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How extract response to String and save it to variable

Being new to Java/JSON/REST Assured topics, I would like to extract a parameter of "token": from a JSON response body as a String and store it as variable which I could take to some other classes and use there. However, I have tried it and have not found a way. Below is part of a code which I have created at the beginning in a same manner as other requests stored in this class, but this is the first one from which I need something from the response:
public FakeTokenVO fakeToken() {
String payload = "payloadthere";
return given(specBuilder.fakeTokenRequestSpecification()) .
body(payload)
.log().all()
.when()
.post(RestApiRoutes.FAKE_URI)
.then()
.log().all()
.extract()
.response()
.as(FakeTokenVO.class);
}
Don't mind about the payload and those VO classes as it is stored as data model somewhere else.
Response from the request made looks like this:
{
"createTokenResponse": {
"createTokenSuccess": {
"token": "token_with_somewhere_about_700_characters"
}
}
}
Here is how I have tried to modify it to get the part of response which I need later (the token to authorize other requests):
#Test
public void fakeToken()
{
String payload = "payloadthere";
String token = given(specBuilder.fakeTokenRequestSpecification())
.body(payload)
.log().all()
.when()
.post(RestApiRoutes.FAKE_URI)
.then()
.log().all()
.extract()
.response()
.body().path("createTokenResponse.createTokenSuccess.token");
System.out.print(token);
}
This test returns me a value which I needed, but I do not know how to implement it as a method instead of test. Please help how should I approach it? What am I missing there? I tried to search for answers, but I haven't found a solution yet or do not know how to implement it in my part of the code.

I assume that you can get your response as a String. So all you need to do is to parse your Json String. For that you can use any available Json parser. The most popular ones are Json-Jackson (also known as Faster XML) or Gson (by Google). Both are very well known and popular. (My personal preference is Jackson, but it is a matter of opinion).
However, For simplistic cases like this I wrote my own utility (a thin wrapper over Jackson library) that allows you to parse Json String very simply without learning relatively complex libraries. With my utility your code may look like this:
try {
Map<String, Object> map = JsonUtils.readObjectFromJsonString(jsonStr, Map.class);
Map<String, Object> innerMap = map.get("createTokenResponse");
Map<String, Object> innerMap2 = map.get("createTokenSuccess");
String token = innerMap.get("token");
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStacktrace();
}
Or you can create your own classes such as
public class TokenResult {
String token;
//getter and setter
}
public class TokenHolder {
private TokenResult createTokenSuccess;
//setter and getter
}
public class TokenResponse {
private TokenHolder createTokenResponse;
//setter and getter
}
And than your code may look like this:
try {
TokenResponse response = JsonUtils.readObjectFromJsonString(jsonStr, TokenResponse .class);
String token = response.getCreateTokenResponse().getCreateTokenSuccess().getToken();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStacktrace();
}
Here is a Javadoc for JsonUtils class. This Utility comes as part of Open Source MgntUtils library written and maintained by me. You can get the library as maven artifact on Maven Central here or on the github (including source code and javadoc)

Using decorator pattern without adding "different" behaviour

I have facade interface where users can ask for information about lets say Engineers. That information should be transferred as JSON of which we made a DTO for. Now keep in mind that I have multiple datasources that can provide an item to this list of DTO.
So I believe right now that I can use Decorative Pattern by adding handler of the datasource to the myEngineerListDTO of type List<EngineerDTO>. So by that I mean all the datasources have the same DTO.
This picture below shows that VerticalScrollbar and HorizontalScrollBar have different behaviours added. Which means they add behaviour to the WindowDecorator interface.
My question, does my situation fit the decorator pattern? Do I specifically need to add a behaviour to use this pattern? And is there another pattern that does fit my situation? I have already considered Chain of Responsibility pattern, but because I don't need to terminate my chain on any given moment, i thought maybe Decorator pattern would be better.
Edit:
My end result should be: List<EngineersDTO> from all datasources. The reason I want to add this pattern is so that I can easily add another datasource behind the rest of the "pipeline". This datasource, just like the others, will have addEngineersDTOToList method.

