Guzzle HTTP, can't parse response to JSON

Question

So I'm integrating an API from a 3rd party company and I'm facing this strange situation.

I fetch the endpoint with the following code

$client = $this->client = new Client([
    'base_uri' => 'https://xxx.xxxxxxxxxx.com/api/',
    'timeout' => 15
]);

$this->requestConfig = [
    'auth' => [
        'xxxx@xx.xxx',
        'xxxxx'
    ],
    'headers' => [
        'cache-control' => 'no-cache',
        'content-type' => 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'
    ],

];

$response = $this->client->get($url, $this->requestConfig);

$content = $response->getBody()->getContents();

Now the fun comes, if I var_dump content I get:

string(66) ""[{\"ExternalId\":\"38\",\"AgencyReference\":\"45436070356676\"}]""

Now I know this response is bad, response type if not set a json, json is URL encoded and everything smells bad.

I've been trying to parse this string for a while.

urldecode doesn't work either.

Question is simple, given a response like that, how can I get a normal array?

Currently using PHP 7.1

no, I mean debug your decoding error using json_last_error :) — hassan, Mar 19 '18 at 10:20
Looks like you need to get rid of slashes before `json_decode`-ing. What happens if you do `$content = json_decode(stripslashes($response->getBody()->getContents()));`? — N.B., Mar 19 '18 at 10:21

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 19 '18 at 10:22

So finally found this: Remove backslash \ from string using preg replace of php

To solve my issue.

In this case it was that the escaped quotes where malforming the json. My final code looks like this.

$response = $response->getBody()->getContents();
$clean = stripslashes($response);
$clean = substr($clean, 1, -1);

dd(json_decode($clean));

Please never write your API's like this...

Just looks awfull

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 20 '18 at 12:21

BTW, Content-Type makes sense when you send (in request or response) some content. But you send a GET request, that has no content.

And to specify preferred content type for the response, you should use Accept HTTP header, Accept: application/json for example.

I'm not sure this will solve your problem, but just make things clear and correct ;)

Guzzle HTTP, can't parse response to JSON

2 Answers2