JerseyTest WebTarget POST support - junit

Question

I am developing a light weight server App with a RESTful api implemented with Jersey 2.12 and Jackson 2.
I am writing tests while developing using JUnit and JerseyTest. I know that my Jersey Resources work as expected including the marshalling from and to JSON because I tested them manually with the PostMan Chrome plugin.
My GET tests with query parameters work well too, based on the example in the Jersey documentation
Here is a simplified (I have left out boilerplate code to make the idea clearer) example of a test I'd like to write:
import static org.junit.Assert.assertTrue;
import javax.ws.rs.client.Entity;
import javax.ws.rs.client.WebTarget;
import javax.ws.rs.core.Application;
import javax.ws.rs.core.Response;
import org.glassfish.jersey.server.ResourceConfig;
import org.glassfish.jersey.test.JerseyTest;
import org.junit.Test;
import com.acme.api.rest.SessionsEndPoint;
import com.acme.api.rest.beans.UserCredentialsBean;
public class TestSession extends JerseyTest {
#Override
protected Application configure() {
return new ResourceConfig(SessionsEndPoint.class);
}
#Test
public void test() {
UserCredentialsBean userCredentialsBean = new UserCredentialsBean();
userCredentialsBean.setUserId("alice");
userCredentialsBean.setPassword("secret");
WebTarget theTarget = target("sessions/login");
Response response = theTarget.request().post( Entity.entity(UserCredentialsBean.class, "application/json"));
assertTrue(true);
}
}
The basic problem I have is that I cannot find any documentation on how to properly use the WebTarget class for post requests. the WebTarget theTarget is constructed correctly but the line:
Response response = theTarget.request().post( Entity.entity(UserCredentialsBean.class, "application/json"));
does not work.
As I understand the WebTarget class is fairly new in the JerseyTest framework. Is there anybody who can point me at any recent documentation, examples, or just explain here how I can get this to work?

Answer 1

I did do a lot of googling before I posted my question here, but after checking back my eyes suddenly fell on this Related Question. I did search on SO several times but never found this question. Anyway, here's the solution to my problem:
I started implementing as explained in the accepted answer and got it to work quickly.
Then I decided that you it should be possible to avoid using JSON string representations at all, and I got that to work to.
The code above works if modified as follows:
import static org.junit.Assert.assertTrue;
import javax.ws.rs.client.Entity;
import javax.ws.rs.client.WebTarget;
import javax.ws.rs.core.Application;
import javax.ws.rs.core.Response;
import org.glassfish.jersey.server.ResourceConfig;
import org.glassfish.jersey.test.JerseyTest;
import org.junit.Test;
import com.acme.api.rest.SessionsEndPoint;
import com.acme.api.rest.beans.UserCredentialsBean;
public class TestSession extends JerseyTest {
#Override
protected Application configure() {
return new ResourceConfig(SessionsEndPoint.class);
}
#Test
public void test() {
UserCredentialsBean userCredentialsBean = new UserCredentialsBean();
userCredentialsBean.setUserId("alice");
userCredentialsBean.setPassword("secret");
LoginResponseBean loginResponseBean =
target("sessions/login")
.request(MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_TYPE)
.post(
Entity.entity(
userCredentialsBean,
MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_TYPE
),
LoginResponseBean.class
);
assertTrue(
loginResponseBean.isSuccess()
&&
loginResponseBean.getToken().length()==36
);
}
}
LoginResponseBean is a plain Java Bean. Just getters and setters and a default constructor.
Marshalling to- and from JSON is done by the framework, either by moxy or jackson as the JSON provider.