Option to decode JSON as object, instead of associative array

[rodamaral]

By default, json_decode will convert the string to an object, not to associative arrays. I wonder if it's possible to get the same behaviour in json-machine, or should I use json_decode(json_encode($field), false)?

[halaxa]

Hello, thanks for your question. This feature is not planned to be implemented. The reason is, that this can be easily done using native PHP type casting.

Short version

foreach(JsonMachine::fromFile('some.json') as $array) {
    $object = (object) $array; // array casts to stdClass instance, the same as json_decode produces.
    echo $object->example;
}

That's it.

Longer version

If you want to have your client code clean without having to cast the array every time as in previous example, you can make yourself a little generator function:

function toObjects(iterable $items): Generator
{
    foreach ($items as $item) {
        yield (object) $item;
    }
}

and use it like this:

foreach (toObjects(JsonMachine::fromFile('some.json')) as $object) {
    echo $object->example;
}

Please let me know if it solves your problem.

[rodamaral]

It solves our problem. Thank you for your library.

[halaxa]

Glad to help. If you like it, give it a star, share it and spread the word :).

You made a valid point. If you want to be a contributor, you could make pull request with this example in README.md. What do you think?

[halaxa]

I made a function for that called objects. See cbc45bd

[halaxa]

Object will be default in version 1.0. See #37.

[halaxa]

objects function is deprecated since 0.4.0

[halaxa]

Done in master branch. Will be released in 1.0.0.