Getting JSON response WITH cURL - php

Question

I don't know what I'm doing wrong but I've already lost a couple days struggling with this.
Here is my cURL request from the command line:
curl -i -H "Accept: text/html" http://laravel.project/api/v1/users/4
This returns:
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: nginx/1.6.2
Content-Type: application/json
Transfer-Encoding: chunked
Connection: keep-alive
Cache-Control: no-cache
Date: Sun, 29 Mar 2015 10:33:36 GMT
Set-Cookie: laravel_session=eyJpdiI6ImNPTkZIYVJZSVRKaHBOZTR3SWh0dHc9PSIsInZhbHVlIjoiblpZYVJlN2dBY1ljejNIYUQycXpsNXRWd1I5a3JSRG8wSWdDOWlHVTMrYUcrdDBNVmVuZUNkOGtJb2M4bXFpTFF3cUdoTFZOVXBWXC82Q1luSGd5bjJBPT0iLCJtYWMiOiI0ZTEwOWQxMmVhMzY2NjI1Yzc1MTBmZmRmYjUyOGQwNDlhYzRjOTNiM2FiOWIyN2E1YjA0OTM4YTUxZmNmMzMzIn0%3D; expires=Sun, 29-Mar-2015 12:33:36 GMT; Max-Age=7200; path=/; httponly
{
"data":{
"id":4,
"name":"Helena",
"email":"hh#gmail.com",
"created_at":"2015-03-26 21:13:16",
"updated_at":"2015-03-26 21:13:16"
}
}
So everything looks fine: the Content-type is correctly set and response is in JSON.
But now watch what happens if I consume the API with curl in PHP:
$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, $final_url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST, "GET");
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, array('Accept: application/json'));
$result = curl_exec($ch);
return json_decode($result);
I get this response:
{#165
+"data": {#167
+"id": 4
+"name": "Helena"
+"email": "hh#gmail.com"
+"created_at": "2015-03-26 21:13:16"
+"updated_at": "2015-03-26 21:13:16"
}
}
And, if I return the $result without json_decode, I get this:
"{
"data":{
"id":4,
"name":"Helena",
"email":"hh#gmail.com",
"created_at":"2015-03-26 21:13:16",
"updated_at":"2015-03-26 21:13:16"
}
}"
The correct response but inside quotes. I've read in PHP docs that curl_opt_returntranfer returns the result as a string but I can't be the only person on the planet that just wants to get the JSON.
This is my ApiController class:
class ApiController extends Controller {
// Base controller for API Controllers
protected $statusCode = 200;
protected function respond($data)
{
return Response::json([
'data' => $data,
]);
}
protected function respondNotFound($message = 'No data found')
{
return Response::json([
'error' => [
'message' => $message,
'status_code' => $this->getStatusCode(),
]
]);
}
}
This is my UserController:
class UserController extends ApiController {
public function show($user)
{
if ($user == null)
return $this->setStatusCode(404)->respondNotFound('User not found');
return $this->respond($user);
}
}

Answer 1

And if I return the $result without json_decode i get this: The correct response but inside quotes
nope, what makes you think that? i guess the problem is how you are printing it, you are most likely printing it with var_export($result) or var_dump($result) or echo json_encode($result); which is adding the quotes. if you just want the json, just echo it with echo $result;, no extra processing, just echo the string as-is, it's already json.

Answer 2

I think this will solve your problem:
curl -i -H "Accept: text/html" http://laravel.project/api/v1/users/4 | tr -d '"'

Answer 3

$response = (string)$result;
$resp_arr = explode("<!DOCTYPE",$response);
$obj = json_decode(trim($japi_arr[0]));
if(isset($obj[0]))
{
$rsp_id = $obj[0]->id;
$rsp_name = $obj[0]->name;