it used outside the Databaseclass you really have a design problem
2. remove the commit method. I suppose it does not make sense as connection.setAutoCommit(false) is never called and I don't see a rollback method
3. remove the instance variable connection, instead obtain a connection per call
4. and properly close this connection in the finally block of each call

Disclaimer: No idea how your transaction handling works at the moment, so I may be wrong with #2.

Sample code for a method to obtain a connection:

Connection c = null;
try {
    c = this.dataSource.getConnection();
    c.executeStatement("select * from dual");
} catch (SQLException e) {
    // handle...
} finally {
    closeConnection(c);
}

Interesting how this app can work at all :-)