Operations

API Platform Core relies on the concept of operations. Operations can be applied to a resource exposed by the API. From an implementation point of view, an operation is a link between a resource, a route and its related controller.

API Platform automatically registers typical CRUD operations and describes them in the exposed documentation (Hydra and Swagger). It also creates and registers routes corresponding to these operations in the Symfony routing system (if it is available).

The behavior of built-in operations is briefly presented in the Getting started guide.

The list of enabled operations can be configured on a per resource basis. Creating custom operations on specific routes is also possible.

There are two types of operations: collection operations and item operations.

Collection operations act on a collection of resources. By default two routes are implemented: POST and GET. Item operations act on an individual resource. 3 default routes are defined GET, PUT and DELETE.

When the ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource annotation is applied to an entity class, the following built-in CRUD operations are automatically enabled:

Collection operations

Method	Mandatory	Description
`GET`	yes	Retrieve the (paginated) list of elements
`POST`	no	Create a new element

Item operations

Method	Mandatory	Description
`GET`	yes	Retrieve element
`PUT`	no	Update an element
`DELETE`	no	Delete an element

# Enabling and Disabling Operations

If no operation is specified, all default CRUD operations are automatically registered. It is also possible - and recommended for large projects - to define operations explicitly.

Keep in mind that collectionOperations and itemOperations behave independently. For instance, if you don’t explicitly configure operations for collectionOperations, GET and POST operations will be automatically registered, even if you explicitly configure itemOperations. The reverse is also true.

Operations can be configured using annotations, XML or YAML. In the following examples, we enable only the built-in operation for the GET method for both collectionOperations and itemOperations to create a readonly endpoint.

itemOperations and collectionOperations are arrays containing a list of operation. Each operation is defined by a key corresponding to the name of the operation that can be anything you want and an array of properties as value. If an empty list of operations is provided, all operations are disabled.

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Book.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;

/**
 * @ApiResource(
 *     collectionOperations={"get"={"method"="GET"}},
 *     itemOperations={"get"={"method"="GET"}}
 *     )
 */
class Book
{
    // ...
}

Alternatively, you can use the YAML configuration format:

# src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.yml
AppBundle\Entity\Book:
    collectionOperations:
        get:
            method: 'GET' # nothing more to add if we want to keep the default controller
    itemOperations:
        get:
            method: 'GET'

Or the XML configuration format:

<!-- src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<resources xmlns="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata"
           xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
           xsi:schemaLocation="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata
           https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata/metadata-2.0.xsd">
    <resource class="AppBundle\Entity\Book">
        <itemOperations>
            <itemOperation name="get">
                <attribute name="method">GET</attribute>
            </itemOperation>
        </itemOperations>
        <collectionOperations>
            <collectionOperation name="get">
                <attribute name="method">GET</attribute>
            </collectionOperation>
        </collectionOperations>
    </resource>
</resources>

API Platform Core is smart enough to automatically register the applicable Symfony route referencing a built-in CRUD action just by specifying the enabled HTTP method.

# Configuring Operations

The URL, the HTTP method and the Hydra context passed to documentation generators of operations is easy to configure.

In the next example, both GET and PUT operations are registered with custom URLs. Those will override the default generated URLs. In addition to that, we replace the Hydra context for the PUT operation, and require the id parameter to be an integer.

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Book.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;

/**
 * @ApiResource(itemOperations={
 *     "get"={"method"="GET", "path"="/grimoire/{id}", "requirements"={"id"="\d+"}},
 *     "put"={"method"="PUT", "path"="/grimoire/{id}/update", "hydra_context"={"foo"="bar"}},
 * })
 */
class Book
{
    //...
}

Or in YAML:

# src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.yml
AppBundle\Entity\Book:
    itemOperations:
        get:
            method: 'GET'
            path: '/grimoire/{id}'
            requirements:
                id: '\d+'
        put:
            method: 'PUT'
            path: '/grimoire/{id}/update'
            hydra_context: { foo: 'bar' }
            requirements:
                id: '\d+'

