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JPA: fetch posts with vote cast by a specific user

I need to load the Post entities along with the PostVote entity that represents the vote cast by a specific user (The currently logged in user). These are the two entities:
Post
#Entity
public class Post implements Serializable {
public enum Type {TEXT, IMG}
#Id
#GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
protected Integer id;
#ManyToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY, optional = false)
#JoinColumn(name = "section_id")
protected Section section;
#ManyToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY, optional = false)
#JoinColumn(name = "author_id")
protected User author;
#Column(length = 255, nullable = false)
protected String title;
#Column(columnDefinition = "TEXT", nullable = false)
protected String content;
#Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
#Column(nullable = false)
protected Type type;
#CreationTimestamp
#Column(nullable = false, updatable = false, insertable = false)
protected Instant creationDate;
/*accessor methods*/
}
PostVote
#Entity
public class PostVote implements Serializable {
#Embeddable
public static class Id implements Serializable{
#Column(name = "user_id", nullable = false)
protected int userId;
#Column(name = "post_id", nullable = false)
protected int postId;
/* hashcode, equals, getters, 2 args constructor */
}
#EmbeddedId
protected Id id;
#ManyToOne(optional = false)
#MapsId("postId")
protected Post post;
#ManyToOne(optional = false)
#MapsId("userId")
protected User user;
#Column(nullable = false)
protected Short vote;
/* accessor methods */
}
All the associations are unidirectional #*ToOne. The reason I don't use #OneToMany is because the collections are too large and need proper paging before being accessed: not adding the #*ToManyassociation to my entities means preventing anyone from naively doing something like for (PostVote pv : post.getPostVotes()).
For the problem i'm facing right now I've come with various solutions: none of them looks fully convincing to me.
1° solution
I could represent the #OneToMany association as a Map that can only be accessed by key. This way there is no issue caused by iterating over the collection.
#Entity
public class Post implements Serializable {
[...]
#OneToMany(mappedBy = "post")
#MapKeyJoinColumn(name = "user_id", insertable = false, updatable = false, nullable = false)
protected Map<User, PostVote> votesMap;
public PostVote getVote(User user){
return votesMap.get(user);
}
[...]
}
This solution looks very cool and close enough to DDD principles (i guess?). However, calling post.getVote(user) on each post would still cause a N+1 selects problem. If there was a way to efficiently prefetch some specific PostVotes for subsequent accesses in the session then it would be great. (Maybe for example calling from Post p left join fetch PostVote pv on p = pv.post and pv.user = :user and then storing the result in the L1 cache. Or maybe something that involves EntityGraph)
2° solution
A simplistic solution could be the following:
public class PostVoteRepository extends AbstractRepository<PostVote, PostVote.Id> {
public PostVoteRepository() {
super(PostVote.class);
}
public Map<Post, PostVote> findByUser(User user, List<Post> posts){
return em.createQuery("from PostVote pv where pv.user in :user and pv.post in :posts", PostVote.class)
.setParameter("user",user)
.setParameter("posts", posts)
.getResultList().stream().collect(Collectors.toMap(
res -> res.getPost(),
res -> res
));
}
}
The service layer takes the responsability of calling both PostRepository#fetchPosts(...) and then PostVoteRepository#findByUser(...), then mixes the results in a DTO to send to the presentation layer above.
This is the solution I'm currently using. However, I don't feel like having a ~50 parameters long in clause might be a good idea. Also, having a separate Repository class for PostVote may be a bit overkill and break the purpose of ORMs.
3° solution
I haven't tested it so it might have an incorrect syntax, but the idea is to wrap the Post and PostVote entity in a VotedPost DTO.
public class VotedPost{
private Post post;
private PostVote postVote;
public VotedPost(Post post, PostVote postVote){
this.post = post;
this.postVote = postVote;
}
//getters
}
I obtain the object with a query like this:
select new my.pkg.VotedPost(p, pv) from Post p
left join fetch PostVote pv on p = pv.post and pv.user = :user
This gives me more type safeness than the the solutions based on Object[] or Tuple query results. Looks like a better alternative than the solution 2 but adopting the solution 1 in a efficient way would be the best.
What is, generally, the best approach in problems like this? I'm using Hibernate as JPA implementation.

