Creating a REST API in Symfony2 - empty input

Question

I've been following this guide as close as possible to create a simple REST API in Symfony2.

Unfortunately whatever I post to the API I always get:

{"children":{"firstName":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]},"lastName":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]},"email":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]},"password":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]},"dob":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."],"children":{"year":[],"month":[],"day":[]}},"tutorialWatched":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]},"challengeEmails":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]},"mailingList":{"errors":["This value should not be blank."]}}}

My validation is as follows:

LifeMirror\APIBundle\Model\Users:
    properties:
        firstName:
            - NotBlank:
        lastName:
            - NotBlank:
        email:
            - NotBlank:
            - Email:
        password:
            - NotBlank:
        dob:
            - NotBlank:
            - Date:
        tutorialWatched:
            - NotBlank:
            - Choice:
                choices: [0, 1]
        challengeEmails:
            - NotBlank:
            - Choice:
                choices: [0, 1]
        mailingList:
            - NotBlank:
            - Choice:
                choices: [0, 1]

And my controller is:

class RegisterController extends Controller
{
    public function indexAction()
    {
        return $this->processForm(new Users());
    }

    private function processForm(Users $user)
    {
        $statusCode = $user->isNew() ? 201 : 204;

        $form = $this->createForm(new UsersType(), $user);
        $form->bind($this->getRequest());

        if ($form->isValid()) {
            $user->save();

            $response = new Response();
            $response->setStatusCode($statusCode);
            return $response;
        }
        $view = View::create($form, 400);
        $view->setFormat('json');
        return $view;
    }
}

I can var_dump $this->getRequest() and can see the data are there, but I'm not sure why the validator is complaining.

EDIT:

Here's the form:

namespace LifeMirror\APIBundle\Form\Type;

use Symfony\Component\Form\AbstractType;
use Symfony\Component\Form\FormBuilderInterface;

class UsersType extends AbstractType
{
    /**
     * {@inheritdoc}
     */
    public function buildForm(FormBuilderInterface $builder, array $options)
    {
        $builder->add('firstName');
        $builder->add('lastName');
        $builder->add('email');
        $builder->add('password');
        $builder->add('dob');
        $builder->add('tutorialWatched');
        $builder->add('challengeEmails');
        $builder->add('mailingList');
    }

    /**
     * {@inheritdoc}
     */
    public function getDefaultOptions(array $options)
    {
        return array(
            'data_class' => 'LifeMirror\APIBundle\Model\Users',
            'csrf_protection'   => false,
        );
    }

    /**
     * {@inheritdoc}
     */
    public function getName()
    {
        return 'users';
    }
}

And my input: enter image description here

EDIT 2: Content tof $_REQUEST:

array(9) { ["firstName"]=> string(5) "James" ["lastName"]=> string(6) "Hadley" ["email"]=> string(9) "[email protected]" ["password"]=> string(7) "test123" ["dob"]=> string(33) "{'year':1991,'month':08,'day':02}" ["location"]=> string(9) "Lancaster" ["tutorialWatched"]=> string(1) "0" ["challengeEmails"]=> string(1) "0" ["mailingList"]=> string(1) "0" }

EDIT 3: HTML form:

<form action="http://www.lifemirror.org/api/register/" method="post">
    <input type="hidden" name="firstName" value="James" />
    <input type="hidden" name="lastName" value="Hadley" />
    <input type="hidden" name="email" value="[email protected]" />
    <input type="hidden" name="password" value="test123" />
    <input type="hidden" name="dob" value="{'year':1991,'month':08,'day':02}" />
    <input type="hidden" name="location" value="Lancaster" />
    <input type="hidden" name="tutorialWatched" value="0" />
    <input type="hidden" name="challengeEmails" value="0" />
    <input type="hidden" name="mailingList" value="0" />
    <input type="submit" />
</form>

