Deserialize a nested json field with Jackon in Kotlin - kotlin

Question

I've already deserialized some nested field in the past in Java, following instructions from https://www.baeldung.com/jackson-nested-values (section 5) :
#JsonProperty("brand")
private void unpackNested(Map<String,Object> brand) {
this.brandName = (String)brand.get("name");
Map<String,String> owner = (Map<String,String>)brand.get("owner");
this.ownerName = owner.get("name");
}
ownerName being a field in the bean.
Now, I need to do something similar in Kotlin, but I am not happy with what I have so far. Assuming I have a MyPojo class that has a createdAt field, but in the JSON that represents it, the field is nested under a metadata attribute:
data class MyPojo(var createdAt: LocalDateTime = LocalDateTime.MIN) {
#JsonProperty("metadata")
private fun unpackNested(metadata: Map<String, Any>) {
var createdAtAsString = metadata["createdAt"] as String
this.createdAt = LocalDateTime.parse(createdAtAsString,DateTimeFormatter.ISO_DATE_TIME)
}
}
One of the thing I don't like here is that I am forced to make createdAt a var, not a val.
Is there a Kotlin trick to make things overall better here?

Answer 1

For the sake of simplicity, I used Int as type for createdAt.
You could do it like this:
class JsonData(createdAt: Int = 0) {
private var _createdAt: Int = createdAt
val createdAt: Int
get() = _createdAt
#JsonProperty("metadata")
private fun unpackNested(metadata: Map<String, Any>) {
_createdAt = metadata["createdAt"] as Int
}
}
createdAt will be a parameter with a default value. Since a data classe's constructor can only have properties (var/val) you will loose the advantages of a data class (toString() out of the box etc.).
You will assign this parameter to a private var _createdAt when the class is instantiated.
The only thing that will be exposed to the outside is a property without a backing field createAt (just a getter in Java terms). So, _createdAt cannot be changed after instantiation.
There are two cases now:
If you instantiate the class, _createdAt will be set to the value you specify.
If Jackson instantiates the class the value of _createdAt will be overwritten by the unpackNested call.
Here is an example:
val jsonStr = """{
"metadata": {
"createdAt": 1
}
}
""".trimIndent()
fun main() {
val objectMapper = ObjectMapper()
// Jackson does instantiation
val jsonData = objectMapper.readValue(jsonStr, JsonData::class.java)
// you do it directly
JsonData(5)
}