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16.

DELETE is for Saying Goodbye

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So you have to part ways with your programmer, and we all know goodbyes are hard. So let's delete them instead. We're going to create an rm -rf endpoint to send a programmer to /dev/null.

Start with the test! public function testDELETEProgrammer, because we'll send a DELETE request to terminate that programmer resource:

105 lines | src/AppBundle/Tests/Controller/Api/ProgrammerControllerTest.php
// ... lines 1 - 5
class ProgrammerControllerTest extends ApiTestCase
{
// ... lines 8 - 93
public function testDELETEProgrammer()
{
// ... lines 96 - 102
}
}

Copy the guts of the GET test - fetching and deleting a programmer are almost the same, except for the HTTP method, change it to delete():

105 lines | src/AppBundle/Tests/Controller/Api/ProgrammerControllerTest.php
// ... lines 1 - 93
public function testDELETEProgrammer()
{
$this->createProgrammer(array(
'nickname' => 'UnitTester',
'avatarNumber' => 3,
));
$response = $this->client->delete('/api/programmers/UnitTester');
// ... line 102
}
// ... lines 104 - 105

Now, what's the status code? What should we return? We can't return the JSON programmer, because we just finished truncating it's proverbial tables. I mean, it's deleted - so it doesn't make sense to return the resource. Instead, we'll return nothing and use a status code - 204 - that means "everything went super great, but I have no content to send back." Remove the asserts on the bottom... since there's nothing to look at:

105 lines | src/AppBundle/Tests/Controller/Api/ProgrammerControllerTest.php
// ... lines 1 - 93
public function testDELETEProgrammer()
{
$this->createProgrammer(array(
'nickname' => 'UnitTester',
'avatarNumber' => 3,
));
$response = $this->client->delete('/api/programmers/UnitTester');
$this->assertEquals(204, $response->getStatusCode());
}
// ... lines 104 - 105

The Controller

Let's get straight to the controller: public function deleteAction(). Copy the route stuff from updateAction(). It's all the same again, except the method is different. Take out the route name - we don't need this unless we link here. And change the method to DELETE:

154 lines | src/AppBundle/Controller/Api/ProgrammerController.php
// ... lines 1 - 117
/**
* @Route("/api/programmers/{nickname}")
* @Method("DELETE")
*/
public function deleteAction($nickname)
{
// ... lines 124 - 135
}
// ... lines 137 - 154

Grab the query code from updateAction() too, and make sure you have your $nickname argument:

154 lines | src/AppBundle/Controller/Api/ProgrammerController.php
// ... lines 1 - 121
public function deleteAction($nickname)
{
$programmer = $this->getDoctrine()
->getRepository('AppBundle:Programmer')
->findOneByNickname($nickname);
if (!$programmer) {
throw $this->createNotFoundException(sprintf(
'No programmer found with nickname "%s"',
$nickname
));
}
// todo ...
}
// ... lines 137 - 154

So this will 404 if we don't find the programmer. Surprise! In the REST world, this is controversial! Since the job of this endpoint is to make sure the programmer resource is deleted, some people say that if the resource is already gone, then that's success! In other words, you should return the same 204 even if the programmer wasn't found. When you learn more about idempotency, this argument makes some sense. So let's do it! But really, either way is fine.

Change the if statement to be if ($programmer), then we'll delete it. Grab the EntityManager and call the normal remove() on it, then flush():

156 lines | src/AppBundle/Controller/Api/ProgrammerController.php
// ... lines 1 - 121
public function deleteAction($nickname)
{
// ... lines 124 - 127
if ($programmer) {
// debated point: should we 404 on an unknown nickname?
// or should we just return a nice 204 in all cases?
// we're doing the latter
$em = $this->getDoctrine()->getManager();
$em->remove($programmer);
$em->flush();
}
// ... lines 136 - 137
}
// ... lines 139 - 156

And whether the Programmer was found or not, we'll always return the same new Response(null, 204):

156 lines | src/AppBundle/Controller/Api/ProgrammerController.php
// ... lines 1 - 121
public function deleteAction($nickname)
{
$programmer = $this->getDoctrine()
->getRepository('AppBundle:Programmer')
->findOneByNickname($nickname);
if ($programmer) {
// ... lines 129 - 134
}
return new Response(null, 204);
}
// ... lines 139 - 156

Try the test and send a programmer to the trash! Filter for testDELETE.

phpunit -c app --filter testPUTProgrammer

Another endpoint bites the dust!