Hibernate Interview Questions and Answers
Freshers / Beginner level questions & answers
Ques 1. What is Hibernate?
Ques 2. What is ORM?
ORM stands for Object/Relational mapping. It is the programmed and mapping of objects in a Java application in to the tables of a relational database using the metadata that describes the mapping between the objects and the database. It works by transforming the data from one representation to another.
Ques 3. What does an ORM solution comprises of?
Hibernate should have an language or API for performing basic CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations on objects of persistent classes where persistent means POJO classes that you create that represent the table in database to keep the state of object alive.
Ques 4. What are the different levels of ORM quality?
Four levels defined for ORM quality:
- Pure relational
- Light object mapping
- Medium object mapping
- Full object mapping
Ques 5. What is a pure relational ORM?
The entire application including the user interface is designed around the relational model and SQL based relational operations where Model and Database will be mapped through hbm.xml configuration files or annotations and can execute SQL operations using Model Objects.
Ques 6. Why do you need ORM tools like hibernate?
The main advantage of ORM like hibernate is that it shields developers from messy SQL. Apart from this, ORM provides following benefits:
► Improved productivity
* High-level object-oriented API
* Less Java code to write
* No SQL to write
► Improved performance
* Sophisticated caching
* Eager loading
► Improved maintainability
* A lot less code to write
► Improved portability
* ORM framework generates database-specific SQL for you
Ques 7. What is a meant by light object mapping?
The entities are represented as classes that are mapped manually to the relational tables. The code is hidden from the business logic using specific design patterns. This approach is successful for applications with a less number of entities, or applications with common, metadata-driven data models. This approach is most known to all.
Ques 8. What is a meant by medium object mapping?
The application is designed around an object model. The SQL code is generated at build time. And the associations between objects are supported by the persistence mechanism, and queries are specified using an object-oriented expression language. This is best suited for medium-sized applications with some complex transactions. Used when the mapping exceeds 25 different database products at a time.
Ques 9. What is meant by full object mapping?
Full object mapping supports sophisticated object modeling: composition, inheritance, polymorphism and persistence. The persistence layer implements transparent persistence; persistent classes do not inherit any special base class or have to implement a special interface. Efficient fetching strategies and caching strategies are implemented transparently to the application.
Ques 10. What are the benefits of ORM and Hibernate?
There are many benefits from these. Out of which the following are the most important one.
Productivity : Hibernate reduces the burden of developer by providing much of the functionality and let the developer to concentrate on business logic.
Maintainability :As hibernate provides most of the functionality, the LOC for the application will be reduced and it is easy to maintain. By automated object/relational persistence it even reduces the LOC.
Performance : Hand-coded persistence provided greater performance than automated one. But this is not true all the times. But in hibernate, it provides more optimization that works all the time there by increasing the performance. If it is automated persistence then it still increases the performance.
Vendor independence : Irrespective of the different types of databases that are there, hibernate provides a much easier way to develop a cross platform application.
Ques 11. What the Core interfaces are of hibernate framework?
There are many benefits from these. Out of which the following are the most important one.
Session Interface : This is the primary interface used by hibernate applications. The instances of this interface are lightweight and are inexpensive to create and destroy. Hibernate sessions are not thread safe.
SessionFactory Interface : This is a factory that delivers the session objects to hibernate application. Generally there will be a single SessionFactory for the whole application and it will be shared among all the application threads.
Configuration Interface : This interface is used to configure and bootstrap hibernate. The instance of this interface is used by the application in order to specify the location of hibernate specific mapping documents.
Transaction Interface : This is an optional interface but the above three interfaces are mandatory in each and every application. This interface abstracts the code from any kind of transaction implementations such as JDBC transaction, JTA transaction.
Query and Criteria Interface : This interface allows the user to perform queries and also control the flow of the query execution.
Ques 12. What should SessionFactory be placed so that it can be easily accessed?
As far as it is compared to J2EE environment, if the SessionFactory is placed in JNDI then it can be easily accessed and shared between different threads and various components that are hibernate aware. You can set the SessionFactory to a JNDI by configuring a property hibernate.session_factory_name in the hibernate.properties file.
Ques 13. What are POJOs?
POJO stands for plain old java objects. These are just basic JavaBeans that have defined setter and getter methods for all the properties that are there in that bean. Besides they can also have some business logic related to that property. Hibernate applications works efficiently with POJOs rather then simple java classes.
Ques 14. What is object/relational mapping metadata?
ORM tools require a metadata format for the application to specify the mapping between classes and tables, properties and columns, associations and foreign keys, Java types and SQL types. This information is called the object/relational mapping metadata. It defines the transformation between the different data type systems and relationship representations.
Ques 15. What is HQL?
HQL stands for Hibernate Query Language. Hibernate allows the user to express queries in its own portable SQL extension and this is called as HQL. It also allows the user to express in native SQL.
Ques 16. What are the most common methods of Hibernate configuration?