To further illustrate on how you can Chain-of-responsibility pattern I put together a small example. I believe you should be able to adapt this solution to suit the needs of your real world problem.
Problem Space
We have an unknown set of user requests which contain the name of properties to be retrieved. There are multiple datasources which each have varying amounts of properties. We want to search through all possible data sources until all of the properties from the request have been discovered. Some data types and data sources might look like bellow (note I am using Lombok for brevity):
#lombok.Data
class FooBarData {
private final String foo;
private final String bar;
}
#lombok.Data
class FizzBuzzData {
private final String fizz;
private final String buzz;
}
class FooBarService {
public FooBarData invoke() {
System.out.println("This is an expensive FooBar call");
return new FooBarData("FOO", "BAR");
}
}
class FizzBuzzService {
public FizzBuzzData invoke() {
System.out.println("This is an expensive FizzBuzz call");
return new FizzBuzzData("FIZZ", "BUZZ");
}
}
Our end user might require multiple ways to resolve the data. The following could be a valid user input and expected response:
// Input
"foobar", "foo", "fizz"
// Output
{
"foobar" : {
"foo" : "FOO",
"bar" : "BAR"
},
"foo" : "FOO",
"fizz" : "FIZZ"
}
A basic interface and simple concrete implementation for our property resolver might look like bellow:
interface PropertyResolver {
Map<String, Object> resolve(List<String> properties);
}
class UnknownResolver implements PropertyResolver {
#Override
public Map<String, Object> resolve(List<String> properties) {
Map<String, Object> result = new HashMap<>();
for (String property : properties) {
result.put(property, "Unknown");
}
return result;
}
}
Solution Space
Rather than using a normal "Decorator pattern", a better solution may be a "Chain-of-responsibility pattern". This pattern is similar to the decorator pattern, however, each link in the chain is allowed to either work on the item, ignore the item, or end the execution. This is helpful for deciding if a call needs to be made, or terminating the chain if the work is complete for the request. Another difference from the decorator pattern is that resolve will not be overriden by each of the concrete classes; our abstract class can call out to the sub class when required using abstract methods.
Back to the problem at hand... For each resolver we need two components. A way to fetch data from our remote service, and a way to extract all the required properties from the data retrieved. For fetching the data we can provide an abstract method. For extracting a property from the fetched data we can make a small interface and maintain a list of these extractors seeing as multiple properties can be pulled from a single piece of data:
interface PropertyExtractor<Data> {
Object extract(Data data);
}
abstract class PropertyResolverChain<Data> implements PropertyResolver {
private final Map<String, PropertyExtractor<Data>> extractors = new HashMap<>();
private final PropertyResolver successor;
protected PropertyResolverChain(PropertyResolver successor) {
this.successor = successor;
}
protected abstract Data getData();
protected final void setBinding(String property, PropertyExtractor<Data> extractor) {
extractors.put(property, extractor);
}
#Override
public Map<String, Object> resolve(List<String> properties) {
...
}
}
The basic idea for the resolve method is to first evaluate which properties can be fulfilled by this PropertyResolver instance. If there are eligible properties then we will fetch the data using getData. For each eligible property we extract the property value and add it to a result map. Each property which cannot be resolved, the successor will be requested to be resolve that property. If all properties are resolved the chain of execution will end.
#Override
public Map<String, Object> resolve(List<String> properties) {
Map<String, Object> result = new HashMap<>();
List<String> eligibleProperties = new ArrayList<>(properties);
eligibleProperties.retainAll(extractors.keySet());
if (!eligibleProperties.isEmpty()) {
Data data = getData();
for (String property : eligibleProperties) {
result.put(property, extractors.get(property).extract(data));
}
}
List<String> remainingProperties = new ArrayList<>(properties);
remainingProperties.removeAll(eligibleProperties);
if (!remainingProperties.isEmpty()) {
result.putAll(successor.resolve(remainingProperties));
}
return result;
}
Implementing Resolvers
When we go to implement a concrete class for PropertyResolverChain we will need to implement the getData method and also bind PropertyExtractor instances. These bindings can act as an adapter for the data returned by each service. This data can follow the same structure as the data returned by the service, or have a custom schema. Using the FooBarService from earlier as an example, our class could be implemented like bellow (note that we can have many bindings which result in the same data being returned).
class FooBarResolver extends PropertyResolverChain<FooBarData> {
private final FooBarService remoteService;
FooBarResolver(PropertyResolver successor, FooBarService remoteService) {
super(successor);
this.remoteService = remoteService;
// return the whole object
setBinding("foobar", data -> data);
// accept different spellings
setBinding("foo", data -> data.getFoo());
setBinding("bar", data -> data.getBar());
setBinding("FOO", data -> data.getFoo());
setBinding("__bar", data -> data.getBar());
// create new properties all together!!
setBinding("barfoo", data -> data.getBar() + data.getFoo());
}
#Override
protected FooBarData getData() {
return remoteService.invoke();
}
}
Example Usage
Putting it all together, we can invoke the Resolver chain as shown bellow. We can observe that the expensive getData method call is only performed once per Resolver only if the property is bound to the resolver, and that the user gets only the exact fields which they require:
PropertyResolver resolver =
new FizzBuzzResolver(
new FooBarResolver(
new UnknownResolver(),
new FooBarService()),
new FizzBuzzService());
Map<String, Object> result = resolver.resolve(Arrays.asList(
"foobar", "foo", "__bar", "barfoo", "invalid", "fizz"));
ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();
mapper.enable(SerializationFeature.INDENT_OUTPUT);
System.out.println(mapper
.writerWithDefaultPrettyPrinter()
.writeValueAsString(result));
Output
This is an expensive FizzBuzz call
This is an expensive FooBar call
{
"foobar" : {
"foo" : "FOO",
"bar" : "BAR"
},
"__bar" : "BAR",
"barfoo" : "BARFOO",
"foo" : "FOO",
"invalid" : "Unknown",
"fizz" : "FIZZ"
}

