json_encode with non UTF-8 chars

PHP
1

Hi!

I’m trying to develop a simple PHP webservice that returns json.

The data comes from a MS SQL server database.
The data is auto Makes, Models and Trims.

It’s content is portuguese, so I’ll have accented charactes, i.e., á, é, í, ó, ú, ã, etc.

The code:


// get some parameters
$action = isset($_GET['action']) ? $_GET['action'] : '';
$condition = isset($_GET['condition']) ? $_GET['condition'] : '';

// Array used to encode the JSON
$arr = array();
$encodedArray = array();
$marcas = '';
$modelos = '';
$versoes = '';
$detalhes = '';


switch($action)
{
 case "getmarcas":
    $result = mssql_query("exec SP_GetMarcas_Web");

    while($marcas = mssql_fetch_object($result))
    {
      $arr[] = $marcas;
    }

    //$encodedArray = array_map("utf8_encode", $arr);
    //echo json_encode($encodedArray);
    $encodedArray = array_map("utf8_encode", $arr);
	
    echo json_encode($encodedArray);
    break;

  case "getmodelos":
    $result = mssql_query("exec SP_GetModelos_Web $condition");

    while($modelos = mssql_fetch_object($result))
    {
      $arr[] = $modelos;
    }
    echo json_encode($arr);
    break;

  case "getversoes":
    $result = mssql_query("exec SP_GetVersoes_Web2 $condition");

    while($versoes = mssql_fetch_object($result))
    {
      $arr[] = $versoes;
    }
    echo json_encode($arr);
    break;

  case "getdetalhes":
    $result = mssql_query("exec SP_GetFotoVersao_Web $condition");

    while($detalhes = mssql_fetch_object($result))
    {
      $arr[] = $detalhes;
    }
    echo json_encode($arr);
    break;
} //end switch

If I use

$encodedArray = array_map("utf8_encode", $arr);

to convert to utf-8 (because json_encode only accepts utf-8 strings), I get the error:
“Catchable fatal error: Object of class stdClass could not be converted to string” on that line.

If I just do:


echo json_encode($arr);

The strings get cut off at the first accented char.

Can anybody help me out with this?

Thanks!

2

Maybe you’d consider passing around something less bulky than an array of full-blown objects via json. An array of arrays (switch to mssql_fetch_array) perhaps?

3

Hi Dan!

Thanks to your guideline, I modified my code as such:


switch($action)
	{
		case "getmarcas":
			/* grab the DATA from the db */
			$query = "exec SP_GetMarcas_Web";
			$result = mssql_query($query,$link) or die('Errant query:  '.$query);
		 
			/* create one master array of the records */
			$marcas = array();
			if(mssql_num_rows($result)) 
			{
				while($marca = mssql_fetch_assoc($result)) 
				{
					$marcas[] = array('marca'=>array_map('utf8_encode',$marca));
				}
			}
		 
			/* output in necessary format */
			if($format == 'json') 
			{
				header('Content-type: application/json');
				echo json_encode(array('marcas'=>$marcas));
			}
			break;

and it’s working like a charm.

Thanks again for pointing me out in the right direction.