Spring Framework Responses from POST - spring

Question

What is the standard object design for accepting a POST request from a client, saving the record to the database, and then returning a response back to the client? I'm working with the Spring framework.
Should I be sending back the entity and hiding properties that aren't necessary for the response?
#RestController
public class SomeController {
private final SomeService service;
#PostMapping(value = "/post/new", produces = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE)
public ResponseEntity<SomeEntity> post(#RequestBody final SomeEntity someEntity) {
SomeEntity savedEntity = service.save(someEntity);
return ResponseEntity.ok(savedEntity);
}
}
#Entity
#Table(name = "posts")
public class SomeEntity {
#Id
#GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
private Long id;
#Column(name = "title")
private String title;
#Column(name = "body")
#JsonIgnore
private String body;
#JsonIgnore
#Column(name = "deleted_ind")
private boolean deleted;
#JsonIgnore
#Column(name = "author")
private String author;
#Column(name = "created_at")
private LocalDateTime createdAt;
}
or would I accept some sort of POST request object that I convert to an entity, then re-assemble the entity into a response?
#JsonIgnoreProperties(ignoreUnknown = true)
public class SomePostRequestResource {
private String title;
private String body;
private String createdAt;
}
#RequiredArgsConstructor
#RestController
public class SomeController {
private final SomeService service;
private final SomeResourceAssembler resourceAssembler;
#PostMapping(value = "/post/new", produces = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE)
public ResponseEntity<SomePostRequestResource> post(
#RequestBody final SomePostRequestResource someResource
) {
SomeEntity savedEntity = service.convertToEntityAndSave(someResource);
SomePostRequestResource response = resourceAssembler.toResource(savedEntity);
return ResponseEntity.ok(response);
}
}
But then maybe I only want to send back the createdAt, would I hide the other properties in the SomePostRequestResource, or do I need another object to represent the response, which only has the property I want to send back?
I would also appreciate any book or article suggestions related to desigining objects for use with a RESTful API. I have seen articles concerning how to design and name the endpoints, but not so many concerning how to design the objects on the backend.

Answer 1

I would recommend you create a DTO class for the incoming/outgoing data containing the filed that are set/viewable by the client like:
public class SomeEntityIncomingDto {
private String title;
....
}
public class SomeEntityOutgoingDto {
private Long id;
private String title;
....
}
On the other hand, You won't need to map your persistence entities to DTOs and vice versa manually, you can use a library like ModelMapper or MapStruct that handles the conversion automatically.