I am having problems parsing a serialized JSON Ajax Get request (using jQuery $.ajax) send to my express.js 4 server. The data send as a JSON request is generated by datatables.
Here is how I started on the client-side
$(document).ready(function() {
$('#example').dataTable( {
"bServerSide": true,
"fnServerData": function (sSource, aoData, fnCallback) {
$.ajax({
"dataType": 'json',
contentType: 'application/json',
"type": "GET",
"url": "http://localhost:3000/ajax/phenotypes/withOrg/like/datatables/",
"data": aoData,
"success": fnCallback,
"error": function () {
alert('have some problem');
}
});
}
} );
} );
when I load this code in the brower datatables generates the following GET request URL (to the server):
GET /ajax/phenotypes/withOrg/like/datatables/?draw=1&columns=%5Bobject+Object%5D%2C%5Bobject+Object%5D%2C%5Bobject+Object%5D%2C%5Bobject+Object%5D%2C%5Bobject+Object%5D%2C%5Bobject+Object%5D&order=%5Bobject+Object%5D&start=0&length=10&search=%5Bobject+Object%5D
or in decoded form (output from firebug)
columns [object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object]
draw 1
length 10
order [object Object]
search [object Object]
start 0
so I serialized the data before sending
$(document).ready(function() {
$('#example').dataTable( {
"bServerSide": true,
"fnServerData": function (sSource, aoData, fnCallback) {
var myData = JSON.stringify(aoData);
$.ajax({
"dataType": 'json',
contentType: 'application/json',
"type": "GET",
"url": "http://localhost:3000/ajax/phenotypes/withOrg/like/datatables/",
"data": myData,
"success": fnCallback,
"error": function () {
alert('have some problem');
}
});
}
} );
} );
here is the generated GET parameters from datatables:
GET /ajax/phenotypes/withOrg/like/datatables/?[{%22name%22:%22draw%22,%22value%22:1},{%22name%22:%22columns%22,%22value%22:[{%22data%22:0,%22name%22:%22%22,%22searchable%22:true,%22orderable%22:true,%22search%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}},{%22data%22:1,%22name%22:%22%22,%22searchable%22:true,%22orderable%22:true,%22search%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}},{%22data%22:2,%22name%22:%22%22,%22searchable%22:true,%22orderable%22:true,%22search%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}},{%22data%22:3,%22name%22:%22%22,%22searchable%22:true,%22orderable%22:true,%22search%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}},{%22data%22:4,%22name%22:%22%22,%22searchable%22:true,%22orderable%22:true,%22search%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}},{%22data%22:5,%22name%22:%22%22,%22searchable%22:true,%22orderable%22:true,%22search%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}}]},{%22name%22:%22order%22,%22value%22:[{%22column%22:0,%22dir%22:%22asc%22}]},{%22name%22:%22start%22,%22value%22:0},{%22name%22:%22length%22,%22value%22:10},{%22name%22:%22search%22,%22value%22:{%22value%22:%22%22,%22regex%22:false}}] HTTP/1.1
in decoded form (output from firebug and beautified using an online tool- checked with jslint, seems correct!)
[
{
"name":"draw",
"value":1
},
{
"name":"columns",
"value":[
{
"data":0,
"name":"",
"searchable":true,
"orderable":true,
"search":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
},
{
"data":1,
"name":"",
"searchable":true,
"orderable":true,
"search":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
},
{
"data":2,
"name":"",
"searchable":true,
"orderable":true,
"search":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
},
{
"data":3,
"name":"",
"searchable":true,
"orderable":true,
"search":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
},
{
"data":4,
"name":"",
"searchable":true,
"orderable":true,
"search":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
},
{
"data":5,
"name":"",
"searchable":true,
"orderable":true,
"search":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
}
]
},
{
"name":"order",
"value":[
{
"column":0,
"dir":"asc"
}
]
},
{
"name":"start",
"value":0
},
{
"name":"length",
"value":10
},
{
"name":"search",
"value":{
"value":"",
"regex":false
}
}
]
the problem is now that this stringified URL can not be parsed on the express 4 server side I use express4 req.query and url.parse method for this : http://expressjs.com/api.html#req.query and then try to parse the received json string with the JSON.parse() method
...
var url = require('url');
...
router.get('/withOrg/like/datatables/', function (req, res) {
console.log('getting json string via req.query');
console.log(req.query);
console.log('output parsed json object using JSON.parse');
console.log(JSON.parse(req.query));
//another try
console.log('for stack overflows test 2');
console.log(url.parse(req.url, true).query);
console.log('output parsed json object using JSON.parse');
console.log(url.parse(req.url, true).query);
})
both json string output results are invalid json as you can see here and unable to parse with JSON.parse:
getting json string via req.query
{ '{"data":0,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":1,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":2,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":3,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":4,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":5,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}}': { '{"column":0,"dir":"asc"}': '' } }
output parsed json object using JSON.parse
getting json string via req.query
{ '{"data":0,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":1,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":2,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":3,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":4,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}},{"data":5,"name":"","searchable":true,"orderable":true,"search":{"value":"","regex":false}}': { '{"column":0,"dir":"asc"}': '' } }
output parsed json object using JSON.parse
when I try to parse the json string I get the error from JSON.parse
SyntaxError: Unexpected token o
at Object.parse (native)
at module.exports (/Users/xxx/yyy/routes/phenotypesAJAX.js:16:19)
at Layer.handle [as handle_request] (/Users/xxx/yyy/node_modules/express/lib/router/layer.js:82:5)
at next (/Users/xxx/yyy/node_modules/express/lib/router/route.js:100:13)
Is this a bug in express 4? I cannot see where the problem is. On the client-side the serialized datatable GET request seems valid (checked with JSLint). On the express4 server side I cannot find any other way to parse the GET request in a different way.
Thank you so much for your help, Oliver