The most common methods of Hibernate configuration are:
* Programmatic configuration
* XML configuration (hibernate.cfg.xml)
Ques 17. What are the important tags of hibernate.cfg.xml?
An Action Class is an adapter between the contents of an incoming HTTP request and the corresponding business logic that should be executed to process this request.
Ques 18. What role does the Session interface play in Hibernate?
The Session interface is the primary interface used by Hibernate applications. It is a single-threaded, short-lived object representing a conversation between the application and the persistent store. It allows you to create query objects to retrieve persistent objects.
Session session = sessionFactory.openSession();
Session interface role:
* Wraps a JDBC connection
* Factory for Transaction
* Holds a mandatory (first-level) cache of persistent objects, used when navigating the object graph or looking up objects by identifier
Ques 19. What role does the SessionFactory interface play in Hibernate?
The application obtains Session instances from a SessionFactory. There is typically a single SessionFactory for the whole application created during application initialization. The SessionFactory caches generate SQL statements and other mapping metadata that Hibernate uses at runtime. It also holds cached data that has been read in one unit of work and may be reused in a future unit of work.
SessionFactory sessionFactory = configuration.buildSessionFactory();
Ques 20. What is the general flow of Hibernate communication with RDBMS?
The general flow of Hibernate communication with RDBMS is :
* Load the Hibernate configuration file and create configuration object. It will automatically load all hbm mapping files
* Create session factory from configuration object
* Get one session from this session factory
* Create HQL Query
* Execute query to get list containing Java objects
Ques 21. What is Hibernate Query Language (HQL)?
Hibernate offers a query language that embodies a very powerful and flexible mechanism to query, store, update, and retrieve objects from a database. This language, the Hibernate query Language (HQL), is an object-oriented extension to SQL.
Ques 22. How do you map Java Objects with Database tables?
* First we need to write Java domain objects (beans with setter and getter). The variables should be same as database columns.
* Write hbm.xml, where we map java class to table and database columns to Java class variables.
Example :
<hibernate-mapping>
<class name="com.test.User" table="user">
<property column="USER_NAME" length="255″
name="userName"; not-null="true" type="java.lang.String"/>
<property column="USER_PASSWORD" length="255″
name="userPassword" not-null="true" type="java.lang.String"/>
</class>
</hibernate-mapping>
Ques 23. What Does Hibernate Simplify?
Hibernate simplifies:
* Saving and retrieving your domain objects
* Making database column and table name changes
* Centralizing pre save and post retrieve logic
* Complex joins for retrieving related items
* Schema creation from object model
Ques 24. What is the difference between load() and get()?
load() vs. get()
load() :-
Only use the load() method if you are sure that the object exists.
load() method will throw an exception if the unique id is not found in the database. load() just returns a proxy by default and database won't be hit until the proxy is first invoked.
get():-
If you are not sure that the object exists, then use one of the get() methods.
get() method will return null if the unique id is not found in the database.
get() will hit the database immediately.
Ques 25. What is the difference between and merge and update?
Use update() if you are sure that the session does not contain an already persistent instance with the same identifier, and merge() if you want to merge your modifications at any time without consideration of the state of the session.
Ques 26. How do you define sequence generated primary key in hibernate?
Using <generator> tag.
Example:-
<id column="USER_ID" name="id" type="java.lang.Long">
<generator class="sequence">
<param name="table">SEQUENCE_NAME</param>
<generator>
</id>
Ques 27. What do you mean by Named - SQL query?
Named SQL queries are defined in the mapping xml document and called wherever required.
Example:
<sql-query name = "empdetails">
<return alias="emp" class="com.test.Employee"/>
SELECT emp.EMP_ID AS {emp.empid},
emp.EMP_ADDRESS AS {emp.address},
emp.EMP_NAME AS {emp.name}
FROM Employee EMP WHERE emp.NAME LIKE :name
</sql-query>
Invoke Named Query :
List people = session.getNamedQuery("empdetails")
.setString("TomBrady", name)
.setMaxResults(50)
.list();
Ques 28. Explain Criteria API?
Criteria is a simplified API for retrieving entities by composing Criterion objects. This is a very convenient approach for functionality like "search" screens where there is a variable number of conditions to be placed upon the result set.
Example :
List employees = session.createCriteria(Employee.class)
.add(Restrictions.like("name", "a%") )
.add(Restrictions.like("address", "Boston"))
.addOrder(Order.asc("name") )
.list();
Ques 29. Define HibernateTemplate?
org.springframework.orm.hibernate.HibernateTemplate is a helper class which provides different methods for querying/retrieving data from the database. It also converts checked HibernateExceptions into unchecked DataAccessExceptions.
Ques 30. What are the benefits does HibernateTemplate provide?
The benefits of HibernateTemplate are :
* HibernateTemplate, a Spring Template class simplifies interactions with Hibernate Session.
* Common functions are simplified to single method calls.
* Sessions are automatically closed.
