I have two client applications. Both applications are running (in separate VMs).

The first application carries out a query using session.find(String). The session is closed following the query.

The second application updates an object that was a child of the object returned in the above query using session.saveOrUpdate() and a transaction commit: the changes are reflected immediately in the database. The session is closed following the update.

The first application carries out the same query it did the first time. To my surprise, it does not show the changes that the second application has made to the object.

When (if ever) does Hibernate check to see if objects it has cached on return from a query are dirty? How can I remedy/control this situation?

Note that the two applications are running in different VMs and are therefore using separate database connections and separate session factories. The session factory is alive for the whole application lifetime, but the sessions are created and closed with each query or update.

Thanks,

Gareth.

If you are accessing the same database from different VMs, you probably should not use caching at all. Otherwise you have to implement some kind of communication mechanism to tell the other VM it has to flush the cache - how should Hibernate know otherwise if someone else changed the database?

I should have included more in the way of the "default" behaviour I mentioned in the subject of the original posting. AFAIK there is no caching enabled, I have the query cache property set to false. I have changed no other properties and my configuration is a copy of the one supplied with Hibernate. Is there some other property I should be configuring to disable the caching?

The second level cache is disabled by default.

Good... so what group of properties govern the second-level cache and is there any other possible reason for the problem that I am having?