Return HTTP Status “created” in Play! Framework

Question

I have a create action in a Play! framework controller that should return the HTTP status code Created and redirect the client to the location of the created object.

public class SomeController extends Controller {

    public static void create() {
        Something something = new Something();
        something.save();
        response.status = StatusCode.CREATED;  // Doesn't work!
        show(something.id);
    }

    public static void show(long id) {
        render(Something.findById(id));
    }
}

See also method chaining in the Play! framework documentation.

The code above returns the status code 302 Found instead of 201 Created. What can I do to let Play return the correct status (and Location header)?

Answer 1

The reason this is happening, is that once you created your something, you are then telling play to Show your something, through calling the show action.

To achieve this, play is performing a redirect (to maintain its RESTful state), to tell the browser that as a result of calling the create() action, it must now redirect to the show() action.

So, you have a couple of options.

1. Don't render a response, and let the client side handle where it goes after creating it (not ideal).
2. Instead of calling show(), simply render it yourself in the create() method...

To use option 2, it may look like the following:

public static void create() {
    Something something = new Something();
    something.save();
    response.status = StatusCode.CREATED;
    renderTemplate("Application/show.html", something);
}

Answer 2

Example code for setting the status code in Play framework: Response.current().status = Http.StatusCode.CREATED;

Answer 3

In the play framework, calling another action performs a redirect except that the action called is not public. So, here is one of the solutions:

public class SomeController extends Controller {

    public static void create() {
        Something something = new Something();
        something.save();
        response.status = StatusCode.CREATED;  // Doesn't work!
        show(something.id);
    }

    private static void show(long id) {
        render(Something.findById(id));
    }
}