Support persisting tool_calls in JdbcChatMemoryRepository

[astor-dev]

Expected Behavior

JdbcChatMemoryRepository should persist and restore the tool_calls field for AssistantMessages that use tool calling (i.e., function-calling).

Specifically:

• Add a tool_calls TEXT NULL column to the schema
• Serialize the list of ToolCall objects to JSON on insert
• Deserialize and rehydrate AssistantMessage(null, toolCalls) when loading from the database

This ensures that responses such as:

new AssistantMessage(null, toolCalls)

...can be stored and later reused without violating OpenAI's API requirements.

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Current Behavior

Currently, JdbcChatMemoryRepository only stores the content field. When an AssistantMessage has content = null and non-empty toolCalls, the following happens:

• The toolCalls are silently discarded during persistence
• Upon loading, the message becomes: content = null, toolCalls = []
• This leads to a malformed payload when used in a follow-up prompt:

{ "role": "assistant", "content": null }

Which violates the OpenAI API spec:

If content is null, a non-empty tool_calls array must be present

Resulting in:

  "error": {
    "message": "Invalid value for 'content': expected a string, got null.",
    "type": "invalid_request_error",
    "param": "messages.[3].content",
    "code": null
  }

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Context

Tool calling is a core feature of OpenAI and Azure OpenAI LLMs. Without persisting tool_calls, JDBC-based chat memory implementations cannot reconstruct valid assistant messages, causing:

• 400 API errors
• Broken multi-turn flows
• Prompt history loss

This makes JdbcChatMemoryRepository incompatible with modern LLM usage patterns.

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Alternatives considered

• In-memory chat memory works correctly (retains toolCalls)
• Custom JDBC memory with JSON serialization (invasive)
• Skipping such messages entirely (causes context loss)

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Workaround

Avoid using JdbcChatMemoryRepository when tool calling is enabled. Use in-memory fallback instead.

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Related

• ToolResponseMessage results in null content, causing SQLIntegrityConstraintViolationException in JdbcChatMemoryRepository #3339