JPA Basics

Topics

  • What is and Why O/R Mapper (ORM)? 
  • Why JPA? 
  • Java Persistence Requirements 
  • JPA O/R Mapping 
  • What is an entity?
  • Entity Manager 
  • Persistence context 
  • Persistence unit

What is and Why use O/R Mapper (ORM)?

Why Object/Relational Mapping (ORM)?

  • A major part of any enterprise application development project is the persistence layer
    • Accessing and manipulating persistent data typically with relational database
  • ORM handles Object-relational impedance mismatch
    • Data lives in the relational database, which is table driven (with rows and columns)
    • Relational database is designed for fast query operation of tabledriven data
    • We (Java developers) want to work with objects, not rows and columns of table, however

Why JPA?

  • Standard ORM framework for Java platform 
  • Enables transparent POJO persistence 
    • Let you work without being constrained by table-driven relational database model handles Object-Relational impedance mismatch 
    • Like Hibernate 
  • Lets you build persistent objects with common OO programing concepts 
    • Inheritance, Polymorphism

Java Persistence Requirements

Java Persistence Requirements (1)

  • Simplify the persistence programming 
    • Default over configuration (Convention over configuration) 
    • Eliminate the need of the XML-based deployment descriptor 
  • Provide light-weight persistence model 
    • In both programming model and deployment 
    • Runtime performance 
  • Enable testability outside of the containers 
    • Enables test-driven development 
    • Test entities as part of nightly-build process

Java Persistence Requirements (2)

  • Support rich domain modelling 
    • Support inheritance and polymorphism among entities 
  • Provide standardized and efficient ORM 
    • Optimized for relational database 
    • Standardize annotations and XML configuration files 
  • Provide extensive querying capabilities 
    • Comparable to Hibernate query capabilities 
  • Support for pluggable, third-party persistence providers 
    • Through persistence unit - represented by persistence.xml

Common Java Persistence Between J2SE and J2EE Environments

  • Persistence API expanded to include use outside of EJB container 
  • Evolved into “common” Java persistence API between Java SE and Java EE apps 
    • You can use Java persistence API (JPA) in Java SE, Web, and EJB applications

O/R Mapping

O/R Mapping Annotations

  • Comprehensive set of annotations defined for mapping 
    • Relationships 
    • Joins 
    • Database tables and columns 
    • Much more

An Example Data Model

 An Example Data Model

Maps entity state to data store

Maps relationship to other entities

Simple Mapping

Simple Mapping

Mapping defaults to matching column name. Only configure if entity field and table column names are different. (By the way, @Lob is for large object)

What is an Entity?

  • Plain Old Java Object (POJO) 
    • Created by means of new keyword just like a normal Java class 
    • Supports OO programming model -inheritance, polymorphic relationship 
  • May be in either persistent (managed) or non-persistent state (nonmanaged) 
    • Example of non-persistent state is “transient” state 
  • Have persistent identity 
    • When it is in managed state 
  • Can extend other entity and non-entity classes 
    • Inheritance 
  • Serializable; usable as detached objects in other tiers 
    • No need for Data Transfer Objects (DTOs) anymore

Entity Class (@Entity)

  • Annotated with @Entity 
  • Can extend another entity 
  • Programming requirement 
    • Must have a primary key field 
    • Must have a public no-arg constructor 
    • Instance variables must not be public 
    • Must not be final or have final methods

Default Mapping

  • Entity name → table name (customizable via @Table) 
  • Attribute name → column name (customizable via @Column) 
  • Data type mapping (some differences among databases) 
    • String → VARCHAR(255) 
    • Long, long → BIGINT 
    • Double, double → DOUBLE 
    • Boolean → SMALLINT

Entity Example

@Entity
public class Customer implements Serializable {
@Id protected Long id;
protected String name;
@Embedded protected Address address;
protected PreferredStatus status;
@Transient protected int orderCount;
public Customer() {}
public Long getId() {return id;}
protected void setId(Long id) {this.id = id;}
public String getName() {return name;}
public void setName(String name) {this.name = name;}
…
}