I could imagine the standard bi-directional association using #OneToMany being a maintainable yet performant solution.
To mitigate n+1 selects, one could use e.g.:
#EntityGraph, to specify which associated data is to be loaded (e.g. one user with all of it's posts and all associated votes within one single select query)
Hibernates #BatchSize, e.g. to load votes for multiple posts at once when iterating over all posts of a user, instead having one query for each collection of votes of each post
When it comes to restricting users to perform accesses in less performant ways, I'd argue that it should be up the API to document possible performance impacts and offer performant alternatives for different use-cases.
(As a user of an API one might always find ways to implement things in the least performant fashion:)

JPA #Query to count how many relations each object has

I've been trying to get a query inside a join table for a many to many relation working. The query was meant to count how many users follow a specific game. The entity itself is very simple, looks like this:
#Entity
#Table(name = "followed_users_games", uniqueConstraints = {
#UniqueConstraint(columnNames = "followed_id")
})
public class FollowedEntity {
#Id
#GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.SEQUENCE)
#Column(name = "followed_id", unique = true, nullable = false)
private Integer followedId;
#ManyToOne
#JoinColumn(name = "game_id")
private GameEntity games;
#ManyToOne
#JoinColumn(name = "user_id")
private UserEntity users;
#Column(name = "notify")
#NonNull private Boolean notify;
}
And the query I've been trying to get running looks like so
#Query("select f.gameId, count(f) as usercount from FollowedEntity f group by f.games.gameId order by usercount desc")
List<GameEntity> findMostFollowed(Pageable pageable);
I have tested the query on my database itself, and it seems to be working fine. However my application returns an error as such:
org.postgresql.util.PSQLException: ERROR: column "gameentity1_.game_id" must appear in the GROUP BY clause or be used in an aggregate function
Any help would be appreciated.

It looks like you have to use join in your query like
#Query(value = "SELECT g.gameId, COUNT(g) as usercount FROM FollowedEntity f JOIN f.games g GROUP By g.gameId ORDER BY usercount DESC")
List<GameEntity> findMostFollowed(Pageable pageable);

You try to map a pair (game_id, count) to the whole GameEntity that has a different structure, that's why sql query that is generated is not what you expect.
What can probably help you is mapping your query result to DTO.
Every time when you have an issue like this I would recommend to have a look at SQL query that JPA is generating. See, e.g., https://www.baeldung.com/sql-logging-spring-boot

