java - Spring: When getting a ManyToOne entity, reference entity (OneToMany) is not showing in JSON -

when send request in postman child entity (town) parent entity (province) not shown in json response.

this controller.

@requestmapping(value ="api/v1/town",method = requestmethod.get) public responseentity<list<town>> getalltowns() {     list<town> towns = townservice.getalltowns();     if(towns.isempty()) {         return new responseentity<list<town>>(httpstatus.no_content);     }      return new responseentity<list<town>>(towns, httpstatus.ok); } 

and these entities.

parent class

@entity @table(name = "province") public class province {      @id     @generatedvalue(strategy = generationtype.auto)     @column(name = "province_id")     private long id;      private string name;      @onetomany(fetch = fetchtype.lazy, cascade = cascadetype.all, mappedby = "province", targetentity = town.class)     @jsonmanagedreference("province-town")     private list<town> towns;      public long getid() {         return id;     }      public void setid(long id) {         this.id = id;     }      public string getname() {         return name;     }      public void setname(string name) {         this.name = name;     }      public list<town> gettowns() {         return towns;     }      public void settowns(list<town> towns) {         this.towns = towns;     } } 

child class

@entity @table(name = "town") public class town {      @id     @generatedvalue(strategy = generationtype.auto)     @column(name = "town_id")     private long id;      private string name;      @manytoone(cascade = cascadetype.merge)     @joincolumn(name = "province_id")     @jsonbackreference("province-town")     private province province;      private long kilometer;      public long getid() {         return id;     }      public void setid(long id) {         this.id = id;     }      public string getname() {         return name;     }      public void setname(string name) {         this.name = name;     }      public province getprovince() {         return province;     }      public void setprovince(province province) {         this.province = province;     }      public long getkilometer() {         return kilometer;     }      public void setkilometer(long kilometer) {         this.kilometer = kilometer;     } } 

the response i'm getting this

{     "id" : 1,       "name" : "some town",     "kilometer" : 350 } 

what i'm expecting is

{     "id" : 1,       "name" : "some town",     "province" : {               //province data.....      }     "kilometer" : 350 } 

i able show this, objects used not spring-data-jpa entities, simple pojos.

is there problem entities? or there else?

swap @jsonbackreference , @jsonmanagedreference. basically:

@jsonmanagedreference private province province;  @jsonbackreference private list<town> towns;