Posting JSON data to API using CURL - php

Question

When I'm posting json data to API using curl - I'm not getting any output. I would like to send email invitation to recipient.
$url_send ="http://api.address.com/SendInvitation?";
$str_data = json_encode($data);
function sendPostData ($url, $post) {
$ch = curl_init($url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST, "POST");
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, http_build_query($post));
return curl_exec($ch);
}
And here is JSON $str_data
[
{
"authorizedKey" : "abbad35c5c01-xxxx-xxx",
"senderEmail" : "myemail#yahoo.com",
"recipientEmail" : "jaketalledo86#yahoo.com",
"comment" : "Invitation",
"forceDebitCard" : "false"
}
]
And calling function:
$response = sendPostData($url_send, $str_data);
This is the API: https://api.payquicker.com/Help/Api/POST-api-SendInvitation

Answer 1

Try adding curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, 1);
And changing http_build_query($post) to $post
The implementation:
<?php
$data = array(
"authorizedKey" => "abbad35c5c01-xxxx-xxx",
"senderEmail" => "myemail#yahoo.com",
"recipientEmail" => "jaketalledo86#yahoo.com",
"comment" => "Invitation",
"forceDebitCard" => "false"
);
$url_send ="http://api.payquicker.com/api/SendInvitation?authorizedKey=xxxxx";
$str_data = json_encode($data);
function sendPostData($url, $post){
$ch = curl_init($url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST, "POST");
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS,$post);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, 1);
$result = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch); // Seems like good practice
return $result;
}
echo " " . sendPostData($url_send, $str_data);
?>
The response I get is:
{"success":false,"errorMessage":"Object reference not set to an instance of an object.","status":"N/A"}
But maybe it will work with valid data....
Edit:
For posting xml,
it's the same as on their site, except in a string:
$xml = '
<SendInvitationRequest xmlns:i="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns="http://schemas.datacontract.org/2004/07/PQApi.Models">
<authorizedKey>80c587b9-caa9-4e56-8750-a34b17dba0a2</authorizedKey>
<comment>sample string 4</comment>
<forceDebitCard>true</forceDebitCard>
<recipientEmail>sample string 3</recipientEmail>
<senderEmail>sample string 2</senderEmail>
</SendInvitationRequest>';
Then:
sendPostData($url_send, $xml)

Answer 2

You have to add header:
$headers= array('Accept: application/json','Content-Type: application/json');
And:
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, $headers);
Otherwise ...
HTTP Status 415 - Unsupported Media Type
... may happen.

Answer 3

You don't need to add headers as you already do json_encode.
just print_r (curl_getinfo($ch)); and see the content type info in it.