accessing child constant in parent class in java

OK, so I have an interesting problem. I am using java/maven/spring-boot/cassandra... and I am trying to create a dynamic instantiation of the Mapper setup they use.
I.E.
//Users.java
import com.datastax.driver.mapping.annotations.Table;
#Table(keyspace="mykeyspace", name="users")
public class Users {
#PartitionKey
public UUID id;
//...
}
Now, in order to use this I would have to explicitly say ...
Users user = (DB).mapper(Users.class);
obviously replacing (DB) with my db class.
Which is a great model, but I am running into the problem of code repetition. My Cassandra database has 2 keyspaces, both keyspaces have the exact same tables with the exact same columns in the tables, (this is not my choice, this is an absolute must have according to my company). So when I need to access one or the other based on a form submission it becomes a mess of duplicated code, example:
//myWebController.java
import ...;
#RestController
public class MyRestController {
#RequestMapping(value="/orders", method=RequestMethod.POST)
public string getOrders(...) {
if(Objects.equals(client, "first_client_name") {
//do all the things to get first keyspace objects like....
FirstClientUsers users = (db).Mapper(FirstClientUsers.class);
//...
} else if(Objects.equals(client, "second_client_name") {
SecondClientUsers users = (db).Mapper(SecondClientUsers.class);
//....
}
return "";
}
I have been trying to use methods like...
Class cls = Class.forName(STRING_INPUT_VARIABLE_HERE);
and that works ok for base classes but when trying to use the Accessor stuff it no longer works because Accessors have to be interfaces, so when you do Class cls, it is no longer an interface.
I am trying to find any other solution on how to dynamically have this work and not have to have duplicate code for every possible client. Each client will have it's own namespace in Cassandra, with the exact same tables as all other ones.
I cannot change the database model, this is a must according to the company.
With PHP this is extremely simple since it doesn't care about typecasting as much, I can easily do...
function getData($name) {
$className = $name . 'Accessor';
$class = new $className();
}
and poof I have a dynamic class, but the problem I am running into is the Type specification where I have to explicitly say...
FirstClientUsers users = new FirstClientUsers();
//or even
FirstClientUsers users = Class.forName("FirstClientUsers");
I hope this is making sense, I can't imagine that I am the first person to have this problem, but I can't find any solutions online. So I am really hoping that someone knows how I can get this accomplished without duplicating the exact same logic for every single keyspace we have. It makes the code not maintainable and unnecessarily long.
Thank you in advance for any help you can offer.

