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Unexpected NullReferenceException When Unit Testing Method with Complex Object Parsing in Java

👀 Views: 490 đŸ’Ŧ Answers: 1 📅 Created: 2025-06-14
java unit-testing jackson junit5 Java

I'm working on a personal project and I'm writing unit tests and I'm experimenting with I'm confused about I've been struggling with this for a few days now and could really use some help... I'm working with a frustrating scenario while trying to unit test a method that parses a complex object in Java. The method is supposed to convert a JSON string into a Java object using Jackson, but during the test, I'm getting a `NullReferenceException`. The method looks like this: ```java public MyObject parseJson(String json) { ObjectMapper objectMapper = new ObjectMapper(); MyObject myObject = objectMapper.readValue(json, MyObject.class); return myObject; } ``` In my unit test, I provide the following JSON string: ```java String jsonInput = "{\"name\": \"Test\", \"value\": null}"; ``` When I run the test, I encounter the following behavior message: ``` java.lang.NullPointerException: want to invoke "MyObject.getValue()" because "myObject" is null ``` I've verified that the JSON input is valid and matches the structure of `MyObject`. Just to confirm, here's the `MyObject` class: ```java public class MyObject { private String name; private String value; // Getters and Setters public String getName() { return name; } public void setName(String name) { this.name = name; } public String getValue() { return value; } public void setValue(String value) { this.value = value; } } ``` I tried wrapping the `readValue` call in a try-catch block to handle any parsing exceptions, but that didn't guide to catch the root of the scenario. I'm using Jackson version 2.12.5 and JUnit 5 for the tests. Is this a case of the `ObjectMapper` not being able to handle null values appropriately? Or is there something else I might be missing in my unit test setup? Any guidance would be greatly appreciated! Any ideas what could be causing this? I'm working in a Linux environment. What am I doing wrong? I'm working on a CLI tool that needs to handle this. Is there a better approach? I'm working with Java in a Docker container on Ubuntu 20.04. I'm open to any suggestions.