Laravel Array & JSON Casting to Algolia - json

Question

I am trying to send some data along to Algolia through the toSearchableArray. Any strings I have stored in my DB are sending along fine, but I hit a roadblock when trying to push nested JSON data along—the information is being sent as a string with characters escaped.
This is a sample of the nested object that I am storing in my table (MySQL with a JSON data type):
[
{
"id": 19,
"name": "Mathematics",
"short": "Math"
},
{
"id": 23,
"name": "Science",
"short": "Science"
},
{
"id": 14,
"name": "Health and Life Skills",
"short": "Health"
}
]
My model looks like this:
<?php
namespace App;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Laravel\Scout\Searchable;
class Resource extends Model
{
use Searchable;
protected $primaryKey = 'objectID';
public function toSearchableArray()
{
$data = $this->toArray();
$data['grades'] = explode(';', $data['grades']);
$data['units'] = explode(';', $data['units']);
return $data;
}
}
I get an output that looks like this:
array:22 [
"objectID" => 1
"name" => "Resource #1"
"slug" => "resource-1"
"write_up" => """
This is an example write up.
"""
"author" => "johnny"
"type_name" => "Lesson Plan"
"language" => "English"
"grades" => array:3 [
0 => "Kindergarten"
1 => "Grade 1"
2 => "Grade 4"
]
"subjects" => "[{"id": 19, "name": "Mathematics", "short": "Math"}, {"id": 23, "name": "Science", "short": "Science"}, {"id": 14, "name": "Health and Life Skills", "short": "Health"}]"
"units" => array:2 [
0 => "Unit A"
1 => "Unit B"
]
"main_image" => "https://dummyimage.com/250x325/000000/fff.png&text=Just+a+Test"
"loves" => 88
"downloads" => 280
"created_at" => "2018-01-01 13:26:47"
"updated_at" => "2018-01-02 10:10:32"
]
As you can see, the 'subjects' attribute is being stored as a string. I know there is attribute casting in 5.5 (I am running 5.5), but I am not too clear on how I would implement the example they have for Array & JSON Casting in my work above. https://laravel.com/docs/5.5/eloquent-mutators#attribute-casting
Would anyone be willing to show me an example?

Answer 1

I'd rely on Attribute Casting for this, add a $casts property in your model and it will be done automatically.
<?php
namespace App;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Laravel\Scout\Searchable;
class Resource extends Model
{
use Searchable;
protected $primaryKey = 'objectID';
protected $casts = [
'subjects' => 'array',
];
public function toSearchableArray()
{
// Same function as you posted
}
}
You can also do it manually in your toSearchableArray method with $data['subjects'] = json_decode($this->subjects, true);
I answered with more details on this other posts: https://discourse.algolia.com/t/laravel-array-json-casting-to-algolia/4125/2