MVC ApiController JSON objectroot

Question

I'm using Microsoft MVC 4 ApiController to render JSON for an Ember application. The ApiController returns JSON, which looks like:

[{"id": 1, "customerName": "Customer 1"}]

Ember expects the JSON to be formatted with an objectroot like this:

{"customers": [{"id": 1, "customerName": "Customer 1"}]

The same goes for posting a new Customer record. Ember posts JSON, which has the objectroot, while MVC expects the JSON to be without the objectroot:

{"customers": [{"customerName": "Customer 1"}]

I've changed the WebApiConfig to change JSON attributes to camelcase (so the keys looks like "customerName" instead of "CustomerName"). I believe it's possible to add a JsonConverter to add / remove the JSON objectroot, but I can't figure out how to do it.

public static class WebApiConfig
{
    public static void Register(HttpConfiguration config)
    {
        var jsonFormatter = config.Formatters.OfType<JsonMediaTypeFormatter>().First();
        jsonFormatter.SerializerSettings.ContractResolver = new CamelCasePropertyNamesContractResolver();

        config.Routes.MapHttpRoute(
            name: "DefaultApi",
            routeTemplate: "api/{controller}/{id}",
            defaults: new { id = RouteParameter.Optional }
        );
    }
}

The controller looks like this:

public class CustomersController : ApiController
{
    private DatabaseContext db = new DatabaseContext();

    public IEnumerable<Customer> GetCustomers()
    {
        return db.Customers.AsEnumerable();
    }

    public HttpResponseMessage PostCustomer([FromBody] Customer customer)
    {
        if (ModelState.IsValid)
        {
            db.Customers.Add(customer);
            db.SaveChanges();

            HttpResponseMessage response = Request.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.Created, customer);
            response.Headers.Location = new Uri(Url.Link("DefaultApi", new { id = customer.Id }));
            return response;
        }
        else
        {
            return Request.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.BadRequest);
        }
    }
}

Well, first of all, This is WebApi, not MVC. WebApi may ship with MVC4, but they are two different technologies. Second, it might help if you showed your controller action, and how are returning the data. — Erik Funkenbusch
– Erik Funkenbusch, Commented Dec 16, 2014 at 19:54
@ErikFunkenbusch: Thanks! I've updated the question and extracted the relevant controller sourcecode from my solution. — Martin
– Martin, Commented Dec 16, 2014 at 20:03
Check out this blog post. It might help. emadibrahim.com/2014/04/09/… — Simon C
– Simon C, Commented Dec 16, 2014 at 20:06

Erik Funkenbusch · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-16 21:36:38Z

1

You could probably do something like this, wrap your object in a parent object that has a customers property, though I haven't tested it:

var mycust = new { customers = customer };
HttpResponseMessage response = Request.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.Created, mycust);

Or you can use a custom formatter, as in this gist:

https://gist.github.com/eed3si9n/4554127

answered Dec 16, 2014 at 21:36

Erik Funkenbusch

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