Entity Identity (@Id, @GeneratedValue)

  • Every entity has a persistence identity 
    • Maps to primary key in database 
  • Can correspond to simple type 
    • @Id—single field/property in entity class 
    • @GeneratedValue—value can be generated automatically using various strategies 
      • AUTO - Choose type depending on database, e.g. IDENTITY for MySQL 
      • IDENTITY - using a database identity column. 
      • SEQUENCE - using a database sequence 
      • TABLE - Use a sequence table for key generation (most portable)

Lab: Exercise 1: JPA Basic Annotations 4320_jpa_basics.zip

@Transient

Use it for any attribute that does not map to a column

@Entity
@Table(name="my_own_employee_table")
public class Employee {

 @Id
 private int id;
 @Column(name="my_name")
 private String name;
 @Column(name="my_bonus")
 private long salary;
 @Transient
 private Double bonus;
 @Transient
 private Boolean b;

@Temporal

Use it to map Date or Calendar attribute

@Entity
public class Employee {
 @Id
 private int id;
 @Temporal(TemporalType.DATE)
 @Column(name = "my_birthday")
 private Date dateOfBirth;
 @Temporal(TemporalType.TIME)
 private Date currentTime;
 @Temporal(TemporalType.TIMESTAMP)
 private Calendar dateOfHiring;

@Enumerated

Use it to map enum

public enum EmployeeType {
 ADMIN,
 MANAGER,
 OFFICER }
@Entity
@Table(name="my_own_employee_table")
public class Employee {

 //@Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
 @Enumerated(EnumType.ORDINAL)
 private EmployeeType employeeType;

Lab: Exercise 2: JPA Misc. Annotations 4320_jpa_basics.zip

Entity Manager & Persistence Context & Persistence Unit

Key Concepts of JPA Operations

  • Entity manager 
  • Persistence context 
  • Persistence unit

What is EntityManager?

  • Manages the state and life-cycle of entities 
    • Creates and removes entity instances within the persistence context 
  • Handles querying entities within a persistence context 
    • Performs finding entities via their primary keys 
  • Lock entities 
  • Accessible through EntityManager Java interface 
    • The life-cycle operations are defined in the EntityManager interface 
  • Similar in functionality to Hibernate Session

Types of Entity Managers

  • #1: Application-Created Entity Manager (Java SE environment) 
    • Entity manager is created and managed by the application 
  • #2: Container-Created Entity Manager (Java EE environment) 
    • Entity manager is created and managed by the Container 
    • Entity manager will be provided to the application via dependency injection

#1: Application Created EM (Java SE)

public static void main(String[] args) {
 // Application is responsible for explicitly obtaining Entity Manager
 // and life-cycle of it
 EntityManagerFactory emf =
 Persistence.createEntityManagerFactory("EmployeeService");
 EntityManager em = emf.createEntityManager();

 Collection emps = em.createQuery("SELECT e FROM Employee e")
 .getResultList();
 // Some code
 em.close();
 emf.close();

#2: Container-Created EM (Java EE)

@Stateless
public class OrderEntry {

// Entity Manager is created & injected by the container.
@PersistenceContext
EntityManager em;
public void enterOrder(int custID, Order newOrder){
 // Use find method to locate customer entity
 Customer c = em.find(Customer.class, custID);
 // Add a new order to the Orders
 c.getOrders().add(newOrder);
 newOrder.setCustomer(c);
 }
// No need to close EntityManager
}

Persistence Context & Entity Manager

  • Persistence context 
    • Represents a set of managed entity instances at runtime 
    • “Entity instance is in managed state” means it is contained in a particular persistent context 
    • All entity instances in a particular persistent context behaves in a consistent manner – for example, all changed entity instances will be persisted to the database table next commit or flush 
  • Entity manager 
    • Manages persistence context 
    • Performs life-cycle operations on entities maintained in the persistence context

