[SOLVED] Envers 4.2.x adds a record to the AUD table even if there are no changes

Envers 4.2.x adds a record to the AUD table even if there are no changes

I'm using Hibernate Envers 4.2.21.FINAL. As I want to track only some properties' changes, I added the annotation

@Audited(withModifiedFlag = true)

on them. The flag column "propname_MOD" is correctly created, but the problem is that when I save an object, all the MOD flags are set to true, and not only for the attribute I modified. Does anyone know how to solve this problem?

UPDATE I noticed that in the class org.hibernate.envers.event.EnversPostUpdateEventListenerImpl, when the following object is instantiated

AuditWorkUnit workUnit = new ModWorkUnit(
    event.getSession(),event.getPersister().getEntityName(),getAuditConfiguration(),
    event.getId(),event.getPersister(),newDbState,event.getOldState() );

event.getOldState() is null, but IMO it should be not null. This is why Envers is adding a new revision each time.

Solution

The problem was in fact related to the event.getOldState() being null.

It was due to the saveOrUpdate method of Hibernate, which perceives the entity from JSF as detached. I now use merge instead of saveOrUpdate and Envers correctly stores the _MOD fields to true or false.