Spring 3.1 JSON date format

In order to override the default date formatting strategy of Jakson following are the step to follow:

1. Extend JsonSerializer to create a new class for handling date formatting
2. Override serialize(Date date, JsonGenerator gen, SerializerProvider provider) function to format date in your desired format and write it back to generator instance (gen)
3. Annotate your date getter object to use your extended json serializer using @JsonSerialize(using = CustomDateSerializer.class)

Code:

//CustomDateSerializer class
public class CustomDateSerializer extends JsonSerializer<Date> {    
    @Override
    public void serialize(Date value, JsonGenerator gen, SerializerProvider arg2) throws 
        IOException, JsonProcessingException {      

        SimpleDateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd");
        String formattedDate = formatter.format(value);

        gen.writeString(formattedDate);

    }
}


//date getter method
@JsonSerialize(using = CustomDateSerializer.class)
public Date getDate() {
    return date;
}

Source: http://blog.seyfi.net/2010/03/how-to-control-date-formatting-when.html