Working with Arrays at the Root

[rahul0x24]

Suppose i have array of URLS. I am trying to convert the below to NSURL objects but couldn't find any method.

[
    "http://google.com",
    "http://facebook.com"
]

But if i have a rootKey like the below json. I can use Decoder.decodeURLArray("urls")(json).

{ 
"urls" : [
    "http://google.com",
    "http://facebook.com"
]
}    

I guess JSON should be AnyObject instead of [String: AnyObject].

[hkellaway]

it's not clear to me that there's a good way to handle that situation the library itself. it could be managed client-side by doing the following.

create a model with a new initializer that takes in JSON array - and creates a JSON dictionary with a custom key, which is passed to the required initializer:

struct Test: Glossy {

    let urls: [String]

    // introduce JSON array initializer that creates JSON with a custom key
    init?(jsonArray: [AnyObject]) {
        let jsonDictionary = ["myCustomJSONArrayKey" : jsonArray]

        self.init(json: jsonDictionary)
    }

    init?(json: JSON) {
        guard let urls: [String] = "myCustomJSONArrayKey" <~~ json else {
            return nil
        }

        self.urls = urls
    }

    func toJSON() -> JSON? {
        return jsonify([
            "myCustomJSONArrayKey" ~~> self.urls
            ])
    }

}

client-side, use the custom key to retrieve values:

let testJSON = [ "http://google.com", "http://facebook.com" ]
let test = Test(jsonArray: testJSON)

print(test?.urls)

// use the custom key to retrieve array
let myJSON: [String]? = test?.toJSON()?["myCustomJSONArrayKey"] as? [String]

print(myJSON)

i get its not ideal - but the designation of JSON as a dictionary is currently part of the library. thoughts on this solution?

[rahul0x24]

The solution works but I guess this will increase more work for the developer.
JSON could be Object, Array, String, Number and NSNull.

Refer to https://github.com/thoughtbot/Argo/blob/master/Argo/Types/JSON.swift. It is handling all the scenarios of JSON.

The same issue exists with Alamofire also. The parameters are the type of [String: AnyObject] so it doesn't allow us to send post requests using Array of objects. We always have to keep a rootKey like "results" and then pass the array into it.
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/27026916/sending-json-array-via-alamofire

I can work on this with the test cases if you like. I kind of need this functionality to save myself from extra work 😋.

[hkellaway]

sure, if you have the time to work on it. i'd love to see what you come up with

[rahul0x24]

Update: I was able to solve this in Reactofire itself and it seems to work without changing the Gloss Library. Regards