Spring REST, JSON "Can not handle managed/back reference 'defaultReference'" 415 Unsupported Media Type

Question

I am trying to POST to http://localhost:9095/translators from an AngularJS front-end using Spring boot/Spring RestController backend.

I can do a GET and the response is like following:

[{"userId":1,"firstName":"John","lastName":"Doe","emailId":"[email protected]","languages":[{"languageId":1,"languageCode":"gb","source":true}],"translations":[{"translationId":3,"sourceId":1,"sourceText":"Hello","targetId":null,"targetText":null,"translationStatus":"DUE"}],"userType":"TRANSLATOR"}

When I post the below json, I get the error response

POST data:

{
                    firstName: "zen",
                    lastName: "cv",
                    emailId: "email",
                    userType: "TRANSLATOR",
                    languages : [{languageId:1,languageCode:"gb",source:true}]
}

Error:

{
timestamp: 1422389312497
status: 415
error: "Unsupported Media Type"
exception: "org.springframework.web.HttpMediaTypeNotSupportedException"
message: "Content type 'application/json' not supported"
path: "/translators"
}

I have made sure that my controller has correct Mediatype annotation.

@RestController
@RequestMapping("/translators")
public class TranslatorController {
    @Autowired
    private UserRepository repository;

    @RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.GET)
    public List findUsers() {
        return repository.findAll();
    }

    @RequestMapping(value = "/{userId}", method = RequestMethod.GET)
    public User findUser(@PathVariable Long userId) {
        return repository.findOne(userId);
    }

    @RequestMapping(method = RequestMethod.POST, consumes = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE, produces = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE)
    public User addTranslator(@RequestBody User user) {
        //translation.setTranslationId(null);
        return repository.saveAndFlush(user);
    }

    @RequestMapping(value = "/{translatorId}", method = RequestMethod.PUT)
    public User updateTranslation(@RequestBody User updatedUser, @PathVariable Long userId) {
        //updatedTranslation.setTranslationId(translationId);
        return repository.saveAndFlush(updatedUser);
    }

    @RequestMapping(value = "/{translatorId}", method = RequestMethod.DELETE)
    public void deleteTranslation(@PathVariable Long translationId) {
        repository.delete(translationId);
    }
}

After some research and also by seeing log output, I realize that this is a misleading error message and the problem is in fact happening while serializing/deserializing Json

In log file, I find

2015-01-27 21:08:32.488 WARN 15152 --- [nio-9095-exec-1] .c.j.MappingJackson2HttpMessageConverter : Failed to evaluate deserialization for type [simple type, class User]: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: Can not handle managed/back reference 'defaultReference': back reference type (java.util.List) not compatible with managed type (User)

Here is my class User and class Translation (getter, setter, constructor etc. omitted for brevity)

@Entity
@Table(name = "users")
public class User {

    @Id
    @GeneratedValue(strategy= GenerationType.AUTO)
    @Column(name = "user_id")
    private long userId;

    @Column(name = "first_name")
    private String firstName;

    @Column(name = "last_name")
    private String lastName;

    @Column(name = "email_id")
    private String emailId;

    @ManyToMany
    @JoinTable(name = "languages_users", joinColumns = { @JoinColumn(name = "user_id")},
            inverseJoinColumns = {@JoinColumn(name = "lang_id")})
    @JsonManagedReference
    private List<Language> languages = new ArrayList<Language>();

    @OneToMany(mappedBy = "translator", fetch = FetchType.EAGER)
    @JsonManagedReference
    private List<Translation> translations;

    @Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
    private UserType userType;
}

@Entity
@Table(name = "translations")
public class Translation {

    @Id
    @GeneratedValue(strategy= GenerationType.IDENTITY)
    @Column(name = "translation_id")
    private Long translationId;

    @Column(name = "source_lang_id")
    private Long sourceId;

    @Column(name = "source_text")
    private String sourceText;

    @Column(name = "target_lang_id")
    private Long targetId;

    @Column(name = "target_text")
    private String targetText;

    @Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
    @Column(name = "status")
    private TranslationStatus translationStatus;

    @ManyToOne
    @JoinColumn(name = "translator_id")
    @JsonBackReference
    private User translator;
}

My question is this: How can I correctly set JsonManagedReference and JsonBackReference for the above entities? I did read the doc. and I cannot figure out what is wrong here based on the error message

Answer 1

As @Sharppoint said in comments, I solved the mine by removing @JsonManagedReference BUT keep @JsonBackReference.

Answer 2

For those asking, an alternative approach would be to use fasterxml's JsonIdentityInfo and to annotate your class with:

import com.fasterxml.jackson.annotation.JsonIdentityInfo;
import com.fasterxml.jackson.annotation.ObjectIdGenerators;
@JsonIdentityInfo(generator=ObjectIdGenerators.PropertyGenerator.class, property="id")
public class Account implements java.io.Serializable {
....
private Long id;
}

*Didnt have enough rep to comment.

Answer 3

I got it solved by getting rid of JsonManagedReference and JsonBackReference and replacing it with JsonIdentityInfo