spring mvc rest response json and xml

Question

I have the requirement to return the result from the database either as a string in xml-structure or as json-structure. I\'ve got a solution, but I don\'t know, if this one

Answer 1

You can use ContentNegotiatingViewResolver as below:

<bean class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.ContentNegotiatingViewResolver">
    <property name="defaultContentType" value="application/json" />
    <property name="ignoreAcceptHeader" value="true" />
    <property name="favorPathExtension" value="true" />
    <property name="order" value="1" />
    <property name="mediaTypes">
        <map>
            <entry key="xml" value="application/xml" />
            <entry key="json" value="application/json" />
        </map>
    </property>
    <property name="defaultViews">
        <list>
            <ref bean="xmlView"/>
            <ref bean="jsonView"/>
        </list>
    </property>
</bean>

<bean id="jsonView"
      class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.json.MappingJacksonJsonView">
    <property name="contentType" value="application/json;charset=UTF-8"/>
    <property name="disableCaching" value="false"/>
</bean>

<bean id="xmlView"
      class="org.springframework.web.servlet.view.xml.MarshallingView">
    <property name="contentType" value="application/xml;charset=UTF-8"/>
    <constructor-arg>
        <ref bean="xstreamMarshaller"/>
    </constructor-arg>
</bean>


<bean id="xstreamMarshaller" class="org.springframework.oxm.xstream.XStreamMarshaller">
    <property name="autodetectAnnotations" value="true" />
    <property name="annotatedClass" value="demo.domain.xml.XMLResponse"/>
    <property name="supportedClasses" value="demo.domain.xml.XMLResponse"/>
</bean>

In your controller:

@RequestMapping(value = "/get/response.json", method = RequestMethod.GET)
public JSONResponse getJsonResponse(){
    return responseService.getJsonResponse();
}
@RequestMapping(value = "/get/response.xml", method = RequestMethod.GET)
public  XMLResponse getXmlResponse(){
    return responseService.getXmlResponse();
}

Answer 2

Here I wrote method which take XML as request parameter from your request mapping URL

Here I am posting XML to my URL "baseurl/user/createuser/"

    public class UserController {
    @RequestMapping(value = "createuser/" ,
    method=RequestMethod.POST,  consumes= "application/xml")
    @ResponseBody
    ResponseEntity<String> createUser(@RequestBody String requestBody ) {

        String r = "<ID>10</ID>"; // Put whatever response u want to return to requester

    return new ResponseEntity<String>(
              "Handled application/xml request. Request body was: " 
              + r, 
              new HttpHeaders(), 
              HttpStatus.OK);       


    }
}

I tested it using chrome poster where you can send any xml in content body like:

"<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?> <userEntity><id>3</id><firstName>saurabh</firstName><lastName>shri</lastName><password>pass</password><userName>test@test.com</userName></userEntity>"

This XML will capture by my createUser method and stored in String requestBody which i can use further

Answer 3

If you are using Spring 3.1, you can take advantage of the new produces element on the @RequestMapping annotation to ensure that you produce XML or JSON as you wish, even within the same app.

I wrote a post about this here:

http://springinpractice.com/2012/02/22/supporting-xml-and-json-web-service-endpoints-in-spring-3-1-using-responsebody/

Answer 4

If someone using Spring Boot for XML response then add the following dependency,

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.dataformat</groupId>
    <artifactId>jackson-dataformat-xml</artifactId>
</dependency>

And in the model class you are returning add the @XmlRootElement.

@Entity
@Table(name = "customer")
@XmlRootElement
public class Customer {
      //... fields and getters, setters
}

and in your controller add produces="application/xml". This will produce the response in xml format.

Answer 5

Whoa...when you're working with Spring, assume someone else has come up against the same issue. You can dump all the server-side JSON generation, because all you need to do is:

1. Include the Jackson JSON JARs in your app
2. Set the RequestMapping return type to @ResponseBody(yourObjectType)

Spring will auto-magically convert your object to JSON. Really. Works like magic.

Doc for @ResponseBody: http://static.springsource.org/spring/docs/3.0.x/spring-framework-reference/html/mvc.html#mvc-ann-responsebody

Answer 6

Easiest way to do this to get JSON response would be: Using Spring 3.1, you could do as follows

1. In your pom.xml file (hoping you are using a maven project), add maven dependency for jackson-mapper (http://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.codehaus.jackson/jackson-mapper-asl/1.9.13)

2. Modify your code as follows and test the endpoint on postman:

   @RequestMapping(value = "/content/json/{ids}", method = RequestMethod.GET)
   public @ResponseBody String getContentByIdsAsJSON(@PathVariable("ids") String ids){
       String content = "";
       StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder();
   
       List<String> list = this.contentService.findContentByListingIdAsJSON(ids);
       if (list.isEmpty()){
           content = "<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-8\"?><error>no data found</error>";
           return content;
       }
       for (String json : list){
           builder.append(json + "\n");
       }
   
       content = builder.toString();
       return content;
   }