Laravel 5 Model $cats to array utf-8 JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE

Question

When you have an array field and save it in the DB it does a nifty json_encode to the array but without the JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE option. The data end up like so :

{"en":"\u039d\u03ad\u03b1"}

which is pretty much useless. The solution of course is to json_encode with the JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE flag. Is it possible to tell Laravel to add this option before saving the model?

I am trying to avoid using the setNameAttribute mutator as this would be kind of a pain to do it every time i have this type of fields

maxwilms · Accepted Answer · 2016-07-08T09:08:20.263

20

Just override the asJson() method.

class Cat extends Model
{

    // ...

    protected function asJson($value)
    {
        return json_encode($value, JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE);
    }

}

If you don't want to repeat the method for all your models, just extract the method to an abstract class:

abstract class UnicodeModel extends Model 
{
    protected function asJson($value)
    {
        return json_encode($value, JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE);
    }
}

Now you inherit from UnicodeModel instead of Model:

class Cat extends UnicodeModel 
{
    // ...
}

In case you need a finer casting control you can override the setAttribute method, e.g.:

class Cat extends Model
{

    // ...

    public function setAttribute($key, $value)
    {

        // take special care for the attributes foo, bar and baz
        if (in_array($key, ['foo', 'bar', 'baz'])) {
            $this->attributes[$key] = json_encode($value, JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE);

            return $this;
        }

        // apply default for everything else
        return parent::setAttribute($key, $value);
    }
}

edited Jul 08 '16 at 09:08

answered Jul 07 '16 at 15:21

maxwilms

1,964
20
23

1

At the moment i am using the setAttribute mutator. Thing is, i was looking for a more "automatic" solution to avoid having these methods in all of my models (multilingual models, saving a json in the db field) – mbouclas Jul 07 '16 at 20:08
Had one more idea for a cleaner solution. Hope that helps! – maxwilms Jul 08 '16 at 09:08
Actually, this is not a bad idea. Cheers for that – mbouclas Jul 08 '16 at 13:01
Very nice. I like the abstract class approach. – IGP Apr 14 '20 at 17:13

score 3 · Answer 2 · edited Nov 20 '16 at 08:05

3

Better for Laravel's Model:

$yourModel->toJson(JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE)

edited Nov 20 '16 at 08:05

FelixSFD

6,052
10
43
117

answered Nov 20 '16 at 07:37

Tomer Ofer

378
3
15

Laravel 5 Model $cats to array utf-8 JSON_UNESCAPED_UNICODE

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