flowable/flowable-engine · error · ActivitiException

Error while closing EntityManager, may have already been clo

Error message

Error while closing EntityManager, may have already been closed or it is container-managed

What it means

Thrown by EntityManagerSessionImpl.close() when EntityManager.close() raises IllegalStateException. This happens for application-managed EntityManagers that are already closed, or container-managed ones that must not be closed by application code. The engine rethrows it as ActivitiException.

Source

Thrown at modules/flowable5-engine/src/main/java/org/activiti/engine/impl/variable/EntityManagerSessionImpl.java:79

                throw new ActivitiException("Error while flushing EntityManager: " + pe.getMessage(), pe);
            }
        }
    }

    protected boolean isTransactionActive() {
        if (handleTransactions && entityManager.getTransaction() != null) {
            return entityManager.getTransaction().isActive();
        }
        return false;
    }

    @Override
    public void close() {
        if (closeEntityManager && entityManager != null && !entityManager.isOpen()) {
            try {
                entityManager.close();
            } catch (IllegalStateException ise) {
                throw new ActivitiException("Error while closing EntityManager, may have already been closed or it is container-managed", ise);
            }
        }
    }

    @Override
    public EntityManager getEntityManager() {
        if (entityManager == null) {
            entityManager = getEntityManagerFactory().createEntityManager();

            if (handleTransactions) {
                // Add transaction listeners, if transactions should be handled
                TransactionListener jpaTransactionCommitListener = new TransactionListener() {
                    @Override
                    public void execute(CommandContext commandContext) {
                        if (isTransactionActive()) {
                            entityManager.getTransaction().commit();
                        }
                    }

View on GitHub (pinned to d6d39ce1c6)

Solutions

1. Set closeEntityManager=false on EntityManagerSessionFactory when the container manages the EntityManager lifecycle
2. Avoid closing the EntityManager manually while the engine session still owns it
3. Check for duplicate session close calls in custom command interceptors
4. Upgrade container integration (e.g. SpringEntityManagerSessionFactory) to manage close correctly

Example fix

// before
new EntityManagerSessionFactory(emf, false, true); // engine closes container-managed EM
// after
new EntityManagerSessionFactory(emf, false, false); // container closes it

if (entityManager != null && !entityManager.isOpen()) {
    throw new IllegalStateException("EntityManager already closed; do not let engine close container-managed EMs");
}

boolean safeToClose = closeEntityManager && entityManager != null && entityManager.isOpen();

try {
    session.close();
} catch (ActivitiException e) {
    if (e.getCause() instanceof IllegalStateException) {
        // treat as already closed: log and continue
    }
}

When it happens

Trigger: close() invoked with closeEntityManager=true while the EntityManager is already closed; using a container-managed (JTA) EntityManager and letting the engine attempt close; double-close of the session.

Common situations: Spring-managed shared EntityManager passed to EntityManagerSessionFactory with closeEntityManager=true; session closed twice; application closed the EM before the engine session teardown.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid state transition" errors: "status must be X, actually Y", "already rejected/charging/uninstalled", "cannot ... while running" — what they mean when a library rejects your call — this error's family across 31 libraries.

Related errors

• Error while closing EntityManager, may have already been clo
• Error while flushing EntityManager, illegal state
• Cannot set JPA variable: ${session} not configured
• JPA entity variables can only be used in 'variableValueEqual
• Variables containing a list of JPA entities cannot be used t

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/04236c6c19fbf801. Report an issue: GitHub.