How to prevent additional query for OneToOne relation

I have tables:
users (id, name, email, password)
user_statuses (user_id, is_premium, is_advanced, user_rank_id)
user_ranks (id, name, ordinal)
So the relation between User and UserStatus is 1-1, and I have following entity clasess:
#Entity
#Table(name = "users")
#Getter
#Setter
#NoArgsConstructor
public class User {
#Id
#GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
private long id;
private String name;
private String email;
private String password;
#OneToOne(mappedBy = "user", cascade = CascadeType.ALL, fetch = FetchType.LAZY)
private UserStatus status;
}
#Entity
#Table(name = "user_statuses")
#Getter
#Setter
#NoArgsConstructor
public class UserStatus {
#Id
private long id;
#MapsId
#OneToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY)
#JoinColumn(name = "user_id")
private User user;
private boolean isPremium;
private boolean isAdvanced;
#ManyToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY)
#JoinColumn(name = "user_rank_id")
private UserRank rank;
}
#Entity
#Table(name = "user_ranks")
#Getter
#Setter
#NoArgsConstructor
public class UserRank {
#Id
#GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
private long id;
private String name;
private int ordinal;
}
Then i created endpoint "/users/{id}" which should return user's email address as a string:
#GetMapping("/users/{id}")
public String getUserEmail(#PathVariable("id") long userId) {
User user = service.getUser(userId);
return user.getEmail();
}
When I call above endpoint I get user's email address as a response, however looking at the console log I see that hibernate executed 2 queries but noone asked him to do so:
First one for fetching the user:
SELECT
user0_.id AS id1_2_0_,
user0_.email AS email2_2_0_,
user0_.name AS name3_2_0_,
user0_.password AS password4_2_0_
FROM
users user0_
WHERE
user0_.id = 1;
And second one for fetching User Status that is associated with this User object:
SELECT
userstatus0_.user_id AS user_id1_1_0_,
userstatus0_.is_advanced AS is_advan2_1_0_,
userstatus0_.is_premium AS is_premi3_1_0_,
userstatus0_.user_rank_id AS user_ran4_1_0_
FROM
user_statuses userstatus0_
WHERE
userstatus0_.user_id = 1;
So I am confused: Why is hibernate running second query when I set fetch = FetchType.LAZY on each relation... It looks like that LAZY is ignored for #OneToOne annotation?
I do not use EntityGraph.
How to stop hibernate for running second query?
EDIT
So, it turns out Hibernate ignores my Lazy hint because it needs to decide should it initialize property with NULL or ProxyObject which makes sense. This link explains it well:
https://thorben-janssen.com/hibernate-tip-lazy-loading-one-to-one/
However this link also suggests that the best way to model this is Unidirectional One to One and it says that I can always fetch UserStatus based on User's ID (because both tables "shares" primary key)
However this confuses me a little bit, because I can fetch both rows using single query (SELECT * FROM users LEFT JOIN user_statuses ON users.id = user_statuses.user_id), but with approach described in the link I need 2 queries, and as far as I know (which I might be wrong) is 1 query is better than executing 2 queries, also if I want to fetch 25 users and their User Statuses, then I would also need 2 queries, one for fetching users and then fetching corespoinding user statuses and finally write nested for each loops to join these objects. I could have just executed one single query to fetch everything...

It is possible to make OTO lazy even if it's not the owning side. You just need to mark it as optional = false. This way Hibernate will know that it can safely a create proxy (and null is not possible) as the association always exists. Note, though it really must be non-optional - the 2nd entity must always exist. Otherwise you'll get an exception once Hibernate tries to load it lazily.
As for the number of queries, with native Hibernate (not JPA!) you can select org.hibernate.annotations.FetchMode. Which gives options to:
Use a separate select
Or use a join to load association
Alternatively, you can stay with JPA and write a JPQL query and use fetch join to keep it as a single query.
PS: before doing additional select Hibernate will check if the element already exists within the Session. If it is, then no select is going to be issued. But with fetch join or FetchMode.JOIN you won't have this luxury - join will always happen.

For one to one relation in hibernate it is always loading reference object whether you keep Fetch type Lazy or Eager. So alternate solution is select only those columns which are needed, it should not contain that reference column. So in this case hibernate will not fire another query.
Query for below class will be :
#Query("select new Example(id,field1) from Example")
#Entity
#Table(name = "example")
class Example implements Serializable {
private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
public Example(Long id, String field1) {
this.id = id;
this.field1 = field1;
}
#Id
#Column(name = "id", nullable = false, updatable = false)
private Long id;
#OneToOne(mappedBy = "example", fetch = LAZY, cascade = ALL)
private CustomerDetails customerDetails;
#Column(name = "field1", nullable = false, updatable = false)
private String field1;
}

Hibernate fetching object linked to current user

I'm currently a little blocked with this and I can't see it clearly.
So I hope one of you have good idea's to help me.
The important code at the moment :
#Entity
#Table(name = "T_NOTA_RECIPIENT")
public class NotaRecipient extends PersistentEntity {
#Id
#Column(name = "NOTA_RECIPIENT_SID")
#GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.AUTO)
private Integer id;
#Column(name = "STATUS", insertable = true, updatable = true)
#Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
private Status status = Status.NEW;
#ManyToOne
#JoinColumn(name = "NOTA_SID", referencedColumnName = "NOTA_SID", nullable = false)
private Nota nota;
#ManyToOne
#JoinColumn(name = "CREATOR_OFFICE_SID", referencedColumnName = "OFFICE_SID", nullable = false)
private Office creator;
#OneToMany(fetch = FetchType.EAGER, mappedBy = "notaRecipient")
private Set<FollowUp> followUps;
...
}
Now, actually I don't want to load all the FollowUp who are in the DB but just the one of the current user.
But the problem is that I want to include the FollowUp so I can do database paging query.
We use hibernate, Spring Data and Query DSL with BooleanBuilder to "refine" our search.
I was thinking of using #Formula but this need to be a constant String so I can't include current userId in that.
Second solution could be setting the FollowUp as #Transient and fetch it myself in the DB and set it in mine service.
Problem here is that I can't use it as filter then or ordering by it.
#Formula doesn't have so much documentation, so is it possible to make a #Transient user and use that in the #Formula?
I asked some colleagues but they couldn't help me.
So then it's the time for asking here.
I can get the current user in the API, so that's no problem.
Anybody have alternative solutions?

