Sending boolean values with $.ajax to PHP

Question

I post data to a PHP backend using jQuery $.ajax:

$.ajax({
    url: "server.php",
    method: "post",
    data: {
        testVariable: true
    }
});

On the server side I tried die(gettype($_POST["testVariable"])); which returns string.

I'm trying to save the JSON data posted from Javascript to a MySQL database, but boolean values get quoted which is not what should happen.

What gets inserted is {"testVariable": "true"} and what I need is {"testVariable": true}. How do I accomplish this?

This is normal behaviour, you can really only send strings, not booleans, so booleans are converted to strings when posted — adeneo, Nov 16 '16 at 13:56
on the php side, you can use json_decode http://php.net/manual/en/function.json-decode.php to parse the incoming data into an array or object. — Loopo, Nov 16 '16 at 14:01
or just send 1 as true and 0 as false in jor ajax, and convert it in your php to boolean. (boolean true is original an 1 and false a 0 (binary)) — Timon Post, Nov 16 '16 at 14:22
Possible duplicate of [Bool parameter from jQuery Ajax received as literal string "false"/"true" in PHP](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7408976/bool-parameter-from-jquery-ajax-received-as-literal-string-false-true-in-php) — san san, Nov 16 '16 at 14:35

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 16 '16 at 14:46

This is the expected behavior. On PHP you need convert the string to boolean, if you need, using a ternary or the method you like. Or you can send 1/0 to represent boolean state.

Converting like that:

$testVariable = ($_POST['testVariable'] === 'true'); //return the boolean evaluation of expression

Sending boolean values with $.ajax to PHP

1 Answers1