Spring returns a resource in pure JSON not in HAL format when including Spring data

Question

When I use the default controller for my objects provided by Spring Data Rest, everything works as it should. The result is as follows:

{
  "_links" : {
    "search" : {
      "href" : "http://localhost:8080/users/search"
    }
  },
  "_embedded" : {
    "users" : [ {
      "firstName" : "Max",
      "lastName" : "Mustermann",
      "email" : "[e-mail]",
      "_links" : {
        "self" : {
          "href" : "http://localhost:8080/users/myadmin"
        }
      }
    } ]
  }
}

But if I use my own controller, the output is as follows:

[ {
  "firstName" : "Max",
  "lastName" : "Mustermann",
  "email" : "[e-mail]",
  "links" : [ {
    "rel" : "self",
    "href" : "http://localhost:8080/user/myadmin"
  } ]
} ]

My controller

@RestController
@RequestMapping("/user")
@EnableHypermediaSupport(type = {HypermediaType.HAL})
public class UserController {

    @Autowired
    UserRepository userRepository;

    @RequestMapping(method=RequestMethod.GET)
    public HttpEntity<List<User>> getUsers(){
        ArrayList<User> users = Lists.newArrayList(userRepository.findAll());
        for(User user : users){
            user.add(linkTo(methodOn(UserController.class).getUser(user.getUsername())).withSelfRel());
        }
        return new ResponseEntity<List<User>>(users, HttpStatus.OK);
    }

    @RequestMapping(value="/{username}", method= RequestMethod.GET)
    public HttpEntity<User> getUser(@PathVariable String username){
        User user = userRepository.findByUsername(username);
        user.add(linkTo(methodOn(UserController.class).getUser(user.getUsername())).withSelfRel());
        return new ResponseEntity<User>(user, HttpStatus.OK);
    }
}

My user:

@Entity
@Table(name="users")
public class User extends ResourceSupport{
    @Id
    private String username;

    private String firstName;
    private String lastName;

    @JsonIgnore
    private boolean enabled;

    @JsonIgnore
    private String password;

    @Column(unique =  true)
    private String email;

    public User(){
        enabled = false;
    }
    //Getters and Setters
}

if I remove Spring's data dependency and enable spring -hateoas, spring-plugin-core and json-path (com.jayway.jsonpath), this will work. But I want to use spring -data-rest for some other objects

Two questions:

• Why is the HAL not used by default when Spring content is enabled?
• How to set HAL as the output format

Answer 1

ResourceSupport ( Resource Resources), HAL Jackson.

, @EnableHypermediaSupport JavaConfig, .