Flaky bare NullPointerException in model instantiation on Lucee 7 (cleared by reload) #3457

Summary

On Lucee 7.0.0.395 (the engine the Wheels CLI installs), the first model() call after a fresh boot — and intermittently afterwards — fails with a bare java.lang.NullPointerException with no Java stack, returning HTTP 500. ?reload=true clears it temporarily. Observed with both SQLite and H2 datasources, in plain wheels new scaffolds running current develop.

A variant of the same failure surfaces as:

Cannot invoke "lucee.runtime.component.Member.getAccess()" because the return
value of "java.util.Map$Entry.getValue()" is null

at lucee.runtime.ComponentImpl.keySet, reached via ComponentUtil.notFunction → onMissingMethod — Lucee enumerating a component whose member map contains a null entry.

Reproduction

1. wheels new bench-perf
2. Replace vendor/wheels with current develop.
3. Add a model (app/models/Post.cfc extends="Model") and an action: for (i = 1; i <= 3000; i++) { model("Post").new(); }.
4. First request after server start → 500 bare NPE (often at iteration 1). The same loop inside try/catch reports java.lang.NullPointerException with empty message and no detail.
5. ?reload=true&password=... → the loop runs clean for a while; the failure can return on later requests.

Suspected cause

Issue #3236's integration-plan cache ($buildComponentIntegrationPlan / $integrateFunctions in vendor/wheels/global/objects.cfm and Model.cfc) pre-resolves method references from a shared holder component ({name, ref} pairs) and copies them into each new instance via variables[name] = ref; this[name] = ref;. If any ref resolves to Java null on Lucee 7 (holder method lookup during a cold class-cache), every materialized instance inherits a null member entry, and Lucee later NPEs while enumerating the component. The plan is cached in application.wheels.integrationPlans, which is why a reload (rebuilding the app scope) clears it.

Context

Found while benchmarking #3213 (Wheels 2.5 vs 4.x performance). The same rig runs cleanly on Wheels 4.0.3 (pre-#3236 code path) and on Wheels 2.5.0.