CloudCreativity\JsonApi\Error\ErrorObject toArray() enhancement?

[nickelozz]

Could it be possible to have the toArray() method (in CloudCreativity\JsonApi\Error\ErrorObject line 332) return only not null values?

I'll try to explain my scenario. I wanna be able to use this class to build application logic errors (as opposed to an Exception which handles "exceptional" situations) that I can then use to respond a client with using the following syntax:

$error = new ErrorObject([
    'status' => '418',
    'code' => '1',
    'title' => "I'm an error object",
    'detail' => 'error object',
    'meta' => ['render' => 'form'],
]);

return $this->reply()->respond('418', ['errors' => [$error->toArray()]]);

Currently if I do it like that, I get the following response:

{
  "errors": [
    {
      "id": null,
      "links": null,
      "status": "418",
      "code": "1",
      "title": "I'm an error object",
      "detail": "error object",
      "source": null,
      "meta": {
        "render": "form"
      }
    }
  ]
}

I'd rather not have all the null value keys returned from toArray(). Would implement such behavour break in some way the functionality of the class?

[lindyhopchris]

@nickelozz

Good point - I hadn't spotted this because I'm not using them in this way, but you're totally right that it shouldn't return null values.

I'll get this fixed.

[lindyhopchris]

@nickelozz

Have just realised this isn't a bug. If you're using the laravel-json-api package you don't need to reply with the errors - you need to the throw the error object so that the exception renderer renders them.

So your code should look like this:

$error = new ErrorObject([
    'status' => '418',
    'code' => '1',
    'title' => "I'm an error object",
    'detail' => 'error object',
    'meta' => ['render' => 'form'],
]);

throw new ErrorException($error);

When error objects are rendered, null values are ignored. That's because neomerx/json-api encodes objects that implement the ErrorInterface, which ErrorObject does.

Internally within ErrorObject, the reason toArray returns null values is because it is the opposite of exchangeArray - which accepts nulls. I hadn't really intended toArray to be used for encoding because neomerx/json-api handles the encoding of the interface.

Does that make sense? The thing I could add if it would be useful is to add a $this->reply()->errors($error) helper to the laravel package which would do the same rendering as if you threw the exception. Let me know if that would be useful as I'll happily add that.

[nickelozz]

Howdy @lindyhopchris!

Thanks for being so diligent about this... I guess I was trying not to use exception throwing for app logic errors but I'm not opposed to the idea of using the existing ErrorObject in combination with a helper method such as the one you mentioned (yes I know ultimately there'd be an exception throwing but I can live with it :P). $this->reply()->errors($error) would definetly be appreciated as I think it helps keep the controllers less cumbersome and it'd be overall more straightforward.

Please do add the helper!! :D

I really like both packages you've built to handle json-api and I expect to continue using them a lot in the future.

Closed as it's currently possible to go around the issue by using ErrorObject and ErrorException to create a valid JSON API response.

[lindyhopchris]

Great. Glad you like the packages and keep sending me an ideas/issues!

I've created an issue in the laravel-json-api package for the errors helper enhancement. I should be able to get it done some point in the next few days.