Question

I have 2 classes that return a json encoded array if an error message is added to the $_error array:

Validate.class.php:

public function showResponse()
{
    if(!empty($this->_error)) {
        return json_encode($this->_error);
    }
    else {
        return true;
    }
}

UserTools.class.php:

public function showResponse()
{
    if(!empty($this->_error)) {
        return json_encode($this->_error);
    }
    else {
        return true;
    }
}

Then in ajax.php I check if either of those classes return true, if so a new user can be added by a User class, then the user class will return a success response, if they don’t return true, the json encoded errors in either UserTools.class.php or Validate.class.php are returned by either of those classes:

ajax.php

if($validate->showResponse() === true && $user_tools->showResponse() === true) {
    $user = new User($username, $password, $email);
    $user->save();
    echo $user->showResponse();
}
else {
    echo $user_tools->showResponse();
    echo $validate->showResponse();
}

Firebug shows that everything get’s returned as expected, UserTools.class.php returns the usernameexists error and Validate.class.php returns the others:

{"error":{"usernameexists":"Username already taken"}}
{"error":{"password":"This field is required","password_again":"This field is required","email":"This field is required"}}

Yet I can’t display either of those messages via jQuery, if I remove ‘echo $user_tools->showResponse();’ from ‘else’ in ajax.php, the error messages do get appended correctly, when I want to display both errors, nothing get’s appended.

jQuery file:

if(msg.error) {
    if(msg.error['usernameexists']) {
        $('#msg-username').show().html('<p></p>').addClass('error');
        $('#msg-username p').append(msg.error['username']);
    }
    if(msg.error['username']) {
        $('#msg-username').show().html('<p></p>').addClass('error');
        $('#msg-username p').append(msg.error['username']);
    }
    if(msg.error['password']) {
        $('#msg-password').show().html('<p></p>').addClass('error');
        $('#msg-password p').append(msg.error['password']);
    }
    if(msg.error['password_again']) {
        $('#msg-password_again').show().html('<p></p>').addClass('error');
        $('#msg-password_again p').append(msg.error['password_again']);
    }
    if(msg.error['email']) {
        $('#msg-email').show().html('<p></p>').addClass('error');
        $('#msg-email p').append(msg.error['email']);
    }
}

Answer 1

The reason its not working is because there are 2 seperate json objects

One way is to combine them, for that put this in your ajax.php

if($validate->showResponse() === true && $user_tools->showResponse() === true) {
    $user = new User($username, $password, $email);
    $user->save();
    echo $user->showResponse();
}else {
    $r1 = $user_tools->showResponse();
    $r2 = $validate->showResponse();

    if($r1 !== true && $r2 !== true){
        $r1 = json_decode($r1);
        $r2 = json_decode($r2);
        foreach($r2['error'] as $k => $v)
            $r1['error'][$k] = $v;
        $r1 = json_encode($r1);
    }else if($r1 === true){
        $r1 = $r2;
    }

    echo $r1;
}

Other easier way would be to return the error object itself instead of json_encoded one from Validate.class.php and UserTools.class.php and combine them in ajax.php then output the json_encoded string. this would save the 2 json_decode calls in the above code.