NHibernate - ISession - nhibernate

About the declaration of ISession.
Should we close the Session everytime we use it, or should we keep it open?
I'm asking this because in manual of NHibernate (nhforge.org) they recommend us to declare it once in Application_Start for example, but i don't know if we should close it everytime we use.
Thanks

You can keep one single static reference to a ISessionFactory, which can be indeed instantiated in Application_Start for web applications.
However, ISession must not be kept open and cannot be shared between two or more requests. You should adopt the "one session per request" pattern which allows you to build a single ISession for each HTTP request and dispose it safely once the request has been handled (this is assuming you are writing a web application).
For instance, the code handling NHibernate sessions in you project might look like this:
public static class NHibernateHelper {
static ISessionFactory _factory;
public static NHibernateHelper(){
//This code runs once when the application starts
//Use whatever is needed to build your ISessionFactory (read configuration, etc.)
_factory = CreateYourSessionFactory();
}
const string SessionKey = "NhibernateSessionPerRequest";
public static ISession OpenSession(){
var context = HttpContext.Current;
//Check whether there is an already open ISession for this request
if(context != null && context.Items.ContainsKey(SessionKey)){
//Return the open ISession
return (ISession)context.Items[SessionKey];
}
else{
//Create a new ISession and store it in HttpContext
var newSession = _factory.OpenSession();
if(context != null)
context.Items[SessionKey] = newSession;
return newSession;
}
}
}
This code is probably far to simple and has not been tested (nor compiled in fact), but it should work. For a more safe handling of your sessions you could also use an IoC container (Autofac for instance) and register your ISessions with a lifetime that depends on HTTP requests (Autofac will handle everything for you in that case).

Sessions should be closed when you are done with them. There are multiple possible ways to manage the lifetime of a session and choosing the right one is specific to each scenario. "Unit of Work" and "Session per Request" are the two most often used session lifetime management patterns.
In Application_Start, you should create the SessionFactory, not the Session. The SessionFactory does not need to be closed.

