Fetching or loading data can be primarily classified into two types: eager and lazy.
In order to use Hibernate make sure you add the latest version of it to the dependencies section of your pom.xml file:
<dependency>
<groupId>org.hibernate</groupId>
<artifactId>hibernate-core</artifactId>
<version>5.2.1.Final</version>
</dependency>
1. Eager Loading And Lazy Loading
The first thing that we should discuss here is what lazy loading and eager loading are:
Eager Loading is a design pattern in which data initialization occurs on the spot. It means that collections are fetched fully at the time their parent is fetched (fetch immediately)
Lazy Loading is a design pattern which is used to defer initialization of an object until the point at which it is needed. This can effectively contribute to application's performance.
2. Using The Different Types Of Loading
Lazy loading can be enabled using the following XML parameter:
lazy="true"
Let's delve into the example. First we have a User class:
public class User implements Serializable {
private Long userId;
private String userName;
private String firstName;
private String lastName;
private Set<OrderDetail> orderDetail = new HashSet<>();
//setters and getters
//equals and hashcode
}
Look at the Set of orderDetail that we have. Now let's have a look at the OrderDetail class:
public class OrderDetail implements Serializable {
private Long orderId;
private Date orderDate;
private String orderDesc;
private User user;
//setters and getters
//equals and hashcode
}
The important part that is involved in setting the lazy loading in the UserLazy.hbm.xml
:
<set name="orderDetail" table="USER_ORDER" inverse="true" lazy="true" fetch="select">
<key>
<column name="USER_ID" not-null="true" />
</key>
<one-to-many class="com.baeldung.hibernate.fetching.model.OrderDetail" />
</set>
This is how the lazy loading is enabled. To disable lazy loading we can simply use: lazy = "false"
and this in turn will enable eager loading. The following is the example of setting up eager loading in another file User.hbm.xml:
<set name="orderDetail" table="USER_ORDER" inverse="true" lazy="false" fetch="select">
<key>
<column name="USER_ID" not-null="true" />
</key>
<one-to-many class="com.baeldung.hibernate.fetching.model.OrderDetail" />
</set>