Symfony post request body parameters?

Question

I'm sending POST request by postman with header application/json and the body:

{
    "name": "user"
}

And when I try to get this parameter from the request object $request->request->get('name') I got null. But when I use $request->getContent() I receive raw string.

Looks like my request is not parsed correctly. What is wrong with the request?

Update:

Turned out that docs not clear about that and I need to manually convert body to json. Don't really understand why not to do it in framework by default.

Answer 1

That is the expected behavior. You are sendind a JSON string inside the body of the request.

In this case, you need json_decode to convert the JSON string into an array or object, in order to access the data.

$parameters = json_decode($request->getContent(), true);
echo $parameters['name']; // will print 'user'

Answer 2

Although the accepted answer is correct, I would like to add here that there are 2 ways of doing so.

$payload = json_decode($request->getContent(), true);
echo $payload['name']; // will print 'user'

or

$payload = json_decode($request->getContent(), false);
echo $payload->name; // will print 'user'

By default, the json_decode returns an object unless otherwise specified by the second parameter.

• true: array
• false: object (default)

Answer 3

Answer from Cacanode is correct - you can decode json from the $request->getContent()

However, if you want to make your live easier you can consider using FOSRestBundle. Specifically the "body_listener" funcationality: https://symfony.com/doc/master/bundles/FOSRestBundle/body_listener.html

This bundle has both JSON and XML decoders already installed - and you can add some new custom decoder if you want.

Answer 4

Using Symfony 4.3 you could use the component:

...
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Request;

...

public function doSomething(Request $request){
        $a = json_decode($request->getContent(), true);

        return $this->json($a);
}

This will return the same json object you sent.