Simplest way to communicate data between php and android

Question

I am trying to build an android application based on hotel management. The app simply provides the list of deals to the user. The website stores the data regarding the user

Answer 1

it is very painless using https://code.google.com/p/google-gson/ on android and json_encode() in PHP (take also a look on blackpanthers response) and here a short excerpt how to bind that thing in java on a concrete sample:

first implement json_encode() in PHP and call in in a browser so you can see the result, say, you get something like:

{"user_name":"my name", "user_surname":"my_surname", "phones": { "mobile":"11111" }}

now, you've got a JSON entity containing a properties "user_name", "user_surname", and "phones". whereas "phones" is a nested entity, containing a property "mobile".

now you create a java-class per entity, so we need two, the one containing the "phones" and the other one containing all properties, including the entity "phones"

class Phones {
    // with this annotation you can bind to
    // properties from JSON named differently than
    // the property in this class
    @SerializedName("mobile")
    String thePhone;
}

class MyJson {
    String user_name;
    String user_surname;
    Phones phones;
}

well, thats it :) ah ok, the final part

    ...
    InputStream is = new URL("http://www.my.php.returning.json").openStream();
    InputStreamReader isr = new InputStreamReader();
    MyJson myJson = new Gson().fromJson(isr , MyJson.class);
    ... //close stream, handle exceptions, etc.

    // now you've got that all in the myJson object...

here you go!

Answer 2

You may find the following tutorial useful: http://www.helloandroid.com/tutorials/connecting-mysql-database

This tutorial shows how you can use the MySQL database and PHP to send JSON to an android application.

(This is assuming you are using a MySQL database, if not, it is still a useful tutorial).

You can also use GSON, Google's API and the following tutorial: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/app-builder/use-gson-to-work-with-json-in-your-android-apps/1386