AFNetworking AFHTTPClient AFJSONRequestOperation not using JSON Operation - ios

Question

I followed this Screencast... http://nsscreencast.com/episodes/6-afnetworking
My singleton AFHTTPClient code is...
+ (MyClient *)sharedInstance
{
static dispatch_once_t once;
static MyClient *myClient;
dispatch_once(&once, ^ { myClient = [[MyClient alloc] initWithBaseURL:[NSURL URLWithString:MyBaseURL]];});
return myClient;
}
- (id)initWithBaseURL:(NSURL *)url
{
self = [super initWithBaseURL:url];
if (self) {
// these are not actual values but I am setting default headers.
[self setDefaultHeader:#"sdfg" value:#"4"];
[self setDefaultHeader:#"std" value:#"3"];
[self setDefaultHeader:#"reg" value:#"5"];
[self setDefaultHeader:#"yu" value:#"1"];
[self setDefaultHeader:#"xv" value:#"3"];
[self setDefaultHeader:#"hmm" value:#"5"];
[self registerHTTPOperationClass:[AFJSONRequestOperation class]];
}
return self;
}
Then I'm executing it like...
[[MyClient sharedInstance] getPath:#"blah.php" parameters:parameters success:^(AFHTTPRequestOperation *operation, id responseObject) {
NSMutableArray *stats = [NSMutableArray array];
// it crashes on the next line because responseObject is NSData
for (NSDictionary *dictionary in responseObject) {
CCStatistic *stat = [[CCStatistic alloc] initWithDictionary:dictionary];
[stats addObject:stat];
}
self.stats = stats;
[self.tableView reloadData];
} failure:^(AFHTTPRequestOperation *operation, NSError *error) {
NSLog(#"Error retrieving!");
NSLog(#"%#", error);
}];
It all works fine. I've intercepted it with Charles and it is sending the correct request and receiving the correct JSON except the operation is not a JSON operation.
So the responseObject is NSData not the JSON object that I was expecting.
An I missing any config to use the JSON operation?

Answer 1

The line of code that in your case is deciding whether the request is processable by a JSON operation is the following:
return [[self acceptableContentTypes] intersectsSet:AFContentTypesFromHTTPHeader([request valueForHTTPHeaderField:#"Accept"])];
As explained here by Mattt Thompson (the author of AFNetworking) you have to set the Accept header for the request to application/json.
This is not intuitive and it's highly implementation-dependent, but it works.
Add
[self setDefaultHeader:#"Accept" value:#"application/json"];
to your client initialization and it should be ok, regardless of the path extension.

Answer 2

OK, so there is a check in the AFNetworking code that throes out the JSON operation if the request url extension is not json.
Because mine is php it's throwing it out.
Changing the code worked.
My Change
In the AFJSONRequestOperation method...
+ (BOOL)canProcessRequest:(NSURLRequest *)request {
return [[[request URL] pathExtension] isEqualToString:#"json"] || [super canProcessRequest:request];
}
I changed it to...
+ (BOOL)canProcessRequest:(NSURLRequest *)request {
// added php to the request valid path extensions.
return [[[request URL] pathExtension] isEqualToString:#"json"] || [super canProcessRequest:request] || [[[request URL] pathExtension] isEqualToString:#"php"];
}
It's not really a bug per se more like a random syntax style of the requests that are open to me.
Is it normal to have .php requests returning JSON?