Related

Ninject Inject Common DbContext Into Numerous Repositories

There’s something which I am doing that is working, but I think it can probably be done a lot better (and therefore, with more maintainability).
I am using Ninject to inject various things into a controller. The problem which I needed to solve is that the DbContext for each repository needed to be the same. That is, the same object in memory.
Whilst, the following code does achieve that, my Ninject common config file has started to get quite messy as I have to write similar code for each controller:
kernel.Bind<OrderController>().ToMethod(ctx =>
{
var sharedContext = ctx.Kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>();
var userAccountService = kernel.Get<UserAccountService>();
ILogger logger = new Log4NetLogger(typeof(Nml.OrderController));
ILogger loggerForOrderManagementService = new Log4NetLogger(typeof(OrderManagementService));
var orderManagementService = new OrderManagementService(
new AffiliateRepository(sharedContext),
new RegTypeRepository(sharedContext),
new OrderRepository(sharedContext),
new RefDataRepository(),
new WebUserRepository(sharedContext),
new WebinarRepository(sharedContext),
loggerForOrderManagementService,
ttsConfig
);
var membershipService = new MembershipService(
new InstitutionRepository(sharedContext),
new RefDataRepository(),
new SamAuthenticationService(userAccountService),
userAccountService,
new WebUserRepository(sharedContext)
);
return new OrderController(membershipService, orderManagementService, kernel.Get<IStateService>(), logger);
}).InRequestScope();
Is there a neater way of doing this?
Edit
Tried the following code. As soon as I make a second request, an exception is chucked that the DbContext has already been disposed.
kernel.Bind<TTSWebinarsContext>().ToSelf().InRequestScope();
string baseUrl = HttpRuntime.AppDomainAppPath;
kernel.Bind<IStateService>().To<StateService>().InRequestScope();
kernel.Bind<IRefDataRepository>().To<RefDataRepository>().InRequestScope().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
var config = MembershipRebootConfig.Create(baseUrl, kernel.Get<IStateService>(), kernel.Get<IRefDataRepository>());
var ttsConfig = TtsConfig.Create(baseUrl);
kernel.Bind<MembershipRebootConfiguration>().ToConstant(config);
kernel.Bind<TtsConfiguration>().ToConstant(ttsConfig);
kernel.Bind<IAffiliateRepository>().To<AffiliateRepository>().InRequestScope().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
kernel.Bind<IWebinarRepository>().To<WebinarRepository>().InRequestScope().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
kernel.Bind<IWebUserRepository>().To<WebUserRepository>().InRequestScope().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
kernel.Bind<IOrderRepository>().To<OrderRepository>().InRequestScope().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
kernel.Bind<IInstitutionRepository>().To<InstitutionRepository>().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
kernel.Bind<IUserAccountRepository>().To<DefaultUserAccountRepository>().InRequestScope();
kernel.Bind<IRegTypeRepository>().To<RegTypeRepository>().InRequestScope().WithConstructorArgument("context", kernel.Get<TTSWebinarsContext>());
kernel.Bind<UserAccountService>().ToMethod(ctx =>
{
var userAccountService = new UserAccountService(config, ctx.Kernel.Get<IUserAccountRepository>());
return userAccountService;
});
kernel.Bind<IOrderManagementService>().To<OrderManagementService>().InRequestScope();
//RegisterControllers(kernel, ttsConfig);
kernel.Bind<AuthenticationService>().To<SamAuthenticationService>().InRequestScope();
kernel.Bind<IMembershipService>().To<MembershipService>().InRequestScope();
There's something about InRequestScope I'm misunderstanding.
Edit:
.InRequestScope() will ensure everything which gets injected that binding will receive exactly the same instance when during injection (creation) the HttpContext.Current is the same. That means when a client makes a request and the kernel is asked to provide instances with .InRequestScope(), it will return the same instance for the exact same request. Now when a client makes another request, another unique instance will be created.
When the request ends, ninject will dispose the instance in case it implements IDisposable.
However consider the following scenario:
public class A
{
private readonly DbContext dbContext;
public A(DbContext dbContext)
{
this.dbContext = dbContext;
}
}
and binding:
IBindingRoot.Bind<DbContext>().ToSelf().InRequestScope();
IBindingRoot.Bind<A>().ToSelf().InSingletonScope();
You got yourself a major problem. There's two scenarios how this can pan out:
You are trying to create an A outside of a request. It will fail. Instantiating the DbContext, ninject will look for HttpContext.Current - which is null at the time - and throw an Exception.
You are trying to create an A during a request. Instantiating will succeed. However, When you try to use some functionality of A (which is accessing DbContext in turn) after the request or during a new request, it will throw an ObjectDisposedException
To sum it up, an ObjectDisposedException when you access the DbContext can only be caused by two scenarios:
-you ar disposing the DbContext (or some component which in turn disposes the DbContext) before the request is over.
-you are keeping a reference to the DbContext (again, or to some component which in turn references the DbContext) across request boundaries.
That's it. Nothing complicated about this, but your object graph.
So what would help is drawing an object graph. Start from the root / request root. Then when you're done, start from the DbContext and check who's calling Dispose() on it. If there is no usage inside your code, it must be Ninject who's cleaning up when the request ends. That means, you need to check all references to the DbContext. Someone is keeping a reference across requests.
Original Answer:
You should look into scopes: https://github.com/ninject/ninject/wiki/Object-Scopes
Specifically, .InRequestScope() - or in case that is not appliccable to your problem - .InCallScope() should be interesting to you.
As you are already using .InRequestScope() for the original binding, i suggest that binding the shared context type also .InRequestScope() should be sufficient. It means every dependency of the OrderController will receive the same webinar context instance. Furthermore, if someone else in the same request wants to get a webinar context injected, he will also get the same instance.
You should look into scopes: https://github.com/ninject/ninject/wiki/Object-Scopes
Specifically, .InRequestScope() - or in case that is not appliccable to your problem - .InCallScope() should be interesting to you.
As you are already using .InRequestScope() for the original binding, i suggest that binding the shared context type also .InRequestScope() should be sufficient. It means every dependency of the OrderController will receive the same webinar context instance. Furthermore, if someone else in the same request wants to get a webinar context injected, he will also get the same instance.

