jpa - Hibernate: comparing current & previous record

Question

I want to compare the current value of an in-memory Hibernate entity with the value in the database:

HibernateSession sess = HibernateSessionFactory.getSession();
MyEntity newEntity = (MyEntity)sess.load(MyEntity.class, id);
newEntity.setProperty("new value");
MyEntity oldEntity = (MyEntity)sess.load(MyEntity.class, id);
// CODEBLOCK#1 evaluate differences between newEntity and oldEntity
sess.update(newEntity);    

In CODEBLOCK#1 I get that newEntity.getProperty()="new value" AND oldEntity.getProperty()="new value" (while I expected oldEntity.getProperty()="old value", of course). In fact the two objects are exactly the same in memory.

I messed around with HibernateSessionFactory.getSession().evict(newEntity) and attempted to set oldEntity=null to get rid of it (I need it only for the comparison):

HibernateSession sess = HibernateSessionFactory.getSession();
MyEntity newEntity = (MyEntity)sess.load(MyEntity.class, id);
newEntity.setProperty("new value");
HibernateSessionFactory.getSession().evict(newEntity);
MyEntity oldEntity = (MyEntity)sess.load(MyEntity.class, id);
// CODEBLOCK#1 evaluate differences between newEntity and oldEntity
oldEntity = null;
sess.update(newEntity);

and now the two entities are distinct, but of course I get the dreaded org.hibernate.NonUniqueObjectException: a different object with the same identifier value was already associated with the session.

Any idea?

EDIT: I tried the double session strategy; I modified my HibernateSessionFactory to implement a map of session and then...

Session session1 = HibernateSessionFactory.getSession(SessionKeys.DEFAULT);
Session session2 = HibernateSessionFactory.getSession(SessionKeys.ALTERNATE);
Entity newEntity = (Entity)entity;
newEntity.setNote("edited note");
Entity oldEntity = (Entity)session1.load(Entity.class, id);

System.out.println("NEW:" + newEntity.getNote());
System.out.println("OLD: " + oldEntity.getNote()); // HANGS HERE!!!

HibernateSessionFactory.closeSession(SessionKeys.ALTERNATE);

My unit test hangs while attempting to print the oldEntity note... :-(

Answer 1

Two easy options spring to mind:

1. Evict oldEntity before saving newEntity
2. Use session.merge() on oldEntity to replace the version in the session cache (newEntity) with the original (oldEntity)

EDIT: to elaborate a little, the problem here is that Hibernate keeps a persistence context, which is the objects being monitored as part of each session. You can't do update() on a detached object (one not in the context) while there's an attached object in the context. This should work:

HibernateSession sess = ...;
MyEntity oldEntity = (MyEntity) sess.load(...);
sess.evict(oldEntity); // old is now not in the session's persistence context
MyEntity newEntity = (MyEntity) sess.load(...); // new is the only one in the context now
newEntity.setProperty("new value");
// Evaluate differences
sess.update(newEntity); // saving the one that's in the context anyway = fine

and so should this:

HibernateSession sess = ...;
MyEntity newEntity = (MyEntity) sess.load(...);
newEntity.setProperty("new value");
sess.evict(newEntity); // otherwise load() will return the same object again from the context
MyEntity oldEntity = (MyEntity) sess.load(...); // fresh copy into the context
sess.merge(newEntity); // replaces old in the context with this one