Coherence 3.6.0 transactional cache and POF - NULL values

Question

Hi,
We are trying to use the new transactional scheme defined in 3.6.0 and we encounter an abnormal behaviour. The code executes without any exception or warnings but in the cache we find the key associated with a NULL value.
To try to identify the problem, we defined two services (see cache-config below):
- one transactional cache
- one distributed cache
If we try to insert into transactional cache primitives or strings everything is normal (both key and value are visible using coherence console). But if we try to insert custom classes using POF, the key is inserted with a NULL value.
In same cluster we defined a distributed cache that uses the same POF classes/configuration. A call to put will succeed in any scenario (both key and value are visible using coherence console).
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE cache-config SYSTEM "cache-config.dtd">
<cache-config>
     <caching-scheme-mapping>
          <cache-mapping>
               <cache-name>cnt.*</cache-name>
               <scheme-name>storage.transactionalcache.cnt.scheme</scheme-name>
          </cache-mapping>
          <cache-mapping>
               <cache-name>stt.*</cache-name>
               <scheme-name>storage.distributedcache.stt.scheme</scheme-name>
          </cache-mapping>
     </caching-scheme-mapping>
     <caching-schemes>
          <transactional-scheme>
               <scheme-name>storage.transactionalcache.cnt.scheme</scheme-name>
               <service-name>storage.transactionalcache.cnt</service-name>
               <thread-count>10</thread-count>
               <serializer>
                    <class-name>com.tangosol.io.pof.ConfigurablePofContext</class-name>
                    <init-params>
                         <init-param>
                              <param-type>String</param-type>
                              <param-value>cnt-pof-config.xml</param-value>
                         </init-param>
                    </init-params>
               </serializer>
               <backing-map-scheme>
                    <local-scheme>
                         <high-units>250M</high-units>
                         <unit-calculator>binary</unit-calculator>
                    </local-scheme>
               </backing-map-scheme>
               <autostart>true</autostart>
          </transactional-scheme>
          <distributed-scheme>
               <scheme-name>storage.distributedcache.stt.scheme</scheme-name>
               <service-name>storage.distributedcache.stt</service-name>
               <serializer>
                    <class-name>com.tangosol.io.pof.ConfigurablePofContext</class-name>
                    <init-params>
                         <init-param>
                              <param-type>String</param-type>
                              <param-value>cnt-pof-config.xml</param-value>
                         </init-param>
                    </init-params>
               </serializer>
               <backing-map-scheme>
                    <local-scheme>
                         <high-units>250M</high-units>
                         <unit-calculator>binary</unit-calculator>
                    </local-scheme>
               </backing-map-scheme>
               <autostart>true</autostart>
          </distributed-scheme>
     </caching-schemes>
</cache-config>
Failing code (uses transaction APIs 3.6.0):
     public static void main(String[] args)
          Connection con = new DefaultConnectionFactory().createConnection("storage.transactionalcache.cnt");
          con.setAutoCommit(false);
          try
               OptimisticNamedCache cache = con.getNamedCache("cnt.t1");
               CId tID = new CId();
               tID.setId(11111L);
               C tC = new C();
               tC.setVal(new BigDecimal("100.1"));
               cache.insert(tID, tC);
               con.commit();
          catch (Exception e)
               e.printStackTrace();
               con.rollback();
          finally
               con.close();
Code that succeeds (but without transaction APIs):
     public static void main(String[] args)
          try
               NamedCache cache = CacheFactory.getCache("stt.t1");
               CId tID = new CId();
               tID.setId(11111L);
               C tC = new C();
               tC.setVal(new BigDecimal("100.1"));
               cache.put(tID, tC);
          catch (Exception e)
               e.printStackTrace();
          finally
And here is what we list using coherence console if we use transactional APIs:
Map (cnt.t1): list
CId {
id = 11111
} = null
Any suggestion, please?

Answer 1

Cristian,
After looking at your configuration I noticed that your configuration is incorrect. For a transactional scheme you cannot specify a backing-map-scheme.
Your config contained:
<backing-map-scheme>
<local-scheme>
<high-units>250M</high-units>
<unit-calculator>binary</unit-calculator>
</local-scheme>
</backing-map-scheme>To specify high-units for a transactional scheme, simply provide a high-units element directly under the transactional-scheme element.
<transactional-scheme>
    <scheme-name>small-high-units</scheme-name>
    <service-name>TestTxnService</service-name>
    <autostart>true</autostart>
    <high-units>1M</high-units>
</transactional-scheme>http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E15357_01/coh.360/e15723/api_transactionslocks.htm#BEIBACHA
The reason that it is not allowable to specify a backing-map-scheme for a transactional scheme is that transactional caches use their own storage.
I am not sure why this would work with primitives and only fail with POF. We will look into this further here and try to reproduce.
Can you please change your configuration with the above changes and let us know your results.
Thanks,
John
Edited by: jspeidel on Sep 16, 2010 10:44 AM