Advice data acces pattern without repository

I want to access ISession directly from application services (without using repository (http://ayende.com/blog/3955/repository-is-the-new-singleton)) but application services unit test is hard and Nhibernate data access code increase complexity of code (no repository mock and I don't want to mock repository or in memory db like sqllite for testing)
Is there any efficient way access to ISession from service layer?
I use a sessionHelper which basically holds the ISessionFactory - and then have methods like this:
public T WrapQueryInTransaction<T>(Func<ISession, T> query)
{
using (var tx = Session.BeginTransaction())
{
try
{
var result = query(Session);
tx.Commit();
return result;
}
}
}
I then have similar methods for common functionality - ie. xxxUpdaters which basically loads the object in question, makes the updates and then closes the ISession again.
And then usage is as follows for queries:
var entities = _sessionHelper.WrapQueryInTransaction(s => s.QueryOver<SomeEntity>().List());
For complex queries I have these incapsulated in a query class which can also be thrown at the sessionHelper.
It works for me - hope you can use it.

NHibernate not persisting changes to my object

My ASP.NET MVC 4 project is using NHibernate (behind repositories) and Castle Windsor, using the AutoTx and NHibernate Facilities. I've followed the guide written by haf and my I can create and read objects.
My PersistenceInstaller looks like this
public class PersistenceInstaller : IWindsorInstaller
{
public void Install(Castle.Windsor.IWindsorContainer container, Castle.MicroKernel.SubSystems.Configuration.IConfigurationStore store)
{
container.AddFacility<AutoTxFacility>();
container.Register(Component.For<INHibernateInstaller>().ImplementedBy<NHibernateInstaller>().LifeStyle.Singleton);
container.AddFacility<NHibernateFacility>(
f => f.DefaultLifeStyle = DefaultSessionLifeStyleOption.SessionPerWebRequest);
}
}
The NHibernateInstaller is straight from the NHib Facility Quickstart.
I am using ISessionManager in my base repository...
protected ISession Session
{
get
{
return _sessionManager.OpenSession();
}
}
public virtual T Commit(T entity)
{
Session.SaveOrUpdate(entity);
return entity;
}
Finally, my application code which is causing the problem:
[HttpPost]
[ValidateAntiForgeryToken]
[Transaction]
public ActionResult Maintain(PrescriberMaintainViewModel viewModel)
{
if (ModelState.IsValid)
{
var prescriber = UserRepository.GetPrescriber(User.Identity.Name);
//var prescriber = new Prescriber { DateJoined = DateTime.Today, Username = "Test" };
prescriber.SecurityQuestion = viewModel.SecurityQuestion;
prescriber.SecurityAnswer = viewModel.SecurityAnswer;
prescriber.EmailAddress = viewModel.Email;
prescriber.FirstName = viewModel.FirstName;
prescriber.LastName = viewModel.LastName;
prescriber.Address = new Address
{
Address1 = viewModel.AddressLine1,
Address2 = viewModel.AddressLine2,
Address3 = viewModel.AddressLine3,
Suburb = viewModel.Suburb,
State = viewModel.State,
Postcode = viewModel.Postcode,
Country = string.Empty
};
prescriber.MobileNumber = viewModel.MobileNumber;
prescriber.PhoneNumber = viewModel.PhoneNumber;
prescriber.DateOfBirth = viewModel.DateOfBirth;
prescriber.AHPRANumber = viewModel.AhpraNumber;
prescriber.ClinicName = viewModel.ClinicName;
prescriber.ClinicWebUrl = viewModel.ClinicWebUrl;
prescriber.Qualifications = viewModel.Qualifications;
prescriber.JobTitle = viewModel.JobTitle;
UserRepository.Commit(prescriber);
}
return View(viewModel);
}
The above code will save a new prescriber (tested by uncommenting out the commented out line etc).
I am using NHProf and have confirmed that no sql is sent to the database for the Update. I can see the read being performed but that's it.
It seems to me that NHibernate doesn't recognise the entity as being changed and therefore does not generate the sql. Or possibly the transaction isn't being committed?
