json_encode(string) giving backslashes in response - php

Question

I am creating an array of objects in js and sending it to one of my controllers after stringify'ing the array.
var arr = new Array();
for(i=0;i<noOfDeals;i++){
var deals = {'percentageMin':document.getElementById("pmin"+i).value,
'percentageMax':document.getElementById("pmax"+i).value,
'modelApplicable': document.getElementById("model"+i).value,
'maxCashback' : document.getElementById("maxcash"+i).value,
'dealId' : document.getElementById("deal"+i).value
};
arr.push(deals);
}
alert(JSON.stringify(arr));
$.ajax({method:'get',url:'abc?data='+JSON.stringify(arr),success:function(response) {
//response = JSON.parse(response);
response = JSON.parse(response);
alert(response.body);
response = JSON.parse(response.body);
if(response.status != undefined && response.status == 'SUCCESS') {
alert('Merchant details updated successfully. Refresh the page to see the changes.');
}
else {
alert('Could not update merchant details, Some Error Occurred');
}
}});
In my controller i am encoding the data and then sending to hit the API :
public function updateselectedmerchants(){
if (isset($_GET['data'])) {
$str_data = $_GET['data'];
print_r(json_encode(array('deals' => $str_data)));
die;
}
}
The Output :
{"deals":"[{\"percentageMin\":\"1.00\",\"perentageMax\":\"0.00\",\"modelApplicable\":\"3\",\"maxCashback\":\"30.00\",\"dealId\":\"7\"}"}
The desired output :
{"deals":[{\"percentageMin\":\"1.00\",\"perentageMax\":\"0.00\",\"modelApplicable\":\"3\",\"maxCashback\":\"30.00\",\"dealId\":\"7\"}]}
There are three things which are unwanted in the output which is coming :
1) The double quotes before the first square brackets should not be there.
2) The ending square bracket is not present
3) "/" appearing
Please help me with this.

Answer 1

You should do
$str_data = json_decode($_GET['data'], true);
print_r(json_encode(array('deals' => $str_data)));
Otherwise $str_data remains a string, and will be JSON encoded as such, while it looks like you want it to be a PHP array structure, and then encode all of that into valid JSON again.
See this PHP 'fiddle'

Answer 2

You probably generate " or ' somewhere you dont want to.
Not sure if it work 100%, but try:
public function updateselectedmerchants(){
if (isset($_GET['data'])) {
$str_data = json_decode($_GET['data']);
print_r(json_encode(array('deals' => $str_data)));
die;
}
}
You should try PHP approach:
http://php.net/manual/en/function.urlencode.php
http://php.net/manual/en/function.urldecode.php
Just decode array and encode it on the other side.