You can define a mapping with expression
#JoinColumnOrFormula(formula=#JoinFormula(value="(SELECT f.id
FROM follow_up_table f
WHERE f.nota_id=id
and f.user_id={USER_ID})",
referencedColumnName="...")
And then add hibernate interceptor (see the example) and change the SQL on fly replacing {USER_ID} with real value in the
/**
* Called when sql string is being prepared.
* #param sql sql to be prepared
* #return original or modified sql
*/
public String onPrepareStatement(String sql);

Is this an N+1 problem and how do I fix it?

I have a list of projects and a list of customers. A project can be for one customer and every customer can have many projects. So it's a simple 1:n relationship where the project is the owning side.
Simplified to the essential it is
#Entity
public class Project {
#Id
long id;
#ManyToOne(optional = true)
#JoinColumn(name = "customer", nullable = true, updatable = true)
Customer customer;
}
#Entity
public class Customer {
#Id
long id;
}
When I load a list of projects, I want to retrieve the customers efficiently at the same time. This is not the case. There is one single query for the projects and then for every distinct customer that is encountered a separate query is issued.
So say I have 100 projects that are assigned to 50 different customers. This would result in one query for the projects and 50 queries for the customers.
This quickly adds up and for large project/customer lists our application gets rather slow. Also this is just one example. All our entities with relationships are affected by this behavior.
I already tried #Fetch(FetchMode.JOIN) on the customers field as suggested here but it does nothing and FetchMode.SUBQUERY is not applicable according to Hibernate:
org.hibernate.AnnotationException: Use of FetchMode.SUBSELECT not allowed on ToOne associations
How can I fix this problem?

If you are using Spring Data JPA to implement your repositories, you can specify lazy fetching in the JPA entities:
#Entity
public class Project {
#Id
long id;
#ManyToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY, optional = true)
#JoinColumn(name = "customer", nullable = true, updatable = true)
Customer customer;
}
#Entity
public class Customer {
#Id
long id;
...
}
And add #EntityGraph to your Spring Data JPA-based repository:
#Repository
public interface ProjectDao extends JpaRepository<Project, Long> {
#EntityGraph(
type = EntityGraphType.FETCH,
attributePaths = {
"customer"
}
)
Optional<Project> findById(Long id);
...
}
My blog post at https://tech.asimio.net/2020/11/06/Preventing-N-plus-1-select-problem-using-Spring-Data-JPA-EntityGraph.html helps you preventing the N+1 select problem using Spring Data JPA and #EntityGraph.

Yes, it is a by-the-book example of the n+1 selects problem.
The approach I use in most cases is to make the association lazy and define a batch size.
Alternatively, you could use a JPQL query with [left] join fetch to initialize the association directly from the query result set:
select p from Project p left join fetch p.customer

Yes, it is a by-the-book example of the n+1 selects problem as #dragan-bozanovic said.
In Spring-Boot 2.1.3 #Fetch(FetchMode.JOIN) can be used to solve it:
#ManyToOne(optional = true)
#Fetch(FetchMode.JOIN)
#JoinColumn(name = "customer", nullable = true, updatable = true)
Customer customer;
Warning: If the relationship can be invalid, for example when marked with #NotFound(action = NotFoundAction.IGNORE), each invalid relationship will trigger another SELECT query.