Most used Hibernate properties during development

Hibernate has many properties that can be very helpful during development phrase. In this article we list some most used hibernate properties  used when developing/testing persistence layer applications.

1. Meaning of most used hibernate properties

1.1 Print out Hibernate created SQL

hibernate.show_sql = true

1.2 Automatic create tables according to entities

hibernate.hbm2ddl.auto = create

Change to create-drop if you want to drop the created table when application over. Useful for prototype and testing.

1.3 Run SQL scripts at beginning of application

hibernate.hbm2ddl.import_files = /path/of/sqlfile

This's most used to insert some test data before unit test case running.

1.4 Use c3p0 connection pool

hibernate.c3p0.min_size=5                              // minimum connections in pool
hibernate.c3p0.max_size=20                           // maximum connections in pool
hibernate.c3p0.timeout=1800                        // time out to remove idle connection. In seconds
hibernate.c3p0.max_statements=50          // cache prepared statements
hibernate.c3p0.idle_test_period=3000      // how often to validate a connection. In seconds.

1.5 Use Improved Naming Strategy ("clientAddress"->"client_address")

hibernate.ejb.naming_strategy  = org.hibernate.cfg.ImprovedNamingStrategy

2. Use Hibernate properties in JPA persistence.xml

If use Hibernate as JPA provider, you can set hibernate properties in persistence.xml.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<persistence version="2.1"
  xmlns="http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/persistence"
  xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
  xsi:schemaLocation="http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/persistence 
                      http://xmlns.jcp.org/xml/ns/persistence/persistence_2_1.xsd">
  <persistence-unit name="persistenceUnitName"  transaction-type="RESOURCE_LOCAL">
    <provider>org.hibernate.ejb.HibernatePersistence</provider>
    <exclude-unlisted-classes>false</exclude-unlisted-classes>
    <properties>
      <!-- common jdbc configuration -->
      <property name="javax.persistence.jdbc.driver" value="org.h2.Driver" />
      <property name="javax.persistence.jdbc.url" value="jdbc:h2:mem:mydb" />
      <property name="javax.persistence.jdbc.user" value="sa" />
      <property name="javax.persistence.jdbc.password" value="" />
    
      <!-- ==================== -->
      <!-- hibernate properties -->
      <!-- ==================== -->
      <property name="hibernate.hbm2ddl.auto" value="create" />
      <property name="hibernate.show_sql" value="true"/>
      <property name="hibernate.ejb.naming_strategy" value="org.hibernate.cfg.ImprovedNamingStrategy"/>
    </properties>
  </persistence-unit>
</persistence>

3. Use Hibernate properties in Spring Boot

Spring boot does a lot of auto configurations.  So there is no need to use hibernate.hbm2ddl.import_files to set a sql script file location to run. Just put the sql script file as src/main/resources/import.sql. Spring boot will auto config it if spring-boot-starter-data-jpa is in pom.

There is also no need for hibernate.hbm2ddl.auto. Spring boot will also auto detect if the database used is a embedded one, like HSQL, H2 or Derby, or external database. If a embedded database is used,  default is create-drop. Otherwise for external database,  default is none. (No tables will be auto created). You can set this behavior in spring boot's  configuration file application.properties with spring.jpa.hibernate.ddl-auto= create, for example.

Other hibernate properties can be se with prefix 'spring.jpa.properties.' , such as add following lines in /src/main/resources/application.properties 

# hibernate special properties, with prefix "spring.jpa.properties."
spring.jpa.properties.hibernate.dialect=org.hibernate.dialect.H2Dialect
spring.jpa.properties.hibernate.c3p0.min_size=3
spring.jpa.properties.hibernate.c3p0.max_size=10
spring.jpa.properties.hibernate.show_sql=true

4. What's More

For complete hibernate 4.x configuration properties, check official hibernate reference.