Do not specify the keyspace in your model classes, and instead, use the so-called "session per keyspace" pattern.
Your model class would look like this (note that the keyspace is left undefined):
#Table(name = "users")
public class Users {
#PartitionKey
public UUID id;
//...
}
Your initialization code would have something like this:
Map<String, Mapper<Users>> mappers = new ConcurrentHashMap<String, Mapper<Users>>();
Cluster cluster = ...;
Session firstClientSession = cluster.connect("keyspace_first_client");
Session secondClientSession = cluster.connect("keyspace_second_client");
MappingManager firstClientManager = new MappingManager(firstClientSession);
MappingManager secondClientManager = new MappingManager(secondClientSession);
mappers.put("first_client", firstClientManager.mapper(Users.class));
mappers.put("second_client", secondClientManager.mapper(Users.class));
// etc. for all clients
You would then store the mappers object and make it available through dependency injection to other components in your application.
Finally, your REST service would look like this:
import ...
#RestController
public class MyRestController {
#javax.inject.Inject
private Map<String, Mapper<Users>> mappers;
#RequestMapping(value = "/orders", method = RequestMethod.POST)
public string getOrders(...) {
Mapper<Users> usersMapper = getUsersMapperForClient(client);
// process the request with the right client's mapper
}
private Mapper<Users> getUsersMapperForClient(String client) {
if (mappers.containsKey(client))
return mappers.get(client);
throw new RuntimeException("Unknown client: " + client);
}
}
Note how the mappers object is injected.
Small nit: I would name your class User in the singular instead of Users (in the plural).

Using Gson for Restlet to convert Post data (Representation) to an Object

I am trying to post a form to a Restlet ServerResource and read it into an object using Gson Restlet Extension.
There's no documentation on how to use it and nothing on StackOverflow.
What is the correct way of using gson restlet extension?
Following is what I have tried so far:
public class CustomerSegment {
private int visitsMin;
private int visitsMax;
// Getters, Setters and constructors
}
public class CampaignsResource extends ServerResource {
#Post
public Representation createCampaign(Representation entity) {
Form form = new Form(entity);
// Using form is the usual way, which works fine
// form: [[visitsMin=3], [visitsMax=6]]
CustomerSegment segment = null;
// Following hasn't worked
GsonConverter converter = new GsonConverter();
try {
segment = converter.toObject(entity, CustomerSegment.class, this);
//segment = null
} catch (IOException e1) {
e1.printStackTrace();
}
GsonRepresentation<CustomerSegment> gson
= new GsonRepresentation<CustomerSegment>(entity, CustomerSegment.class);
try {
segment = gson.getObject();
//NullPointerException
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return new EmptyRepresentation();
}
}
Form data that is being posted:

