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This tutorial uses a deprecated micro-framework called Silex. The fundamentals of REST are still ?valid, but the code we use can't be used in a real application.
Centralizing Error Response Creation
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Centralizing Error Response Creation¶
Let’s go further! Even the creation of the response is error prone. So right now, in both the Application class where we have our error handler and inside of this ApiEntryPoint, we create the JsonResponse and we set the Content-Type header to application/problem+json by hand. I don’t want to have a lot of these laying around: I want to go through one central spot.
The fix for this has nothing to do with Silex or API’s: we’re just going to do a bit of refactoring and repeat ourselves a little bit less.
Lets create a new PHP class called APIProblemResponseFactory and its job will be to create API problem responses:
// src/KnpU/CodeBattle/Api/ApiProblemResponseFactory.php
namespace KnpU\CodeBattle\Api;
class ApiProblemResponseFactory
{
}
So we’ll create a single function called createResponse and it will take in an ApiProblem object and create the response for that. And most of this we can just copy from our error handler code:
// src/KnpU/CodeBattle/Api/ApiProblemResponseFactory.php
// ...
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\JsonResponse;
class ApiProblemResponseFactory
{
public function createResponse(ApiProblem $apiProblem)
{
$data = $apiProblem->toArray();
// making type a URL, to a temporarily fake page
if ($data['type'] != 'about:blank') {
$data['type'] = 'http://localhost:8000/docs/errors#'.$data['type'];
}
$response = new JsonResponse(
$data,
$apiProblem->getStatusCode()
);
$response->headers->set('Content-Type', 'application/problem+json');
return $response;
}
}
I’ll make sure that I add a couple of use statements here. Perfect, it takes in the ApiProblem, transforms that into json, and makes sure that the Content-Type header is set. So if we can use this instead of repeating that logic elsewhere, it’s going to save us some trouble.
Creating an api.response_factory Service¶
Like we saw before, inside of Silex there is a way to create global objects called services. We did this for the serializer, which let us use it in multiple places. So I’m going to do the same thing with the api.response_factory. And we’ll just return new ApiProblemResponseFactory. Of course, like anything else don’t forget to add the use statement for that:
// src/KnpU/CodeBattle/Application.php
// ...
use KnpU\CodeBattle\Api\ApiProblemResponseFactory;
// ...
private function configureServices()
{
// ...
$this['api.response_factory'] = $this->share(function() {
return new ApiProblemResponseFactory();
});
}
Yes, this class is getting a little crazy. And that’s it!
Down inside this class we’ll use that key to access the object and make use of it. I have that same $app variable, so I can get rid of all this stuff here. Pass the ApiProblem object to createResponse and there we go!
private function configureListeners()
{
$app = $this;
$this->error(function(\Exception $e, $statusCode) use ($app) {
// $apiProblem = ...
// existing code ...
/** @var \KnpU\CodeBattle\Api\ApiProblemResponseFactory $factory */
$factory = $app['api.response_factory'];
return $factory->createResponse($apiProblem);
});
}
Injecting ApiProblemResponseFactory into ApiEntryPoint¶
We can do the same thing inside the ApiEntryPoint. I need to practice a little bit of dependency injection, and if this is a new idea to you or going over your head, we have a free tutorial about dependency injection. I highly recommend you check it out, it’s going to change the way you code.
So in Application, I’m going to find the entry point and I’m actually going to go past that new factory object right to it as the second argument to the __construct function of our ApiEntryPoint:
// src/KnpU/CodeBattle/Application.php
// ...
private function configureSecurity()
{
$app = $this;
// ...
$this['security.entry_point.'.$name.'.api_token'] = $app->share(function() use ($app) {
return new ApiEntryPoint($app['translator'], $app['api.response_factory']);
});
// ...
}
This means here I will now have a second argument. Don’t forget the use statement for that and we’ll just set that on a new property:
// src/KnpU/CodeBattle/Security/Authentication/ApiEntryPoint.php
// ...
use KnpU\CodeBattle\Api\ApiProblemResponseFactory;
class ApiEntryPoint implements AuthenticationEntryPointInterface
{
private $translator;
private $responseFactory;
public function __construct(Translator $translator, ApiProblemResponseFactory $responseFactory)
{
$this->translator = $translator;
$this->responseFactory = $responseFactory;
}
// ...
}
So now, when this object is created we’re going to have access to this ApiProblemResponseFactory. Down below, we can just use it:
// src/KnpU/CodeBattle/Security/Authentication/ApiEntryPoint.php
// ...
class ApiEntryPoint implements AuthenticationEntryPointInterface
{
private $responseFactory;
// ...
public function start(Request $request, AuthenticationException $authException = null)
{
$message = $this->getMessage($authException);
$problem = new ApiProblem(401, ApiProblem::TYPE_AUTHENTICATION_ERROR);
$problem->set('detail', $message);
return $this->responseFactory->createResponse($problem);
}
}
So we still create the ApiProblem object, but I don’t want to do any of this other stuff. And that’s it! We just reduced duplication, let’s try our tests:
php vendor/bin/behat features/api/authentication.feature
Those pass too! Let’s try all of our tests for the programmer.
php vendor/bin/behat features/api/programmer.feature
Sahweet! They’re passing too! So there’s no chance of duplication because everything is going through that same class.
