Sending ArrayList from Android to PHP script using JSON

Question

What is the Scenario

I want to send multiple ArrayList (usally 5) from android to the server and want to insert it into mysql database.

Answer 1

This is your Array: you can create more as required in your example.

ArrayList contact = new ArrayList();

Then, create a JSONcontacts variable of type JSONObject to store this array in this object

JSONObject JSONcontacts = new JSONObject();

Now, loop through all elements in that contact array and store it in the JSONcontacts

//Loop through array of contacts and put them to a JSONcontact object
for (int i = 0; i < contact.size(); i++) {
    try {
        JSONcontacts.put("Count:" + String.valueOf(i + 1), contact.get(i));
    } catch (JSONException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }
}

Lets say you created many Arrays, which you probably have done, now you hvave to put them all into 1 JSON. So create a EverythingJSON variable of type JSONObject()

JSONObject EverythingJSON = new JSONObject();

and now put all your contact array and other arrays into it, right you loop through them as described above:

EverythingJSON.put("contact", JSONcontacts);
EverythingJSON.put("something", JSONsoemthing);
EverythingJSON.put("else", JSONelse);

now this is your AsynchTask to send them to your PHP server:

new AsyncTask() {
    //String responseBody = "";
    @SuppressWarnings("unused")
    protected void onPostExecute(String msg) {
        //Not Needed
    }

    protected Object doInBackground(Object... params) {
        //Create Array of Post Variabels
        ArrayList postVars = new ArrayList();

        //Add a 1st Post Value called JSON with String value of JSON inside
        //This is first and last post value sent because server side will decode the JSON and get other vars from it.
        postVars.add(new BasicNameValuePair("JSON", EverythingJSON.toString());

        //Declare and Initialize Http Clients and Http Posts
        HttpClient httpclient = new DefaultHttpClient();
        HttpPost httppost = new HttpPost(Config.OnlineAPI);

        //Format it to be sent
        try {
            httppost.setEntity(new UrlEncodedFormEntity(postVars));
        } catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

        /* Send request and Get the Response Back */                    
        try {
            HttpResponse response = httpclient.execute(httppost);
            String responseBody = EntityUtils.toString(response.getEntity());
        } catch (ClientProtocolException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
            Log.v("MAD", "Error sending... ");
        } catch (IOException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
            Log.v("MAD", "Error sending... ");
        }
        return null;
    }
}.execute(null, null, null);

Now on the PHP server side, you can loop through this JSON as such: FIrst of all, get that JSON from POST and store it in a var:

//Receive JSON
$JSON_Received = $_POST["JSON"];

Now decode it from JSON:

//Decode Json
$obj = json_decode($JSON_Received, true);

And this is the loop to go through the array of contacts and get he Key and Value from it:

foreach ($obj['contact'] as $key => $value) 
{
    //echo "
------" . $key . " => " . $value;
}

you can repeat this loop for other Arrays you have sent :) Good Luck!