In fact, you can leverage the built-in converter support of Restlet without explicitly use the gson converter.
In fact, when you put the GSON extension within the classpath, the converter it contains is automatically registered within the Restlet engine itself. To check that you can simply use these lines when starting your application:
List<ConverterHelper> converters
= Engine.getInstance().getRegisteredConverters();
for (ConverterHelper converterHelper : converters) {
System.out.println("- " + converterHelper);
}
/* This will print this in your case:
- org.restlet.ext.gson.GsonConverter#2085ce5a
- org.restlet.engine.converter.DefaultConverter#30ae8764
- org.restlet.engine.converter.StatusInfoHtmlConverter#123acf34
*/
Then you can rely on beans within signatures of methods in your server resources instead of class Representation, as described below:
public class MyServerResource extends ServerResource {
#Post
public SomeOutputBean handleBean(SomeInputBean input) {
(...)
SomeOutputBean bean = new SomeOutputBean();
bean.setId(10);
bean.setName("some name");
return bean;
}
}
This works in both sides:
Deserialization of the request content into a bean that is provided as parameter of the handling method in the server resource.
Serialization into the response content of the returned bean.
You don't have anything more to do here.
For the client side, you can leverage the same mechanism. It's based on the annotated interfaces. For this, you need to create an interface defining what can be called on the resource. For our previous sample, it would be something like that:
public interface MyResource {
#Post
SomeOutputBean handleBean(SomeInputBean input);
}
Then you can use it with a client resource, as described below:
String url = "http://localhost:8182/test";
ClientResource cr = new ClientResource(url);
MyResource resource = cr.wrap(MyResource.class);
SomeInputBean input = new SomeInputBean();
SomeOutputBean output = resource.handleBean(input);
So in your case, I would refactor your code as described below:
public class CampaignsResource extends ServerResource {
private String getUri() {
Reference resourceRef = getRequest().getResourceRef();
return resourceRef.toString();
}
#Post
public void createCampaign(CustomerSegment segment) {
// Handle segment
(...)
// You can return something if the client expects
// to have something returned
// For creation on POST method, returning a 204 status
// code with a Location header is enough...
getResponse().setLocationRef(getUri() + addedSegmentId);
}
}
You can leverage for example the content type application/json to send data as JSON:
{
visitsMin: 2,
visitsMax: 11
}
If you want to use Gson, you should use this content type instead of the urlencoded one since the tool targets JSON conversion:
Gson is a Java library that can be used to convert Java Objects into
their JSON representation. It can also be used to convert a JSON string
to an equivalent Java object. Gson can work with arbitrary Java objects
including pre-existing objects that you do not have source-code of.
Hope it helps you,
Thierry

How to serialize ANY Object into a URI?

