The Java EE 5 Tutorial

Synchronizing Entity Data to the Database

The state of persistent entities is synchronized to the database when the transaction with which the entity is associated commits. If a managed entity is in a bidirectional relationship with another managed entity, the data will be persisted based on the owning side of the relationship.

To force synchronization of the managed entity to the data store, invoke the flush method of the entity. If the entity is related to another entity, and the relationship annotation has the cascade element set to PERSIST or ALL, the related entity’s data will be synchronized with the data store when flush is called.

If the entity is removed, calling flush will remove the entity data from the data store.