[FIXED] Auditing fields not automatically filled by JPA in Spring Boot

Issue

I have the following entity, which reflects some kind of background task and gonna be updated. I thought using the JPA auditing would be useful so I included it like this:

@Entity
@RequiredArgsConstructor
@Getter
@Setter
@Table(name = "FOO")
public class FooJob{
    @Id
    @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
    @Column(name = "ID", unique = true, nullable = false)
    private long id;

    @LastModifiedDate
    @Column(name = "FINISHED", nullable = false)
    private LocalDateTime finished;

    ...

}

@Repository
public interface FooJobRepository
    extends JpaRepository<FooJob, Long>,
        JpaSpecificationExecutor<FooJob> {}

and I have enabled the @EnableJpaAuditing on the spring-boot application

spring version:

<parent>
    <groupId>org.springframework.boot</groupId>
    <artifactId>spring-boot-starter-parent</artifactId>
    <version>2.5.0</version>
    <relativePath />
</parent>

But when running the code like this:

@Service
@Transactional
/*package*/ class FooJobService{
   public void run() {
     FooJob job = createJob();
     ....
   }

   private FooJob createJob(){
      FooJob job = new FooJob();
      job.setSomeValue("123");
      //Do not set "finished" date here
      repo.saveAndFlush(job); //THIS LINE THROWS EXCEPTION
   }
}

Ill get the following exception:

org.springframework.dao.DataIntegrityViolationException: not-null property references a null or transient value : my.package.entity.FooJob.finished; nested exception is org.hibernate.PropertyValueException: not-null property references a null or transient value : my.package.entity.FooJob.finished

Why does this not work?

Solution

Add this to Entity if you only update finished date:

@EntityListeners(AuditingEntityListener.class)

Answered By - Miguel Angel
Answer Checked By - Cary Denson (JavaFixing Admin)