Does Laravel support "typed" requests? - laravel

Question

To transform a database entity to an API response Laravel support resources, eg. UserResource extends JsonResource. The resource allows me to cleanly define which fields from the entity should be included in the response, how to transform them etc.
Is there a similar functionality for requests? My requests typically look like this:
public function create(JsonRequest $request): UserResource
{
$data = $request->json()->all();
/* Remove, transform, add request fields etc. */
$user = User::create($data);
$user->save();
return new UserResource($user);
}
In our case we have a legacy database behind a modern API so there are a number of fields that need to transformed, renamed etc. before pushing them into the entity class. The fields differ from request to request but the steps are very similar. Is there a less boilerplate-y way to do this, something similar to how resources transform entities to responses?
Something like:
class UserRequest extends JsonRequest {
public function fromArray(JsonRequest $request) {
…
}
}
Then the request could look like this:
public function create(UserRequest $request): UserResource
{
$user = User::create($request);
$user->save();
return new UserResource($user);
}

Answer 1

I suppose, that most of your problems can solve form request. See example below
Form request class:
namespace App\Http\Requests;
use Carbon\Carbon;
use Illuminate\Contracts\Validation\Validator;
use Illuminate\Foundation\Http\FormRequest;
class TestRequest extends FormRequest
{
/**
* Determine if the user is authorized to make this request.
*
* #return bool
*/
public function authorize()
{
return true;
}
/**
* Get the validation rules that apply to the request.
*
* #return array
*/
public function rules()
{
return [
'date' => 'required|date_format:Y-m-d H:i:s',
'name' => 'required|string',
];
}
// here you can specify custom error messages
public function messages()
{
return [
'date.required' => 'No date specified',
'date.date_format' => 'Invalid date format',
'name.required' => 'No name specified',
'name.string' => 'Invalid name format',
];
}
// here you can implement some data mapping before validation
protected function validationData()
{
return $this->transform($this->all());
}
// some data transformation logic
// You can place it anywhere in your applciation services
protected function transform($input)
{
$transformed = [];
foreach ($input as $field => $value) {
if ($field == 'name') {
$value = strtoupper($value);
} elseif ($field == 'date') {
$value = Carbon::parse($value)->toDateTimeString();
}
$transformed[$field] = $value;
}
return $transformed;
}
public function failedValidation(Validator $validator)
{
// here you can implement custom validation failure
parent::failedValidation($validator);
}
}
Here is my test route: Route::get('/test', 'TestController#index');
And controller:
use App\Http\Requests\TestRequest;
class TestController extends Controller
{
public function index(TestRequest $request)
{
return response()->json($request->validated());
}
}
So, then requesting route: curl -H 'Accept: application/json' 'http://localhost:8000/test?date=01.01.2019&name=petya'
And getting response: {"date":"2019-01-01 00:00:00","name":"PETYA"}
And dont be shy to see source code of request and form request, cause of not all methods you wish are described in docs. Hope this helps