My code obtains Connection c on its own. A Session s is opened with the Connection c.

Then, s.save(object1);s.save(object2);....s.close()....c.commit();

Against mysql, it looks like the entire "transaction" got rolled back.

The doc says, Transaction tx = s.beginTransaction .... t.commit(); s.close(), so I figure my approach is totally wacked right?

But well, what if I wanted to do something custom to the connection c and I needed to do that in a different scope than Session s?

In other words, I want to get a Session s with a custom Connection c, use s to persist a few objects, close s, then continue to work using c, then c.commit...that would not work right?

databse have to support rollback savepoint - I don't know for mysql, but postgresql, oracle support it

mysql supports transactions, foreign keys, cascaded operations starting with 3.23.x and savepoints starting with 4.x. Of course you have to use InnoBD table engine

Well, yes, I use InnoDB. So it looks like I need to invoke save points somehow before I close the hibernate session?

I search hibernate and I think that hibernate doesn' support savepoint yet, but it is planned (Gavin's post - search forum)