Can't read JSON using file_get_contents - php

Question

I'm getting null (blank page) from this:
api.php code:
$json_data = array(
'status' => 'failed',
'version' => '0.0.5'
);
header("Content-type: application/json");
echo json_encode($json_data, JSON_PRETTY_PRINT);
getapi.php code:
$json_file = file_get_contents("http://domain.com/api.php");
$json_data = json_decode($json_file);
print_r($json_data);
$json_file = file_get_contents("http://domain.com/api.php");
echo $json_file; //{"status":"failed","version":"0.0.5"}
$json_data = json_decode($json_file);
print_r($json_data); // blank page

Answer 1

Another answer I would like to submit is the one of trying to debug your json string since you have already told us that the content is pulled in correctly by your file_get_contents()
I have the following script from the PHP.net documentation on json_last_error()
echo 'Decoding: ' . $string;
json_decode($json_file);
switch (json_last_error()) {
case JSON_ERROR_NONE:
echo ' - No errors';
break;
case JSON_ERROR_DEPTH:
echo ' - Maximum stack depth exceeded';
break;
case JSON_ERROR_STATE_MISMATCH:
echo ' - Underflow or the modes mismatch';
break;
case JSON_ERROR_CTRL_CHAR:
echo ' - Unexpected control character found';
break;
case JSON_ERROR_SYNTAX:
echo ' - Syntax error, malformed JSON';
break;
case JSON_ERROR_UTF8:
echo ' - Malformed UTF-8 characters, possibly incorrectly encoded';
break;
default:
echo ' - Unknown error';
break;
}
echo PHP_EOL;
Edit
It looks like you are having trouble with your character set. Try forcing utf-8 as follows.
Change:
header("Content-type: application/json");
To:
header('Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8');

Answer 2

The problem is probably with your PHP.ini file and your PHP settings not allowing you to acces remote urls.
The setting you are looking for is allow_url_fopen.
You have two ways of getting around it without changing php.ini, one of them is to use fsockopen(), and the other is to use cURL.
If you have access to your php.ini file though, I would suggest editing it.
Some reading
Documentation on allow_url_fopen

Answer 3

By the first you should be sure that your api.php is available through HTTP.
open URL http://domain.com/api.php in some browser to check, you must see the available response.
If you still see blank page then probably your webserver is not configured properly or api.php file store in not public folder aka. public_html or web.
Run following command:
$ php -i|grep 'allow_url_fopen'
allow_url_fopen => On => On
Also please check your PHP configuration, option allow-url-fopen should be set to true.
Also please pay attention that constant JSON_PRETTY_PRINT available since PHP 5.4.0
Next snippet will help you to troubleshoot, place it on the top of your script, but don't forget to remove them after:
error_reporting(E_ALL);
ini_set('display_errors', true);
ini_set('display_startup_errors', true);

Answer 4

Try to use function above instead json_decode, it include utf8 fix inside
function parseJson($content, $options = true)
{
$content = fixUtf8String(trim($content));
$decoded = json_decode(utf8_decode($content), $options);
if (($jsonLastErr = json_last_error()) != JSON_ERROR_NONE) {
switch ($jsonLastErr) {
case JSON_ERROR_DEPTH:
throw new Exception('JSON Decoding failed: Maximum stack depth exceeded');
case JSON_ERROR_CTRL_CHAR:
throw new Exception('JSON Decoding failed: Unexpected control character found');
case JSON_ERROR_SYNTAX:
throw new Exception('JSON Decoding failed: Syntax error');
default:
throw new Exception('JSON Decoding failed');
}
}
return $decoded;
}
function fixUtf8String($s)
{
if (empty($s)) {
return $s;
}
$s = preg_match_all(
"#[\x09\x0A\x0D\x20-\x7E]|
[\xC2-\xDF][\x80-\xBF]|
\xE0[\xA0-\xBF][\x80-\xBF]|
[\xE1-\xEC\xEE\xEF][\x80-\xBF]{2}|
\xED[\x80-\x9F][\x80-\xBF]#x", $s, $m
);
return implode("", $m[0]);
}