Is your indexAction that is processing the user creation operation? Could you post you request data and you form as well? — P. R. Ribeiro
– P. R. Ribeiro, Commented Jan 27, 2013 at 21:17
I've added the extra information and yes, indexAction should be processing the form. — James
– James, Commented Jan 27, 2013 at 21:22
Still missing some important information ;-). It's important to know the form name and the content of variable $_REQUEST . I seems like the name of the form is missing from client. — P. R. Ribeiro
– P. R. Ribeiro, Commented Jan 27, 2013 at 21:25
I've added $_REQUEST. I don't think there's a form name defined in Symfony2 (might be wrong - very new to Symfony2) and there definitely isn't one defined client side. — James
– James, Commented Jan 27, 2013 at 21:30
Could you post you whole Form class? How are you sending this info from the client? — P. R. Ribeiro
– P. R. Ribeiro, Commented Jan 27, 2013 at 21:38

P. R. Ribeiro · Accepted Answer · 2013-01-27 23:02:58Z

1

The problem is that you are not considering the form name in your action. By the way, your form name is 'users'.

Change your action to

class RegisterController extends Controller
{
    public function indexAction()
    {
        return $this->processForm(new Users());
    }

    private function processForm(Users $user)
    {
        $statusCode = $user->isNew() ? 201 : 204;

        $form = $this->createForm(new UsersType(), $user);
        $form->bind(array('users'=>$this->getRequest()->query->all()));

        if ($form->isValid()) {
            $user->save();

            $response = new Response();
            $response->setStatusCode($statusCode);
            return $response;
        }
        $view = View::create($form, 400);
        $view->setFormat('json');
        return $view;
    }
}

Now it should work fine.

The new binding is the key to get it working

$form->bind(array('users'=>$this->getRequest()->query->all()));

PS: Note that if you use the Twig for rendering that form, you don't need to change the code, as the form name will be rendered together with the HTML markup.

Your HTML form should be something like

<form>
    <input name="users[firstName]">
    <input name="users[lastName]">
    <input name="users[email]">
    <input name="users[password]">
    <input name="users[tutorialWatched]">
    <input name="users[challengeEmails]">
    <input name="users[mailingList]">
</form>

edited Jan 27, 2013 at 23:02

answered Jan 27, 2013 at 21:54

P. R. Ribeiro

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7 Comments

James Over a year ago

Thanks for your help, however, I have tried this as well as adding name="users" to the HTML form and I get the following: {"errors":["This form should not contain extra fields."],"children":{"firstName":{"errors":["This value should ... NB The form will be submitted from mobile phones when done.

P. R. Ribeiro Over a year ago

Could you post your HTML form? PS: I updated the answer to speed things up. Take a look.

P. R. Ribeiro Over a year ago

About the error "This form should not contain extra fields.": you added an extra field called "location" that you did not add to the UsersType class. Do not do that! ;-)

James Over a year ago

I added location to the UsersType class (sorry about that), but the problem still persists. I can get rid of the "extra fields" error by binding to $this->getRequest()->request->all() (request, not query - query is empty). But it's still saying all of the fields are empty. I checked $this->getRequest()->request->all() and it is an array with all of the fields and data in it. Adding [users] seems to create further problems as well.

P. R. Ribeiro Over a year ago

Could you post your HTML form?

|

Emii Khaos · Accepted Answer · 2013-04-29 11:51:22Z

1

If you're using the FOSRestBundle and the body listener, the request doesn't accept any application/x-www-form-urlencoded content any more. You can't send data using a HTML form.

REST Webservice means, that you send your request data as JSON or XML like you get the response.

For testing you can add the NelmioApiDocBundle to your project, they have a excellent sandbox for testing.

answered Apr 29, 2013 at 11:51

Emii Khaos

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Comments

James · Accepted Answer · 2013-01-28 20:44:54Z

0

Strangely, in my case each field had to be specified manually in the controller:

    $form->bind(array(
        "firstName" => $this->getRequest()->request->get('firstName'),
        "lastName" => $this->getRequest()->request->get('lastName'),

etc.

answered Jan 28, 2013 at 20:44

James

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TomiS · Accepted Answer · 2013-04-29 12:01:58Z

0

I also run into this issue. I was able to make it work by binding (POST) request variables like this:

$form->bind($request->request->all());

Still, I find it very strange that the default method does not work...

EDIT: Ok, I figured it out. It's a namespacing thing. If I POST variables with a namespace like this myformname[fieldname] instead just fieldname, then it works with

$form->bind($request);

edited Apr 29, 2013 at 12:01

answered Apr 29, 2013 at 11:44

TomiS

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