Avoiding entity update directly on form submit - jpa

Question

I have an entity which is showed on the screen as text in input boxes which can be modified. When i submit the form hitting save, i would like my ejb3 component to handle the data and persist or merge it using the entity manager. But for some reason, when i modify the data and hit save the data directly gets updated in the database by-pasing my ejb3, which is certainly undesirable. My code looks like the following
#Entity
#Table(name = "EMP")
public class Emp implements java.io.Serializable {
private short empno;
private Dept dept;
private String ename;
private String job;
private Short mgr;
private Date hiredate;
private BigDecimal sal;
private BigDecimal comm;
public Emp() {
}
public Emp(short empno) {
this.empno = empno;
}
public Emp(short empno, Dept dept, String ename, String job, Short mgr,
Date hiredate, BigDecimal sal, BigDecimal comm) {
this.empno = empno;
this.dept = dept;
this.ename = ename;
this.job = job;
this.mgr = mgr;
this.hiredate = hiredate;
this.sal = sal;
this.comm = comm;
}
#Id
#Column(name = "EMPNO", unique = true, nullable = false, precision = 4, scale = 0)
public short getEmpno() {
return this.empno;
}
public void setEmpno(short empno) {
this.empno = empno;
}
#ManyToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY)
#JoinColumn(name = "DEPTNO")
public Dept getDept() {
return this.dept;
}
public void setDept(Dept dept) {
this.dept = dept;
}
#Column(name = "ENAME", length = 10)
#Length(max = 10)
public String getEname() {
return this.ename;
}
public void setEname(String ename) {
this.ename = ename;
}
#Column(name = "JOB", length = 9)
#Length(max = 9)
public String getJob() {
return this.job;
}
public void setJob(String job) {
this.job = job;
}
#Column(name = "MGR", precision = 4, scale = 0)
public Short getMgr() {
return this.mgr;
}
public void setMgr(Short mgr) {
this.mgr = mgr;
}
#Temporal(TemporalType.DATE)
#Column(name = "HIREDATE", length = 7)
public Date getHiredate() {
return this.hiredate;
}
public void setHiredate(Date hiredate) {
this.hiredate = hiredate;
}
#Column(name = "SAL", precision = 7)
public BigDecimal getSal() {
return this.sal;
}
public void setSal(BigDecimal sal) {
this.sal = sal;
}
#Column(name = "COMM", precision = 7)
public BigDecimal getComm() {
return this.comm;
}
public void setComm(BigDecimal comm) {
this.comm = comm;
}
}
#Stateful
#Name("workflow")
#Scope(ScopeType.CONVERSATION)
public class WorkflowBean implements Workflow
{
#Logger private Log log;
#In StatusMessages statusMessages;
#PersistenceContext(type=PersistenceContextType.EXTENDED)
EntityManager entityManager;
#Out(required=false)
Emp employee = new Emp();
#RequestParameter("empEmpno")
String empNo;
public void workflow()
{
log.info("workflow.workflow() action called");
statusMessages.add("workflow");
}
#End
public boolean save(){
entityManager.merge(emp);
entityManger.flush();
}
#Begin(join=true)
public boolean populateEmp(){
entityManager.setFlushMode(FlushModeType.COMMIT);
System.out.println("The Emp No. is---"+empNo);
int no = Integer.parseInt(empNo);
short emp =(short)no;
employee = entityManager.find(Emp.class, emp);
entityManager.flush();
return true;
}
public Emp getEmployee() {
return employee;
}
public void setEmployee(Emp employee) {
this.employee = employee;
}
// add additional action methods
public String getEmpNo() {
return empNo;
}
public void setEmpNo(String empNo) {
this.empNo = empNo;
}
#Remove
#Destroy
public void destroy() {
}
}
My view looks like
<h:form id="emp" styleClass="edit">
<rich:panel>
<f:facet name="header">Edit Emp</f:facet>
<s:decorate id="empnoField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Empno</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="empno"
required="true"
value="#{workflow.employee.empno}">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="commField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Comm</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="comm"
value="#{workflow.employee.comm}"
size="14">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="enameField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Ename</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="ename"
size="10"
maxlength="10"
value="#{workflow.employee.ename}">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="hiredateField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Hiredate</ui:define>
<rich:calendar id="hiredate"
value="#{workflow.employee.hiredate}" datePattern="MM/dd/yyyy" />
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="jobField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Job</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="job"
size="9"
maxlength="9"
value="#{workflow.employee.job}">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="mgrField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Mgr</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="mgr"
value="#{workflow.employee.mgr}">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="salField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Sal</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="sal"
value="#{workflow.employee.sal}"
size="14">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<s:decorate id="deptField" template="layout/edit.xhtml">
<ui:define name="label">Department</ui:define>
<h:inputText id="dname"
value="#{workflow.deptName}">
</h:inputText>
</s:decorate>
<div style="clear:both">
<span class="required">*</span>
required fields
</div>
</rich:panel>
<div class="actionButtons">
<h:commandButton id="save"
value="Save"
action="#{workflow.save}"
rendered="true"/>
</div>
</h:form>

Answer 1

[It was difficult to address issue in comments for your response.]
There are few things which I haven't understand & why it's done that way.
Using transient fields, it will add overhead of adding those to entity object while persisting.
Why is auto-commit causes issue & can't be implemented.
Regardless of these things, you can try
Making the entity detached with entityManager.detach(entity) or clearing the persistence context with entityManager.clear(), detaching all the underlying entities. But prior one is more favourible.
Can manage transaction manually instead of container. Use BMT where you can have control over the operations.