How to pass User object into json to send to api endpoint? - json

Question

I am getting this error 400 when trying to submit a POST.
"$.User": [
"The JSON value could not be converted to WebApi.Models.User. Path: $.User | LineNumber: 5 | BytePositionInLine: 19."
]
}
This is my Order Model in asp.net core 3 api
namespace WebApi.Models
{
public class DispatchRequest
{
[Key]
public int DispatchRequestID { get; set; }
[Required]
[Column(TypeName = "nvarchar(100)")]
public string DispatchRequestNo { get; set; }
[Required]
public string CreatedOn { get; set; }
[Required]
[Column(TypeName = "int(10)")]
[ForeignKey("UserID")]
public User User { get; set; }
public int UserID { get; set; }
public ICollection<DispatchRequestItem> DispatchRequestsItems { get; set; }
}
}
So it seems like the problem is that the value for the json key "User" is not a user object. How do I do that, in order to make the POST request pass?
I am using angular to send the post request, but it didnt work, so I am using Postman now to try and troubleshoot and realized the above.

Answer 1

As a general tip, I would first recommend you to start using Swagger, its a beautiful thing that makes you a page in apiURL/swagger where you can test all your endpoints and have examples of what object each endpoint needs. Also you can scaffold your angular api with the swagger.json and https://www.npmjs.com/package/api-client-generator
Why would you have as Required the object User? having the UserId as required would do just fine. Also if you are attaching the User object , you have to double check not to update the user in the db when EF Core does its magic