Manipulation of Entities (in the PersistenceContext) via EntityManager

Persist Operation

public Order createNewOrder(Customer customer) {
 // Create new object instance – entity is in transient state
Order order = new Order(customer);
 // After persist() method is called upon the entity,
 // the entity state is changed to managed. In other
 // words, the entity is added to the persistence context.
 // On the next flush or commit, the newly persisted
 // instances will be inserted into the database table.
entityManager.persist(order);
return order;
} 

Find and Remove Operations

public void removeOrder(Long orderId) {
Order order =
 // Try to find an entity in the persistence context
 entityManager.find(Order.class, orderId);
 // The instances will be deleted from the the
 // persistence context first.
 // And on the next flush or commit, corresponding
 // row will be deleted from the database table.
entityManager.remove(order);
}

EntityManager Methods

  • void persist(Object entity) – makes an instance managed (i.e. persistent) 
  • void remove(Object entity) - removes the entity from the persistence context (when the transaction is committed or persistence context is flushed, the corresponding row in the table is also removed – difference from “detach”) 
  • void detach(Object entity) - detaches the entity from the persistence context 
  • entity = merge(Object entity) - synchronize the state of detached entity, making it managed again, returns it 
  • void refresh(Object entity) - reloads state from the database 
  • find(Class entityClass, Object primaryKey) - find an entity 
  • void flush() - synchronize the persistence context to the underlying database 
  • void clear() - clears the persistence context, causing all managed entities to become detached 
  • boolean contains(Object entity) - checks if the instance belongs to the current persistence context

Lab: Exercise 3: Life cycle methods jpa_basics_lifecycle 4320_jpa_basics.zip

Persistence Unit

What is Persistence Unit?

  • Entity manager handles the communication to the database through a persistence provider 
  • When Entity manager is created either by Application or Container, configuration information is needed for configuring the persistence manager 
    • In the same way, your JDBC application need to have configuration information 
  • The configuration data is called “Persistence Unit” 
  • Represented by persistence.xml 
    • Every JPA application has to have a persistence.xml file 
    • Located under /META-INF

What Info. Does Persistence Unit Define?

  • Name of the persistence unit 
  • Transaction type 
    • “RESOURCE_LOCAL” for application-managed environment 
    • “JTA” for container-managed environment 
  • Persistence provider class 
  • Entity classes (only for Java SE application) 
  • Table generation strategy 
  • Database related 
    • “Database connection properties” for application-managed environment 
    • “Datasource” for container-managed environment (since Datasource already captures the database connection information) – datasources are created and managed separately

Persistence.xml (JPA 1.0) - for Application Managed environment

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<persistence version="1.0" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/persistence">
 <persistence-unit name="EmployeeService" transaction-type="RESOURCE_LOCAL">
 <provider>oracle.toplink.essentials.PersistenceProvider</provider>
 <class>entities.Employee</class>
 <properties>
 <property name="toplink.jdbc.driver" value="org.apache.derby.jdbc.ClientDriver"/>
 <property name="toplink.jdbc.url" value="jdbc:derby://localhost:1527/testdb"/>
 <property name="toplink.jdbc.user" value="app"/>
 <property name="toplink.jdbc.password" value="app"/>
 <!-- enable this property to see SQL and other logging -->
 <!-- property name="toplink.logging.level" value="FINE"/ -->
 <property name="toplink.ddl-generation" value="drop-and-create-tables"/>
 </properties>
 </persistence-unit>
</persistence>

Persistence.xml (JPA 1.0) - for Container Managed environment

<persistence version="1.0" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/persistence">
 <persistence-unit name="jsf-jpa-war" transaction-type="JTA">
 <jta-data-source>jdbc/__default</jta-data-source>
 <properties>
 <!-- use this property if target server is GlassFish V3 with EclipseLink -->
 <property name="eclipselink.ddl-generation" value="drop-and-create-tables"/>
 <!-- use this property if toplink is a target server persistence provider
 <property name="toplink.ddl-generation" value="drop-and-create-tables"/> -->
 </properties>
 </persistence-unit>
</persistence>

 

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