NHibernate exception while deleting object graph: not-null property references a null or transient value - nhibernate

Question

I've got a scheme (fields aren't necessary):
a busy cat http://picsearch.ru/share/image-BCE8_4E168F3B.jpg
I've got mappings:
Entity
<class name="LogicalModel.Entity" table="`Entity`" lazy="true">
<id name="Id" ..> ... </id>
<bag name="Attributes" lazy="true" cascade="all-delete-orphan" fetch="select" batch-size="1" access="property" inverse="true">
<key column="`Entity`" />
<one-to-many class="LogicalModel.Attribute" />
</bag>
<bag name="Keys" lazy="true" cascade="all-delete-orphan" fetch="select" batch-size="1" access="property" inverse="true">
<key column="`Entity`" />
<one-to-many class="LogicalModel.Key" />
</bag>
</class>
Attribute
<class name="LogicalModel.Attribute" table="`Attribute`" lazy="true">
<id name="Id" ..> ... </id>
<many-to-one name="Type" class="LogicalModel.Entity" column="`Type`" cascade="save-update" fetch="select" not-null="true" foreign-key="fk_TypeAttribute" />
<many-to-one name="Entity" class="LogicalModel.Entity" column="`Entity`" cascade="none" fetch="select" not-null="true" foreign-key="fk_EntityAttributes" />
</class>
Key
<class name="LogicalModel.Key" table="`Key`" lazy="true">
<id name="Id" ..> ... </id>
<bag name="KeyAttributes" lazy="true" cascade="all-delete-orphan" fetch="select" access="property" inverse="true">
<key column="`Key`" />
<one-to-many class="LogicalModel.KeyAttribute" />
</bag>
<many-to-one name="Entity" class="LogicalModel.Entity" column="`Entity`" cascade="none" fetch="select" not-null="true" foreign-key="fk_EntityKeys" />
</class>
KeyAttribute:
<class name="LogicalModel.KeyAttribute" table="`KeyAttribute`" lazy="false">
<id name="Id" ..> ... </id>
<many-to-one name="Attribute" class="LogicalModel.Attribute" column="`Attribute`" cascade="save-update" fetch="select" not-null="true" foreign-key="fk_AttributeKeyAttribute" />
<many-to-one name="Key" class="LogicalModel.Key" column="`Key`" cascade="none" fetch="select" not-null="true" foreign-key="fk_KeyKeyAttributes" />
</class>
Now please take a look...
As you see, We've got one-way master association KeyAttribute - Attribute, so it's just many-to-one and I don't need back association at all.
Now the problem is when I'm trying to delete whole graph - delete Entity object (notice: Entity actually aren't loaded at all, it's just set of proxies, that's why NHibernate make additional SELECT queries to check references before delete)
like this
Session.Delete(Entity); // here PropertyValueException:
// not-null property references a null or transient value: LogicalModel.KeyAttribute.Attribute
Session.Flush(); // Actually I use transactions in my code, but don't mind
SQL Profiler:
exec sp_executesql N'SELECT entities0_.[Id] as Id1_1_, entities0_.[Id] as Id1_45_0_,
FROM [Entity] entities0_ WHERE entities0_.[LogicalModel]=#p0',N'#p0 uniqueidentifier',#p0='DC8F8460-9C41-438A-8334-97D0A94E2528'
exec sp_executesql N'SELECT attributes0_.[Entity] as Entity12_1_, attributes0_.[Id] as Id1_1_, attributes0_.[Id] as Id1_16_0_, attributes0_.[Type] as Type11_16_0_, attributes0_.[Entity] as Entity12_16_0_
FROM [Attribute] attributes0_ WHERE attributes0_.[Entity]=#p0',N'#p0 uniqueidentifier',#p0='63E4D568-EAB2-4DF2-8FED-014C8CB2DE22'
exec sp_executesql N'SELECT keys0_.[Entity] as Entity4_1_, keys0_.[Id] as Id1_1_, keys0_.[Id] as Id1_43_0_, keys0_.[Entity] as Entity4_43_0_
FROM [Key] keys0_ WHERE keys0_.[Entity]=#p0',N'#p0 uniqueidentifier',#p0='63E4D568-EAB2-4DF2-8FED-014C8CB2DE22'
exec sp_executesql N'SELECT keyattribu0_.[Key] as Key4_1_, keyattribu0_.[Id] as Id1_1_, keyattribu0_.[Id] as Id1_0_0_, keyattribu0_.[Attribute] as Attribute3_0_0_, keyattribu0_.[Key] as Key4_0_0_
FROM [KeyAttribute] keyattribu0_ WHERE keyattribu0_.[Key]=#p0',N'#p0 uniqueidentifier',#p0='103D8FB3-0B17-4F51-8AEF-9623616AE282'
So what we can see:
not-null property references a null or transient value: LogicalModel.KeyAttribute.Attribute
happened just after NH check field Attribute (not-null constraint in db, it's ok) in class KeyAttribute (see profiler log).
It's pretty fun, cause NH have to delete Attributes and KeyAttributes both, NH read information about Attribute field in KeyAttribute class, FOUND it in DB, NOT FOUND it in NH session (!!!) (cause Attributes was loaded before), and just throw this stupid error.
What I've already tried to do:
1. make not-null="false". In this case NH makes additional update - try to set Attribute=NULL - cause constraint violation in DB.
2. set lazy="false", lazy="no-proxy" on many-to-one association for KeyAttribute-Attribute - nothing;
Now I don't like the idea of interceptors because there are to many scenarios where I've got the same situation, I need common solution
Please, guys, any suggestions?

