JPA many-to-one relation - need to save only Id

You can do this via getReference call in EntityManager:

EntityManager em = ...;
Car car = em.getReference(Car.class, carId);

Driver driver = ...;
driver.setCar(car);
em.persist(driver);

This will not execute SELECT statement from the database.

You can work only with the car ID like this:

@JoinColumn(name = "car")
@ManyToOne(targetEntity = Car.class, fetch = FetchType.LAZY)
@NotNull(message = "Car not set")
@JsonIgnore
private Car car;

@Column(name = "car", insertable = false, updatable = false)
private Long carId;

That error message means that you have have a transient instance in your object graph that is not explicitly persisted. Short recap of the statuses an object can have in JPA:

• Transient: A new object that has not yet been stored in the database (and is thus unknown to the entitymanager.) Does not have an id set.
• Managed: An object that the entitymanager keeps track of. Managed objects are what you work with within the scope of a transaction, and all changes done to a managed object will automatically be stored once the transaction is commited.
• Detached: A previously managed object that is still reachable after the transction commits. (A managed object outside a transaction.) Has an id set.

What the error message is telling you is that the (managed/detached) Driver-object you are working with holds a reference to a Car-object that is unknown to Hibernate (it is transient). In order to make Hibernate understand that any unsaved instances of Car being referenced from a Driver about be saved should also be saved you can call the persist-method of the EntityManager.

Alternatively, you can add a cascade on persist (I think, just from the top of my head, haven't tested it), which will execute a persist on the Car prior to persisting the Driver.

@ManyToOne(fetch=FetchType.LAZY, cascade=CascadeType.PERSIST)
@JoinColumn(name = "CAR_ID")
private Car car;

If you use the merge-method of the entitymanager to store the Driver, you should add CascadeType.MERGE instead, or both:

@ManyToOne(fetch=FetchType.LAZY, cascade={ CascadeType.PERSIST, CascadeType.MERGE })
@JoinColumn(name = "CAR_ID")
private Car car;

As an answer to okutane, please see snippet:

@JoinColumn(name = "car_id", insertable = false, updatable = false)
@ManyToOne(targetEntity = Car.class, fetch = FetchType.EAGER)
private Car car;

@Column(name = "car_id")
private Long carId;

So what happens here is that when you want to do an insert/update, you only populate the carId field and perform the insert/update. Since the car field is non-insertable and non-updatable Hibernate will not complain about this and since in your database model you would only populate your car_id as a foreign key anyway this is enough at this point (and your foreign key relationship on the database will ensure your data integrity). Now when you fetch your entity the car field will be populated by Hibernate giving you the flexibility where only your parent gets fetched when it needs to.