* Exceptions are automatically caught and converted to runtime exceptions.
Ques 31. If you want to see the Hibernate generated SQL statements on console, what should we do?
In Hibernate configuration file set as follows:
<property name="show_sql">true</property>
Ques 32. What are derived properties?
The properties that are not mapped to a column, but calculated at runtime by evaluation of an expression are called derived properties. The expression can be defined using the formula attribute of the element.
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Ques 33. What is component mapping in Hibernate?
* A component is an object saved as a value, not as a reference
* A component can be saved directly without needing to declare interfaces or identifier properties
* Required to define an empty constructor
* Shared references not supported
Ques 34. What is the difference between sorted and ordered collection in hibernate?
sorted collection vs. order collection
sorted collection :-
A sorted collection is sorting a collection by utilizing the sorting features provided by the Java collections framework. The sorting occurs in the memory of JVM which running Hibernate, after the data being read from database using java comparator.
If your collection is not large, it will be more efficient way to sort it.
order collection :-
Order collection is sorting a collection by specifying the order-by clause for sorting this collection when retrieval.
If your collection is very large, it will be more efficient way to sort it .
Ques 35. How will you configure Hibernate?
The configuration files hibernate.cfg.xml (or hibernate.properties) and mapping files *.hbm.xml are used by the Configuration class to create (i.e. configure and bootstrap hibernate) the SessionFactory, which in turn creates the Session instances. Session instances are the primary interface for the persistence service.
" hibernate.cfg.xml (alternatively can use hibernate.properties): These two files are used to configure the hibernate sevice (connection driver class, connection URL, connection username, connection password, dialect etc). If both files are present in the classpath then hibernate.cfg.xml file overrides the settings found in the hibernate.properties file.
" Mapping files (*.hbm.xml): These files are used to map persistent objects to a relational database. It is the best practice to store each object in an individual mapping file (i.e mapping file per class) because storing large number of persistent classes into one mapping file can be difficult to manage and maintain. The naming convention is to use the same name as the persistent (POJO) class name. For example Account.class will have a mapping file named Account.hbm.xml. Alternatively hibernate annotations can be used as part of your persistent class code instead of the *.hbm.xml files.
Ques 36. What is a SessionFactory? Is it a thread-safe object?
SessionFactory is Hibernates concept of a single datastore and is threadsafe so that many threads can access it concurrently and request for sessions and immutable cache of compiled mappings for a single database. A SessionFactory is usually only built once at startup. SessionFactory should be wrapped in some kind of singleton so that it can be easily accessed in an application code.
Ques 37. What is the difference between the session.update() method and the session.lock() method?
Both of these methods and saveOrUpdate() method are intended for reattaching a detached object. The session.lock() method simply reattaches the object to the session without checking or updating the database on the assumption that the database in sync with the detached object. It is the best practice to use either session.update(..) or session.saveOrUpdate(). Use session.lock() only if you are absolutely sure that the detached object is in sync with your detached object or if it does not matter because you will be overwriting all the columns that would have changed later on within the same transaction.
Note: When you reattach detached objects you need to make sure that the dependent objects are reatched as well.
Ques 38. What are the general considerations or best practices for defining your Hibernate persistent classes?
1.You must have a default no-argument constructor for your persistent classes and there should be getXXX() (i.e accessor/getter) and setXXX( i.e. mutator/setter) methods for all your persistable instance variables.
2.You should implement the equals() and hashCode() methods based on your business key and it is important not to use the id field in your equals() and hashCode() definition if the id field is a surrogate key (i.e. Hibernate managed identifier). This is because the Hibernate only generates and sets the field when saving the object.
3. It is recommended to implement the Serializable interface. This is potentially useful if you want to migrate around a multi-processor cluster.
4.The persistent class should not be final because if it is final then lazy loading cannot be used by creating proxy objects.
5.Use XDoclet tags for generating your *.hbm.xml files or Annotations (JDK 1.5 onwards), which are less verbose than *.hbm.xml files.
Ques 39. What does ORM consists of?
An ORM solution consists of the followig four pieces:
* API for performing basic CRUD operations
* API to express queries refering to classes
* Facilities to specify metadata
* Optimization facilities : dirty checking,lazy associations fetching
Ques 40. What are the ORM level?
The ORM levels are:
* Pure relational (stored procedure.)
* Light objects mapping (JDBC)
* Medium object mapping
* Full object Mapping (composition,inheritance, polymorphism, persistence by reachability)
Ques 41. What is CRUD?
A CRUD operation deals with creating , retriving , updating and deleting from the table.
Employee Class.
- Creating/Persisting the class to databae
- Retriving records from database
- Updating decord(Condition : Where sal is 8000 ,update sal to 11000)
- Deleting decord (condition: where deptno is 30)
Most helpful rated by users:
- What is Hibernate?
- What is ORM?
- What does an ORM solution comprises of?
- What are the different levels of ORM quality?
- What the Core interfaces are of hibernate framework?