I've been scouring the webs for a few hours now trying to work this one out and as a last act of desperation have posted on SO. Any ideas? :)
Oh and in NHProf I see three Sessions (1 for the GetPrescriber call from the repo, one I assume for the update (with no sql) - and one for some action in my actionfilter on the base class). I also get an alert about the use of implicit transactions. This confuses me because I thought I was doing everything I needed to get an transaction - using AutoTx and the Transaction attribute. I also expected there to be only 1 session per webrequest, as per my Windsor config.
UPDATE: It seems, after spending the day reading through the source for NHibernateFacility and AutoTx Facility for automatic transactions, that AutoTx is not setting the Interceptors on my implementation of INHibernateInstaller. It seems this means whenever SessionManager calls OpenSession it is calling the default version with no parameter, rather than the one that accepts an Interceptor. Internally AutoTxFacility registers TransactionInterceptor with windsor, so that it can be added the Interceptor on my INHibernateInstaller concrete, by windsor making use of the AutoTx's TransactionalComponentInspector
AutoTxFacility source on github
To me it looks like creating sessions for every call to the repository. A session should span the whole business operation. It should be opened at the beginning and committed and disposed at the end.
There are other strange things in this code.
Commit is a completely different concept than SaveOrUpdate.
And you don't need to tell NH to store changes anyway. You don't need to call session.Save for objects that are already in the session. They are stored anyway. You only need to call session.Save when you add new objects.
Make sure that you use a transaction for the whole business operation.
There is one most likely "unintended" part in the code snippet above. And proven by observation made by NHProf
Oh and in NHProf I see three Sessions (1 for the GetPrescriber call
from the repo, one I assume for the update (with no sql) - and one for
some action in my actionfilter on the base class).
Calling the OpenSession() is triggering creation of a new session instances.
protected ISession Session
{
get { return _sessionManager.OpenSession(); }
}
So, whenever the code is accessing the Session property, behind is new session instance created (again and again). One session for get, one for udpate, one for filter...
As we can see here, the session returned by SessionManager.OpenSession() must be used for the whole scope (Unit of work, web request...)
http://docs.castleproject.org/Windsor.NHibernate-Facility.ashx
The syntaxh which we need, si to create one session (when firstly accessed) and reuse it until enf of scope (then later correctly close it, commit or rollback transaction...). Anyhow, first thing right now is to change the Session property this way:
ISession _session;
protected ISession Session
{
get
{
if (_session == null)
{
_session = sessionFactory.OpenSession();
}
return _session;
}
}
After spending a full day yesterday searching through the AutoTx and NHibernate facilities on github and getting nowhere, I started a clean project in an attempt to replicate the problem. Unfortunately for the replication, everything worked! I ran Update-Package on my source and brought down new version of Castle.Transactions and I was running correctly. I did make a small adjustment to my own code. That was to remove the UserRepository.Commit line.
I did not need to modify how I opened sessions. That was taken care of by the SessionManager instance. With the update to Castle.Transactions, the Transaction attribute is being recognised and a transaction is being created (as evidenced by no more alert in NHProf).