My basic question: is there anything built that already does this automatically (doesn't have to be part of a popular library/package)? The main things I'm working with are Spring (MVC) and Jackson2.
I understand there are a few manual ways to do this:
Create a method in each class that serializes its specific properties into property=value& form (kind of stinks because it's a bunch of logic duplication, I feel).
Create a function that accepts an object, and uses reflection to dynamically read all the properties (I guess the getters), and build the string by getting each. I'm assuming this is how Jackson works for serialization/deserialization in general, but I really don't know.
Use some feature of Jackson to customly serialize the object. I've researched custom serializers, but it seems they are specific to a class (so I'd have to create one for each Class I'm trying to serialize), while I was hoping for a generic way. I'm just having trouble understanding how to apply one universally to objects. A few of the links:
http://techtraits.com/Programming/2011/11/20/using-custom-serializers-with-jackson/
http://wiki.fasterxml.com/JacksonHowToCustomSerializers
Use ObjectMapper.convertValue(object, HashMap.class);, iterate over the HashMap's key/value pairs, and build the string (which is what I'm using now, but I feel the conversions are excessive?).
I'm guessing there's others I'm not thinking of.
The main post I've looked into is Java: Getting the properties of a class to construct a string representation
My point is that I have several classes that I want to be able to serialize without having to specify something specific for each. That's why I'm thinking a function using reflection (#2 above) is the only way to handle this (if I have to do it manually).
If it helps, an example of what I mean is with, say, these two classes:
public class C1 {
private String C1prop1;
private String C1prop2;
private String C1prop3;
// Getters and setters for the 3 properties
}
public class C2 {
private String C2prop1;
private String C2prop2;
private String C2prop3;
// Getters and setters for the 3 properties
}
(no, the properties names and conventions are not what my actual app is using, it's just an example)
The results of serializing would be C1prop1=value&C1prop2=value&C1prop3=value and C2prop1=value&C2prop2=value&C2prop3=value, but there's only one place that defines how the serialization happens (already defined somewhere, or created manually by me).
So my idea is that I will have to end up using a form of the following (taken from the post I linked above):
public String toString() {
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
try {
Class c = Class.forName(this.getClass().getName());
Method m[] = c.getDeclaredMethods();
Object oo;
for (int i = 0; i < m.length; i++)
if (m[i].getName().startsWith("get")) {
oo = m[i].invoke(this, null);
sb.append(m[i].getName().substring(3) + ":"
+ String.valueOf(oo) + "\n");
}
} catch (Throwable e) {
System.err.println(e);
}
return sb.toString();
}
And modify it to accept an object, and change the format of the items appended to the StringBuilder. That works for me, I don't need help modifying this now.
So again, my main question is if there's something that already handles this (potentially simple) serialization instead of me having to (quickly) modify the function above, even if I have to specify how to deal with each property and value and how to combine each?
If it helps, the background of this is that I'm using a RestTemplate (Spring) to make a GET request to a different server, and I want to pass a specific object's properties/values in the URL. I understand I can use something like:
restTemplate.getForObject("URL?C1prop1={C1Prop1}&...", String.class, C1Object);
I believe the properties will be automatically mapped. But like I said, I don't want to have to make a different URL template and method for each object type. I'm hoping to have something like the following:
public String getRequest(String url, Object obj) {
String serializedUri = SERIALIZE_URI(obj);
String response = restTemplate.getForObject("URL?" + serializedUri, String.class);
return response;
}
where SERIALIZE_URI is where I'd handle it. And I could call it like getRequest("whatever", C1Object); and getRequest("whateverElse", C2Object);.

I think, solution number 4 is OK. It is simple to understand and clear.
I propose similar solution in which we can use #JsonAnySetter annotation. Please, see below example:
import com.fasterxml.jackson.annotation.JsonAnySetter;
import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.ObjectMapper;
public class JacksonProgram {
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
C1 c1 = new C1();
c1.setProp1("a");
c1.setProp3("c");
User user = new User();
user.setName("Tom");
user.setSurname("Irg");
ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();
System.out.println(mapper.convertValue(c1, UriFormat.class));
System.out.println(mapper.convertValue(user, UriFormat.class));
}
}
class UriFormat {
private StringBuilder builder = new StringBuilder();
#JsonAnySetter
public void addToUri(String name, Object property) {
if (builder.length() > 0) {
builder.append("&");
}
builder.append(name).append("=").append(property);
}
#Override
public String toString() {
return builder.toString();
}
}
Above program prints:
prop1=a&prop2=null&prop3=c
name=Tom&surname=Irg
And your getRequest method could look like this:
public String getRequest(String url, Object obj) {
String serializedUri = mapper.convertValue(obj, UriFormat.class).toString();
String response = restTemplate.getForObject(url + "?" + serializedUri, String.class);
return response;
}

Lets we have c1.
c1.setC1prop1("C1prop1");
c1.setC1prop2("C1prop2");
c1.setC1prop3("C1prop3");
Converts c1 into URI
UriComponentsBuilder.fromHttpUrl("http://test.com")
.queryParams(new ObjectMapper().convertValue(c1, LinkedMultiValueMap.class))
.build()
.toUri());
After we will have
http://test.com?c1prop1=C1prop1&c1prop2=C1prop2&c1prop3=C1prop3