[FIXED] How do I call the default deserializer from a custom deserializer in Jackson

Issue

I have a problem in my custom deserializer in Jackson. I want to access the default serializer to populate the object I am deserializing into. After the population I will do some custom things but first I want to deserialize the object with the default Jackson behavior.

This is the code that I have at the moment.

public class UserEventDeserializer extends StdDeserializer<User> {

  private static final long serialVersionUID = 7923585097068641765L;

  public UserEventDeserializer() {
    super(User.class);
  }

  @Override
  @Transactional
  public User deserialize(JsonParser jp, DeserializationContext ctxt)
      throws IOException, JsonProcessingException {

    ObjectCodec oc = jp.getCodec();
    JsonNode node = oc.readTree(jp);
    User deserializedUser = null;
    deserializedUser = super.deserialize(jp, ctxt, new User()); 
    // The previous line generates an exception java.lang.UnsupportedOperationException
    // Because there is no implementation of the deserializer.
    // I want a way to access the default spring deserializer for my User class.
    // How can I do that?

    //Special logic

    return deserializedUser;
  }

}

What I need is a way to initialize the default deserializer so that I can pre-populate my POJO before I start my special logic.

When calling deserialize from within the custom deserializer It seems the method is called from the current context no matter how I construct the serializer class. Because of the annotation in my POJO. This causes a Stack Overflow exception for obvious reasons.

I have tried initializing a BeanDeserializer but the process is extremely complex and I haven't managed to find the right way to do it. I have also tried overloading the AnnotationIntrospector to no avail, thinking that it might help me ignore the annotation in the DeserializerContext. Finally it seams I might have had some success using JsonDeserializerBuilders although this required me to do some magic stuff to get hold of the application context from Spring. I would appreciate any thing that could lead me to a cleaner solution for example how Can I construct a deserialization context without reading the JsonDeserializer annotation.

Solution

As StaxMan already suggested you can do this by writing a BeanDeserializerModifier and registering it via SimpleModule. The following example should work:

public class UserEventDeserializer extends StdDeserializer<User> implements ResolvableDeserializer
{
  private static final long serialVersionUID = 7923585097068641765L;

  private final JsonDeserializer<?> defaultDeserializer;

  public UserEventDeserializer(JsonDeserializer<?> defaultDeserializer)
  {
    super(User.class);
    this.defaultDeserializer = defaultDeserializer;
  }

  @Override public User deserialize(JsonParser jp, DeserializationContext ctxt)
      throws IOException, JsonProcessingException
  {
    User deserializedUser = (User) defaultDeserializer.deserialize(jp, ctxt);

    // Special logic

    return deserializedUser;
  }

  // for some reason you have to implement ResolvableDeserializer when modifying BeanDeserializer
  // otherwise deserializing throws JsonMappingException??
  @Override public void resolve(DeserializationContext ctxt) throws JsonMappingException
  {
    ((ResolvableDeserializer) defaultDeserializer).resolve(ctxt);
  }


  public static void main(String[] args) throws JsonParseException, JsonMappingException, IOException
  {
    SimpleModule module = new SimpleModule();
    module.setDeserializerModifier(new BeanDeserializerModifier()
    {
      @Override public JsonDeserializer<?> modifyDeserializer(DeserializationConfig config, BeanDescription beanDesc, JsonDeserializer<?> deserializer)
      {
        if (beanDesc.getBeanClass() == User.class)
          return new UserEventDeserializer(deserializer);
        return deserializer;
      }
    });


    ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();
    mapper.registerModule(module);
    User user = mapper.readValue(new File("test.json"), User.class);
  }
}

Answered By - schummar
Answer Checked By - Marie Seifert (JavaFixing Admin)