Question

So, I’ve been having trouble decoding valid JSON requests sent to the server from a backbone.js application. No matter what I tried, the decoded $_POST data returned null. I poked around stackoverflow and found this solution:

$data = json_decode(file_get_contents('php://input'), true); 
print_r($data);

This seems like a hack so I am wondering if there is a better way to handle JSON data from backbone in PHP. What is the proper way to recieve and decode JSON data sent from a backbone.js application in PHP?

Answer 1

You should check for the request method used to send data to your script, like this:

switch ($_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'])
{
    case 'POST':
    {
      // do something
    }
    break;

    case 'GET':
    {
      // do something else
    }
    break;

    case 'PUT':
    {
      // your snippet goes here
    }
    break;

    case 'DELETE':
    {
      // do something when request method == DELETE
    }
    break;
}

The code you posted is what you should use for when REQUEST_METHOD is PUT or DELETE. It’s not a hack at all.

You can also configure Backbone to send data via POST with:

Backbone.emulateHTTP = true;

From Backbone’s manual:

If you want to work with a legacy web server that doesn’t support
Backbone’s default REST/HTTP approach, you may choose to turn on
Backbone.emulateHTTP. Setting this option will fake PUT and DELETE
requests with a HTTP POST, setting the X-HTTP-Method-Override header
with the true method. If emulateJSON is also on, the true method will
be passed as an additional _method parameter.