JSON output question

PHP
1

Hi

I’m pretty new to the whole JSON thing, and I know its more javascript but the problem I’m having is on the php side where I’m generating the JSON code.

The code I have at the moment:


$response["cities"] = array();
	
	while($c = mysql_fetch_array($cities))
		{
		$response["cities"][$c["cityid"]] = array("id" => (int)$c["cityid"], "name" => $c["name"]);
		}

echo json_encode($response);

This works perfectly, but the problem comes when there are no cities (for the selected country.)

If there is a city the output looks as follows:


{"cities": {"44": {"id": 44, "name": "London"} } }

but if there isn’t a city it looks like this:


{"cities": [] }

where as for use on the javascript side I need it to look like this:


{"cities": {} }

How can I get it to do this?

thanks!

2

You’re welcome.

Off Topic:

Hows about not trying to move traffic through to that other site, especially when the same answer had already been posted with more detail? If you’re a spammer, so be it (mods?); if you’re a regular member here, trying to participate then please participate. (:

Off Topic:

The quote styling within off-topic blocks should really be changed to suit.

3

Thanks all very much, have used the JSON_FORCE_OBJECT option and seems to be working perfectly.
Thanks!

4

Here is the thread to solve your question

http://www.largeresource.net/forum/php/i-have-json-output-question/

5

If you’re using PHP 5.3.0 (or above) then you can force it to be an object with the JSON_FORCE_OBJECT option.

echo json_encode($response, JSON_FORCE_OBJECT);

If that’s not an option, then provide an empty object:


if (empty($response['cities'])) {
    $response['cities'] = new stdClass;
}
echo json_encode($response);

Details of the available options, and more, can be found on the json_encode manual page.

6

Why do you need it to look like that? It wouldn’t make a huge difference, at least nothing you can’t catch using typeof