Ruby send JSON request

How do I send a JSON request in ruby? I have a JSON object but I dont think I can just do .send. Do I have to have javascript send the form?

Or can I use the net/http class in ruby?

With header - content type = json and body the json object?

uri = URI('https://myapp.com/api/v1/resource')
req = Net::HTTP::Post.new(uri, 'Content-Type' => 'application/json')
req.body = {param1: 'some value', param2: 'some other value'}.to_json
res = Net::HTTP.start(uri.hostname, uri.port) do |http|
  http.request(req)
end

require 'net/http'
require 'json'

def create_agent
	uri = URI('http://api.nsa.gov:1337/agent')
	http = Net::HTTP.new(uri.host, uri.port)
	req = Net::HTTP::Post.new(uri.path, 'Content-Type' => 'application/json')
	req.body = {name: 'John Doe', role: 'agent'}.to_json
	res = http.request(req)
	puts "response #{res.body}"
rescue => e
	puts "failed #{e}"
end

HTTParty makes this a bit easier I think (and works with nested json etc, which didn't seem to work in other examples I've seen.

require 'httparty'
HTTParty.post("http://localhost:3000/api/v1/users", body: {user: {email: '[email protected]', password: 'secret'}}).body

real life example, notify Airbrake API about new deployment via NetHttps

require 'uri'
require 'net/https'
require 'json'

class MakeHttpsRequest
  def call(url, hash_json)
    uri = URI.parse(url)
    req = Net::HTTP::Post.new(uri.to_s)
    req.body = hash_json.to_json
    req['Content-Type'] = 'application/json'
    # ... set more request headers 

    response = https(uri).request(req)

    response.body
  end

  private

  def https(uri)
    Net::HTTP.new(uri.host, uri.port).tap do |http|
      http.use_ssl = true
      http.verify_mode = OpenSSL::SSL::VERIFY_NONE
    end
  end
end

project_id = 'yyyyyy'
project_key = 'xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx'
url = "https://airbrake.io/api/v4/projects/#{project_id}/deploys?key=#{project_key}"
body_hash = {
  "environment":"production",
  "username":"tomas",
  "repository":"https://github.com/equivalent/scrapbook2",
  "revision":"live-20160905_0001",
  "version":"v2.0"
}

puts MakeHttpsRequest.new.call(url, body_hash)

Notes:

in case you doing authentication via Authorisation header set header req['Authorization'] = "Token xxxxxxxxxxxx" or http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActionController/HttpAuthentication/Token.html

This works on ruby 2.4 HTTPS Post with JSON object and the response body written out.

require 'net/http' #net/https does not have to be required anymore
require 'json'
require 'uri'

uri = URI('https://your.secure-url.com')
Net::HTTP.start(uri.host, uri.port, :use_ssl => uri.scheme == 'https') do |http|
  request = Net::HTTP::Post.new(uri, 'Content-Type' => 'application/json')
  request.body = {parameter: 'value'}.to_json
  response = http.request request # Net::HTTPResponse object
  puts "response #{response.body}"
end

A simple json POST request example for those that need it even simpler than what Tom is linking to:

require 'net/http'

uri = URI.parse("http://www.example.com/search.json")
response = Net::HTTP.post_form(uri, {"search" => "Berlin"})

I like this light weight http request client called `unirest'

gem install unirest

usage:

response = Unirest.post "http://httpbin.org/post", 
                        headers:{ "Accept" => "application/json" }, 
                        parameters:{ :age => 23, :foo => "bar" }

response.code # Status code
response.headers # Response headers
response.body # Parsed body
response.raw_body # Unparsed body

It's 2020 - nobody should be using Net::HTTP any more and all answers seem to be saying so, use a more high level gem such as Faraday - Github

---

That said, what I like to do is a wrapper around the HTTP api call,something that's called like

rv = Transporter::FaradayHttp[url, options]

because this allows me to fake HTTP calls without additional dependencies, ie:

  if InfoSig.env?(:test) && !(url.to_s =~ /localhost/)
    response_body = FakerForTests[url: url, options: options]

  else
    conn = Faraday::Connection.new url, connection_options

Where the faker looks something like this

I know there are HTTP mocking/stubbing frameworks, but at least when I researched last time they didn't allow me to validate requests efficiently and they were just for HTTP, not for example for raw TCP exchanges, this system allows me to have a unified framework for all API communication.

---

Assuming you just want to quick&dirty convert a hash to json, send the json to a remote host to test an API and parse response to ruby this is probably fastest way without involving additional gems:

JSON.load `curl -H 'Content-Type:application/json' -H 'Accept:application/json' -X POST localhost:3000/simple_api -d '#{message.to_json}'`

Hopefully this goes without saying, but don't use this in production.

The net/http api can be tough to use.

require "net/http"

uri = URI.parse(uri)

Net::HTTP.new(uri.host, uri.port).start do |client|
  request                 = Net::HTTP::Post.new(uri.path)
  request.body            = "{}"
  request["Content-Type"] = "application/json"
  client.request(request)
end

data = {a: {b: [1, 2]}}.to_json
uri = URI 'https://myapp.com/api/v1/resource'
https = Net::HTTP.new uri.host, uri.port
https.use_ssl = true
https.post2 uri.path, data, 'Content-Type' => 'application/json'