Laravel 5.5 API resources for collections (standalone data) - php

Question

I was wondering if it is possible to define different data for item resource and collection resource.
For collection I only want to send ['id', 'title', 'slug'] but the item resource will contain extra details ['id', 'title', 'slug', 'user', etc.]
I want to achieve something like:
class PageResource extends Resource
{
/**
* Transform the resource into an array.
*
* #param \Illuminate\Http\Request
* #return array
*/
public function toArray($request)
{
return [
'id' => $this->id,
'title' => $this->title,
'slug' => $this->slug,
'user' => [
'id' => $this->user->id,
'name' => $this->user->name,
'email' => $this->user->email,
],
];
}
}
class PageResourceCollection extends ResourceCollection
{
/**
* Transform the resource collection into an array.
*
* #param \Illuminate\Http\Request
* #return array
*/
public function toArray($request)
{
return [
'id' => $this->id,
'title' => $this->title,
'slug' => $this->slug,
];
}
}
PageResourceCollection will not work as expected because it uses PageResource so it needs
return [
'data' => $this->collection,
];
I could duplicate the resource into PageFullResource / PageListResource and PageFullResourceCollection / PageListResourceCollection but I am trying to find a better way to achieve the same result.

Answer 1

The Resource class has a collection method on it. You can return that as the parameter input to your ResourceCollection, and then specify your transformations on the collection.
Controller:
class PageController extends Controller
{
public function index()
{
return new PageResourceCollection(PageResource::collection(Page::all()));
}
public function show(Page $page)
{
return new PageResource($page);
}
}
Resources:
class PageResource extends Resource
{
public function toArray($request)
{
return [
'id' => $this->id,
'title' => $this->title,
'slug' => $this->slug,
'user' => [
'id' => $this->user->id,
'name' => $this->user->name,
'email' => $this->user->email,
],
];
}
}
class PageResourceCollection extends ResourceCollection
{
public function toArray($request)
{
return [
'data' => $this->collection->transform(function($page){
return [
'id' => $page->id,
'title' => $page->title,
'slug' => $page->slug,
];
}),
];
}
}

Answer 2

If you want the response fields to have the same value in the Resource and Collection, you can reuse the Resource inside the Collection
PersonResource.php
<?php
namespace App\Http\Resources;
use Illuminate\Http\Resources\Json\Resource;
class PersonResource extends Resource
{
/**
* Transform the resource into an array.
*
* #param \Illuminate\Http\Request $request
* #return array
*/
public function toArray($request)
{
// return parent::toArray($request);
return [
'id' => $this->id,
'person_type' => $this->person_type,
'first_name' => $this->first_name,
'last_name' => $this->last_name,
'created_at' => (string) $this->created_at,
'updated_at' => (string) $this->updated_at,
];
}
}
PersonCollection.php
<?php
namespace App\Http\Resources;
use Illuminate\Http\Resources\Json\ResourceCollection;
class PersonCollection extends ResourceCollection
{
/**
* Transform the resource collection into an array.
*
* #param \Illuminate\Http\Request $request
* #return \Illuminate\Http\Resources\Json\AnonymousResourceCollection
*/
public function toArray($request)
{
// return parent::toArray($request);
return PersonResource::collection($this->collection);
}
}

Answer 3

The accepted answer works, if you are not interested in using links and meta data. If you want, simply return:
return new PageResourceCollection(Page::paginate(10));
in your controller. You should also look to eager load other dependent relationships before passing over to the resource collection.