json - PHP json_decode with long strings and special characters

Solution:

There is a problem with the decoded JSON you provide theprint_r output of: the key iFlag appears twice in the same object. This should not be possible.

The original JSON string you decoded would have looked like this:

$json = '[
    {
        "id": 1535497,
        "tid": 6970000,
        "text": "Hello :) error is back! It\'s quite annoying!",
        "dFlag": 1,
        "iFlag": null,
        "rFlag": null,
        "member": null,
        "contact": {
            "id": 187,
            "name": "User Name",
            "_info": {
                "contact_href": "https:\/\/url\/187"
            }
        },
        "iFlag": null,
        "cFlag": null,
        "processNotifications": null,
        "dateCreated": "2015-12-08T13:59:19Z",
        "createdBy": "User Name [email protected] (email)",
        "eFlag": 1,
        "_info": {
            "lastUpdated": "2015-12-08T13:59:19Z",
            "updatedBy": "User Name [email protected] (email)"
        }
    }
]';
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And indeed, if I decode and print it like this:

$data = json_decode($json, true); // translate objects to associative arrays
print_r ($data);
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...the output is the same as you provided in the question, with the exception of the duplicate iFlag property:

Array ( [0] => Array ( [id] => 1535497 [tid] => 6970000 [text] => Hello :) error is back! It's quite annoying! [dFlag] => 1 [iFlag] => [rFlag] => [member] => [contact] => Array ( [id] => 187 [name] => User Name [_info] => Array ( [contact_href] => https://url/187 ) ) [cFlag] => [processNotifications] => [dateCreated] => 2015-12-08T13:59:19Z [createdBy] => User Name [email protected] (email) [eFlag] => 1 [_info] => Array ( [lastUpdated] => 2015-12-08T13:59:19Z [updatedBy] => User Name [email protected] (email) ) ) )
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That the array beautifier breaks on this, just means that this beautifier is not good enough. It tries to interpret the output ofprint_r, but apparently it has some weaknesses. This however is no indication that there is a problem with JSON encoding/decoding.

print_r does in fact a good job in "beautifying" the output itself, but in a browser context you need to preserve the formatting to see it, e.g. by wrapping that output inpre tags. If you do, you'll see this output:

Array
(
    [0] => Array
        (
            [id] => 1535497
            [tid] => 6970000
            [text] => Hello :) error is back! It's quite annoying!
            [dFlag] => 1
            [iFlag] => 
            [rFlag] => 
            [member] => 
            [contact] => Array
                (
                    [id] => 187
                    [name] => User Name
                    [_info] => Array
                        (
                            [contact_href] => https://url/187
                        )

                )

            [cFlag] => 
            [processNotifications] => 
            [dateCreated] => 2015-12-08T13:59:19Z
            [createdBy] => User Name [email protected] (email)
            [eFlag] => 1
            [_info] => Array
                (
                    [lastUpdated] => 2015-12-08T13:59:19Z
                    [updatedBy] => User Name [email protected] (email)
                )

        )

)
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Now we could JSON encode that data again:

$json = json_encode($data, JSON_PRETTY_PRINT);
echo $json;
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The output is the original JSON, except for the duplicate object member. There are no other problems:

[
    {
        "id": 1535497,
        "tid": 6970000,
        "text": "Hello :) error is back! It's quite annoying!",
        "dFlag": 1,
        "iFlag": null,
        "rFlag": null,
        "member": null,
        "contact": {
            "id": 187,
            "name": "User Name",
            "_info": {
                "contact_href": "https:\/\/url\/187"
            }
        },
        "cFlag": null,
        "processNotifications": null,
        "dateCreated": "2015-12-08T13:59:19Z",
        "createdBy": "User Name [email protected] (email)",
        "eFlag": 1,
        "_info": {
            "lastUpdated": "2015-12-08T13:59:19Z",
            "updatedBy": "User Name [email protected] (email)"
        }
    }
]
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Now this you can decode again:

$back = json_decode($json);
print_r ($back);
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The output is again the originalprint_r output you provided, except for the duplicate member. So there is no problem with JSON encoding whatsoever.

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