file_get_contents("php://input") or $HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA, which one is better to get the body of JSON request?
PhpJsonXmlhttprequestPhp Problem Overview
file_get_contents("php://input") or $HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA - which one is better to get the body of JSON request?
And which request type (GET or POST) should I use to send JSON data when using client side XmlHTTPRequest?
My question was inspired from this answer: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/813487/how-to-post-json-to-php-with-curl/813512#813512
Quote from that answer:
> From a protocol perspective file_get_contents("php://input") is actually more correct, since you're not really processing http multipart form data anyway.
Php Solutions
Solution 1 - Php
Actually php://input allows you to read raw request body.
It is a less memory intensive alternative to $HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA and does not need any special php.ini directives.
From Reference
>php://input is not available with enctype="multipart/form-data".
Solution 2 - Php
> php://input is a read-only stream that allows you to read raw data > from the request body. In the case of POST requests, it is preferable > to use php://input instead of $HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA as it does not > depend on special php.ini directives. Moreover, for those cases > where $HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA is not populated by default, it is a > potentially less memory intensive alternative to activating > always_populate_raw_post_data.
Solution 3 - Php
file_get_contents(php://input) - gets the raw POST data and you need to use this when you write APIs and need XML/JSON/... input that cannot be decoded to $_POST by PHP some example :
send by post JSON string
<input type="button" value= "click" onclick="fn()">
<script>
function fn(){
var js_obj = {plugin: 'jquery-json', version: 2.3};
var encoded = JSON.stringify( js_obj );
var data= encoded
$.ajax({
type: "POST",
url: '1.php',
data: data,
success: function(data){
console.log(data);
}
});
}
</script>
1.php
//print_r($_POST); //empty!!! don't work ...
var_dump( file_get_contents('php://input'));
Solution 4 - Php
For JSON data, it's much easier to POST it as "application/json" content-type. If you use GET, you have to URL-encode the JSON in a parameter and it's kind of messy. Also, there is no size limit when you do POST. GET's size if very limited (4K at most).
Solution 5 - Php
The usual rules should apply for how you send the request. If the request is to retrieve information (e.g. a partial search 'hint' result, or a new page to be displayed, etc...) you can use GET. If the data being sent is part of a request to change something (update a database, delete a record, etc..) then use POST.
Server-side, there's no reason to use the raw input, unless you want to grab the entire post/get data block in a single go. You can retrieve the specific information you want via the _GET/_POST arrays as usual. AJAX libraries such as MooTools/jQuery will handle the hard part of doing the actual AJAX calls and encoding form data into appropriate formats for you.
Solution 6 - Php
Your second question is easy, GET has a size limitation of 1-2 kilobytes on both the server and browser side, so any kind of larger amounts of data you'd have to send through POST.