How to generate JSON-API data attribute vs results

Question

I have a django 1.9.2 project using Django Rest Framework JSON API:

https://github.com/django-json-api/django-rest-framework-json-api:

My viewset looks like this:

class QuestionViewSet(viewsets.ReadOnlyModelViewSet):
    """
    API endpoint that allows questions and answers to be read.
    """
    resource_name = 'questions'
    queryset = Question.objects.all()
    serializer_class = QuestionSerializer
    renderers = renderers.JSONRenderer
    parsers = parsers.JSONParser

Typical response looks like this:

{"links": {"first": "http://testserver/api/v1/coaches?page=1", "last": "http://testserver/api/v1/coaches?page=1", "next": null, "prev": null}, "results": [{"id": 1, "created": "2016-02-11T02:41:22.569000Z", "updated": null, "deleted": null, "uuid": "0473c709-994f-465b-989e-407c623f365f", "user": {"type": "User", "id": "2"}}, {"id": 2, "created": "2016-02-11T02:41:46.853000Z", "updated": null, "deleted": null, "uuid": "36e19c0e-bda6-4bd7-bc73-374a6fc509d6", "user": {"type": "User", "id": "3"}}, {"id": 3, "created": "2016-02-11T02:42:05.419000Z", "updated": null, "deleted": null, "uuid": "d0798ff4-3be2-4cf3-81ac-edf8049eb075", "user": {"type": "User", "id": "4"}}], "meta": {"pagination": {"page": 1, "pages": 1, "count": 3}}}

I want the output to have a data attribute as opposed to the results attribute. How can I tell DRF JSON API to output the style described here:

http://jsonapi.org/format/

Answer 1

I believe you have to create a custom renderer to work with your project. Here is the guide from rest-framework renderers

I can point you to the line in the Response class of the json template for a quick and dirty fix: Response(), line 35

Answer 2

The problem in my case was that I had a viewset derived class in the view like this:

class QuestionViewSet(viewsets.ReadOnlyModelViewSet):
    """
    API endpoint that allows questions and answers to be read.
    """
    resource_name = 'questions'
    queryset = Question.objects.all()
    serializer_class = QuestionSerializer
    renderers = renderers.JSONRenderer
    parsers = parsers.JSONParser

This is wrong. The renderers and parsers attributes are actually renderer_classes and parser_classes, respectively. Moreover, the rvalues of those attributes are tuples, not singletons. Thus:

class QuestionViewSet(viewsets.ReadOnlyModelViewSet):
    """
    API endpoint that allows questions and answers to be read.
    """
    resource_name = 'questions'
    queryset = Question.objects.all()
    serializer_class = QuestionSerializer
    renderer_classes = (renderers.JSONRenderer,)
    parser_classes = (parsers.JSONParser,)

After this change, the JSON API response is largely correct:

{"data":{"type":"questions","id":"1","attributes":{"created":"2016-02-10T04:28:50.742000Z","updated":null,"deleted":null,"uuid":"eddfc27d-2677-49e5-bd37-92fecea340bd","text":"Are you dizzy?"},"relationships":{"answers":{"data":[{"type":"Answer","id":"1"},{"type":"Answer","id":"2"},{"type":"Answer","id":"3"}]},"members":{"data":[{"type":"Member","id":"1"},{"type":"Member","id":"2"},{"type":"Member","id":"3"},{"type":"Member","id":"4"}],"meta":{"count":4}}}}}