Hibernate recursive mapping parent/child structure - StackOverflowError when retrieve data

Question

I am using Hibernate 5.2.7.Final, and native Hibernate API. I have an Employee entity with recursive relations:

@Entity
public class Employee {

    @Id
    @GeneratedValue
    private Long employeeId;

    @Column
    private String firstname;

    @Column
    private String lastname;

    @ManyToOne(cascade={ CascadeType.ALL})
    @JoinColumn(name="manager_id")
    private Employee manager;

    @OneToMany(mappedBy="manager", cascade = CascadeType.ALL)
    private Set<Employee> subordinates = new HashSet<Employee>();
    // setters, getters, constructors
}

The following table is created by hibernate:

+------------+--------------+------+-----+---------+-------+
| Field      | Type         | Null | Key | Default | Extra |
+------------+--------------+------+-----+---------+-------+
| employeeId | bigint(20)   | NO   | PRI | NULL    |       |
| firstname  | varchar(255) | YES  |     | NULL    |       |
| lastname   | varchar(255) | YES  |     | NULL    |       |
| manager_id | bigint(20)   | YES  | MUL | NULL    |       |
+------------+--------------+------+-----+---------+-------+

I persists successfully the manager and the employees with:

    Employee manager = new Employee("A", "B");

    Employee employee1 = new Employee("C", "D");
    Employee employee2 = new Employee("E", "E");

    employee1.setManager(manager1);
    employee2.setManager(manager1);

    Set<Employee> employees = new HashSet<>();
    employees.add(employee1);
    employees.add(employee2);

    manager.setSubordinates(employees);

    session.save(manager);

Now retrieving the employee will cause StackOverFlowError.

    Long id = manager.getEmployeeId();

    Query<Employee> query = ss.createQuery("from Employee e where e.employeeId = :employeeId", Employee.class);

    query.setParameter("employeeId", id);

    Employee retrieved = (Employee) query.uniqueResult();

Exception in thread "main" java.lang.StackOverflowError

at java.lang.Long.toString(Long.java:396)
at java.lang.Long.toString(Long.java:1032)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)
at java.lang.StringBuilder.append(StringBuilder.java:131)
at objectModels.Employee.toString(Employee.java:82)
at java.lang.String.valueOf(String.java:2994)

I think the way I can persist such Employee object graph is so convenient. But I have no idea how to retrieve such graph from the table.

Question: how can I meaningfully retrieve Employee information from the underlying table. I think the way around it is to create a new Entity for viewing the Employee table like

    public class EmployeeView {
            private Long employeeId;
            private String firstname;
            private String manager_name;
            private Set<String> subordinate_names;
    }

Can I achieve this? and how with JPA annotation?

**Naros** · Accepted Answer

I suspect the problem is the toString() method in your Employeeentity.

Since you didn't provide any code, here is a clear example of how this would happen between a more generalized perspective of a Parent and Child.

public class Parent {
  @OneToMany(mappedBy = "parent");
  List<Child> children;

  @Override
  public String toString() {
    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    sb.append( "Parent{children=" );
    children.forEach( sb::apend );
    sb.append( "}" );
    return sb.toString();
}

public class Child {
  @ManyToOne
  private Parent parent;

  @Override
  public String toString() {
    return "Child{parent=" + parent + "}";
  }
}

Now somewhere in the code there is this:

System.out.println( parent.toString() );

This would cause the same overflow problem because the call into Parent would delegate down into Child which delegates back to Parent and the nasty cycle continues.

You need to decide which makes the most logical sense in your case and likely either skip or only print the identifier of the associated entity to avoid this recursive loop.

Hibernate recursive mapping parent/child structure - StackOverflowError when retrieve data

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