RavenDB Catch 22 - Optimistic Concurrency AND Seeing Changes from Other Clients

With RavenDB, creating an IDocumentSession upon app start-up (and never closing it until the app is closed), allows me to use optimistic concurrency by doing this:
public class GenericData : DataAccessLayerBase, IGenericData
{
public void Save<T>(T objectToSave)
{
Guid eTag = (Guid)Session.Advanced.GetEtagFor(objectToSave);
Session.Store(objectToSave, eTag);
Session.SaveChanges();
}
}
If another user has changed that object, then the save will correctly fail.
But what I can't do, when using one session for the lifetime of an app, is seeing changes, made by other instances of the app (say, Joe, five cubicles away), to documents. When I do this, I don't see Joe's changes:
public class CustomVariableGroupData : DataAccessLayerBase, ICustomVariableGroupData
{
public IEnumerable<CustomVariableGroup> GetAll()
{
return Session.Query<CustomVariableGroup>();
}
}
Note: I've also tried this, but it didn't display Joe's changes either:
return Session.Query<CustomVariableGroup>().Customize(x => x.WaitForNonStaleResults());
Now, if I go the other way, and create an IDocumentSession within every method that accesses the database, then I have the opposite problem. Because I have a new session, I can see Joe's changes. Buuuuuuut... then I lose optimistic concurrency. When I create a new session before saving, this line produces an empty GUID, and therefore fails:
Guid eTag = (Guid)Session.Advanced.GetEtagFor(objectToSave);
What am I missing? If a Session shouldn't be created within each method, nor at the app level, then what is the correct scope? How can I get the benefits of optimistic concurrency and the ability to see others' changes when doing a Session.Query()?
You won't see the changes, because you use the same session. See my others replies for more details
Disclaimer: I know this can't be the long-term approach, and therefore won't be an accepted answer here. However, I simply need to get something working now, and I can refactor later. I also know some folks will be disgusted with this approach, lol, but so be it. It seems to be working. I get new data with every query (new session), and I get optimistic concurrency working as well.
The bottom line is that I went back to one session per data access method. And whenever a data access method does some type of get/load/query, I store the eTags in a static dictionary:
public IEnumerable<CustomVariableGroup> GetAll()
{
using (IDocumentSession session = Database.OpenSession())
{
IEnumerable<CustomVariableGroup> groups = session.Query<CustomVariableGroup>();
CacheEtags(groups, session);
return groups;
}
}
Then, when I'm saving data, I grab the eTag from the cache. This causes a concurrency exception if another instance has modified the data, which is what I want.
public void Save(EntityBase objectToSave)
{
if (objectToSave == null) { throw new ArgumentNullException("objectToSave"); }
Guid eTag = Guid.Empty;
if (objectToSave.Id != null)
{
eTag = RetrieveEtagFromCache(objectToSave);
}
using (IDocumentSession session = Database.OpenSession())
{
session.Advanced.UseOptimisticConcurrency = true;
session.Store(objectToSave, eTag);
session.SaveChanges();
CacheEtag(objectToSave, session); // We have a new eTag after saving.
}
}
I absolutely want to do this the right way in the long run, but I don't know what that way is yet.
Edit: I'm going to make this the accepted answer until I find a better way.
Bob, why don't you just open up a new Session every time you want to refresh your data?
It has many trade-offs to open new sessions for every request, and your solution to optimistic concurrency (managing tags within your own singleton dictionary) shows that it was never intended to be used that way.
You said you have a WPF application. Alright, open a new Session on startup. Load and query whatever you want but don't close the Session until you want to refresh your data (e.g. a list of order, customers, i don't know...). Then, when you want to refresh it (after a user clicks on a button, a timer event is fired or whatever) dispose the session and open a new one. Does that work for you?

ISession per Request (Only when necessary)

I'm developing an application (asp.net mvc) and I'm using ISession per request (in globa.asax I use Bind and Unbind in Begin_Request event and End_Request event). Everything works fine but sometimes (some requests) I don't need to use an ISession (a connection with database).
I'd like to know if is there any way to open an ISession only when I need and make the ISession entry in all process request (to be shared with all repositories and a unique context of transaction) ?
I'm developnig and penny auction website and my server will have many request per second and sometimes I don't need the connection, I'll use a Cache.
Thanks
Cheers
It should be noted that opening a session does not imply opening a connection to the database. As noted in this article, the cost of opening a session is extremely low. So, in general, I wouldn't worry about requests opening a session when they don't need it; essentially you're just newing up a very lightweight object.
You can use an ActionFilter to do this. Here's one that I use to do exactly what you describe.
public class UsingNhibernate : ActionFilterAttribute {
private ISession nhSession;
public override void OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext) {
nhSession = NHHelper.OpenSession();
nhSession.BeginTransaction();
// set an accessible reference to your nhSession for access from elsewhere
// ((ApplicationController)filterContext.Controller).nHSession = nhSession; is what I do
base.OnActionExecuting(filterContext);
}
public override void OnActionExecuted(ActionExecutedContext filterContext) {
try {
if (filterContext.Exception == null && nhSession != null && nhSession.Transaction.IsActive)
nhSession.Transaction.Commit();
else if (nhSession != null && nhSession.Transaction.IsActive)
nhSession.Transaction.Rollback();
} catch (Exception ex) {
if (nhSession != null && nhSession.Transaction.IsActive)
nhSession.Transaction.Rollback();
nhSession.Dispose();
throw;
}
nhSession.Dispose();
base.OnActionExecuted(filterContext);
}
}
On each appropriate controller action (or even at the controller level to apply to all actions) you simply add the UsingNhibernate action filter like so:
[UsingNhibernate]
public ActionResult SaveSystemSetting(SystemAdminVM item) {