How to return only JSON from Zend

Question

I'm using Zend Framework 1.x for my project. I want to create a Web service return only JSON string for the caller function. I tried to use Zend_Controller_Action and applied those ways:

1.

$this->getResponse()
     ->setHeader('Content-type', 'text/plain')
     ->setBody(json_encode($arrResult));

2.

$this->_helper->getHelper('contextSwitch')
              ->addActionContext('nctpaymenthandler', 'json')
              ->initContext();

3.

header('Content-type: application/json');

4.

$this->_response->setHeader('Content-type', 'application/json');

5.

echo Zend_Json::encode($arrResult);
exit;

6.

return json_encode($arrResult);

7.

$this->view->_response = $arrResult;

But when I used cURL to get result, it returned with JSON string surrounded by some HTML tags. Then I tried to user Zend_Rest_Controller with the options above. It still did not success.

P.S.: Most of those ways above are from the question which had been asked on Stack Overflow.

Answer 1

You need to disable the layout and view rendering.

Explicit disable layout and view renderer:

public function getJsonResponseAction()
{
    $this->getHelper('Layout')
         ->disableLayout();

    $this->getHelper('ViewRenderer')
         ->setNoRender();

    $this->getResponse()
         ->setHeader('Content-Type', 'application/json');

    // should the content type should be UTF-8?
    // $this->getResponse()
    //      ->setHeader('Content-Type', 'application/json; charset=UTF-8');

    // ECHO JSON HERE

    return;
}

If your using the json controller action helper you need to add a json context to the action. In this case the json helper will disable the layout and view renderer for you.

public function init()
{
    $this->_helper->contextSwitch()
         ->addActionContext('getJsonResponse', array('json'))
         ->initContext();
}

public function getJsonResponseAction() 
{
    $jsonData = ''; // your json response

    return $this->_helper->json->sendJson($jsonData);
}

Answer 2

It is much easier.

public function init()
{
    parent::init();
    $this->_helper->contextSwitch()
        ->addActionContext('foo', 'json')
        ->initContext('json');
}

public function fooAction()
{
    $this->view->foo = 'bar';
}

Answer 3

Your code would need to disable the layout as well in order to stop the content being wrapped with the standard page template. But a much easier approach would just be:

$this->getHelper('json')->sendJson($arrResult);

the JSON helper will encode your variable as JSON, set the appropriate headers and disable the layout and view script for you.

Answer 4

I Like this way!

//encode your data into JSON and send the response
$this->_helper->json($myArrayofData);
//nothing else will get executed after the line above