Answer 1

In my opinion it may be caused by your lazy load on all entities of model.
When deleting entity, it loads and delete referenced Attribute list, loads referenced Key list, loads referenced KeyAttribute list (to have key of deletion) and then it falls in not-null property references a null or transient value because referenced Attribute has been deleted before in session.
You can check that by removing all lazy load in your mapping files.
A quick solution may be to keep lazy load but to force a full load of model (with hibernate initialize()) when deleting, for example in a Delete(Entity) static method in Entity factory.

Answer 2

Have you tried setting on-delete="cascade" in
<class name="LogicalModel.Key" table="`Key`" lazy="true">
<id name="Id" ..> ... </id>
<bag name="KeyAttributes" lazy="true" cascade="all-delete-orphan" fetch="select" access="property" inverse="true">
<key column="`Key`" on-delete="cascade" />
<one-to-many class="LogicalModel.KeyAttribute" />
</bag>
<many-to-one name="Entity" class="LogicalModel.Entity" column="`Entity`" cascade="none" fetch="select" not-null="true" foreign-key="fk_EntityKeys" />
Because in profile you will see nh trying to update something to null which is non nullable

Answer 3

NH sometimes requires to set references to null. Usually this is to avoid problems in models where circular references exist. But it is not always clever enough to find a way to avoid it, even if the is one.
So it may require to allow nulls in some foreign key fields, of course not only in the mapping file, also in the database. It actually should solve the problem.
Alternatively, you could also delete the data table by table using HQL. This works fine in all cases where you don't have inheritance and if you know all entities and the order to delete them:
object entityId;
// gets keys to delete
List<object> keyIds = Session
.CreateQuery("select id from Key where Entity = :entity")
.SetEntity("entity", Entity)
.List<object>();
// delete KeyAttribute which reference the key
Session.CreateQuery("delete KeyAttribute where Key.id in (:keyIds)")
.SetParameterList("keyIds", keyIds)
.ExecuteUpdate();
// delete the keys
Session.CreateQuery("delete Key where id in (:keyIds)")
.SetParameterList("keyIds", keyIds)
.ExecuteUpdate();
// get attributes to delete
List<object> attributeIds = Session
.CreateQuery("select id from Attribute where Entity = :entity")
.SetEntity("entity", Entity)
.List<object>();
// delete KeyAttributes which reference the attributes
Session.CreateQuery("delete KeyAttribute where Attribute.id in (:attributeIds)")
.SetParameterList("attributeIds", attributeIds )
.ExecuteUpdate();
// delete the attributes
Session.CreateQuery("delete Attribute where id in (:attributeIds)")
.SetParameterList("attributeIds", attributeIds )
.ExecuteUpdate();
Session.CreateQuery("delete Entity where id = :entityId")
.SetParameter("entityId", Entity.Id)
.ExecuteUpdate();
Note:
You may break the parameter lists into piece if they exceed the size of around 2000 (in SQL Server).
The session gets out of synch when deleting directly in the database. This doesn't cause any problems when deleting is all you do. When you are doing other staff in the same session, clear the session after deleting.