Hi,

I am having a problem in REST service when de-serializing JSON using a nested Property.

I am new to Intersystems and my first time creating REST Service. I setup Atelier dev environment. The worst IDE I have ever worked in. I was able to  attach to a process in the debug perspective and step through the code, but one cannot see contents of variables nor print anything to the console, so it is useless as a debugging tool. When looking at a variable all it displays is its type of the variable and if I try to "watch" I get:

An internal error occurred during: "Label Job".
java.lang.NullPointerException

SO I am unable to solve the issue I am having with the JSON in my REST service due to being unable to debug properly, so I will appreciate any help on this. I try to explain the issue:

I have a Persistent class Consumer which uses 2 SerialObjects as Properties "ActivePeriod" and "AM", I created a REST service to add records to the Consumer, I use Postman to send JSON for a new Consumer.  I get an error back in Postman as follows:

2019-02-01{"Status":"ERROR #7207: Datatype value '2019-02-01' is not a valid number\r\n  > ERROR #5802: Datatype validation failed on property 'Metadata.ActivePeriod:StartDate', with value equal to \"2019-02-01\""}{
    "errors":[ {
            "code":7207,
            "domain":"%ObjectErrors",
            "error":"ERROR #7207: Datatype value '2019-02-01' is not a valid number\r\n  > ERROR #5802: Datatype validation failed on property 'Metadata.ActivePeriod:StartDate', with value equal to \"2019-02-01\"",
            "errors":[ {
                    "code":5802,
                    "domain":"%ObjectErrors",
                    "error":"ERROR #5802: Datatype validation failed on property 'Metadata.ActivePeriod:StartDate', with value equal to \"2019-02-01\"",
                    "id":"DatatypeValidationFailed",
                    "params":["Metadata.ActivePeriod:StartDate","2019-02-01"
                    ]
                }
            ],
            "id":"DTNotNum",
            "params":["2019-02-01"
            ]
        }
    ],
    "summary":"ERROR #7207: Datatype value '2019-02-01' is not a valid number\r\n  > ERROR #5802: Datatype validation failed on property 'Metadata.ActivePeriod:StartDate', with value equal to \"2019-02-01\""
}

The error is on the Consumer's Property "ActivePeriod" (a SerialObject) Property "StartDate". 

I convert the JSON from Postman to DynamicObject and assign it to a new Consumer record, because the ActivePeriod is a Proeprty and StartDate again a property of that, I assign it as follows:

Set consumerRecord.ActivePeriod.StartDate = obj.activePeriod.startDate

The format of the JSON date is "2019-02-01". It seems to be happy with the date of the Proeprty "dateOfBirth" and "DeceasedDateTime", but they are not nested Properties.

There is no clear documention for InterSystems Caché how the Dynamic Object handles nested Properties and how to retrieve it, I cannot see anything wrong in my code.

Postman JSON:

---------------------

{        
        "familyName":  "Smith",
        "firstNames" : "Peter",
        "dateOfBirth": "1978-10-10",
        "isDateOfBirthApproximate": 0,
        "isDeceased":  false,
        "deceasedDateTime": "",
        "activePeriod": {
            "startDate": "2019-02-01",
            "endDate":   "",
            "isActive":  1,
            "reasonChangedOrDeleted":  ""
        },
        "am": {
            "createdBy": "Elize",
            "createdDateTime": "2019-02-22 03:34:00",
            "modifiedBy": "Elize",
            "modifiedDateTime": "2019-02-22 03:34:00"
        }

}