Or in XML:

<!-- src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<resources xmlns="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata"
           xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
           xsi:schemaLocation="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata
           https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata/metadata-2.0.xsd">
    <resource class="AppBundle\Entity\Book">
        <itemOperations>
            <itemOperation name="get">
                <attribute name="method">GET</attribute>
                <attribute name="path">/grimoire/{id}</attribute>
                <attribute name="requirements">
                    <attribute name="id">\d+</attribute>
                </attribute>
            </itemOperation>
            <itemOperation name="put">
                <attribute name="method">PUT</attribute>
                <attribute name="path">/grimoire/{id}/update</attribute>
                <attribute name="hydra_context">
                    <attribute name="foo">bar</attribute>
                </attribute>
                <attribute name="requirements">
                    <attribute name="id">\d+</attribute>
                </attribute>
            </itemOperation>
        </itemOperations>
    </resource>
</resources>

# Subresources

Since ApiPlatform 2.1, you can declare subresources. A subresource is a collection or an item that belongs to another resource. The starting point of a subresource must be a relation on an existing resource.

For example, let’s create two entities (Question, Answer) and set up a subresource so that /question/42/answer gives us the answer to the question 42:

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Answer.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;
use Doctrine\ORM\Mapping as ORM;

/**
 * @ORM\Entity
 * @ApiResource
 */
class Answer
{
    /**
     * @ORM\Column(type="integer")
     * @ORM\Id
     * @ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
     */
    private $id;

    /**
     * @ORM\Column
     */
    public $content;

    /**
     * @ORM\OneToOne(targetEntity="Question", mappedBy="answer")
     */
    public $question;

    public function getId()
    {
        return $this->id;
    }
}

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Question.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiProperty;
use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;
use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiSubresource;
use Doctrine\ORM\Mapping as ORM;

/**
 * @ORM\Entity
 * @ApiResource
 */
class Question
{
    /**
     * @ORM\Column(type="integer")
     * @ORM\Id
     * @ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
     */
    private $id;

    /**
     * @ORM\Column
     */
    public $content;

    /**
     * @ORM\OneToOne(targetEntity="Answer", inversedBy="question")
     * @ORM\JoinColumn(referencedColumnName="id", unique=true)
     * @ApiSubresource
     */
    public $answer;

    public function getId()
    {
        return $this->id;
    }
}

Alternatively, you can use the YAML configuration format:

AppBundle\Entity\Answer: ~
AppBundle\Entity\Question:
    properties:
        answer:
            subresource:
                resourceClass: 'AppBundle\Entity\Answer'
                collection: false

Note that all we had to do is to set up @ApiSubresource on the Question::answer relation. Because the answer is a to-one relation, we know that this subresource is an item. Therefore the response will look like this:

{
  "@context": "/contexts/Answer",
  "@id": "/answers/42",
  "@type": "Answer",
  "id": 42,
  "content": "Life, the Universe, and Everything",
  "question": "/questions/42"
}

If you put the subresource on a relation that is to-many, you will retrieve a collection.

Last but not least, Subresources can be nested, such that /questions/42/answer/comments will get the collection of comments for the answer to question 42.

You may want custom groups on subresources. Because a subresource is nothing more than a collection operation, you can set normalization_context or denormalization_context on that operation. To do so, you need to override collectionOperations. Based on the above operation, because we retrieve an answer, we need to alter it’s configuration:

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Answer.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;

/**
 * @ApiResource(collectionOperations={"api_questions_answer_get_subresource"={"method"="GET", "normalization_context"={"groups"={"foobar"}}}})
 */
class Answer
{
    // ...
}

Or using YAML:

# src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.yml
AppBundle\Entity\Answer:
    collectionOperations:
        api_questions_answer_get_subresource:
            method: 'GET' # nothing more to add if we want to keep the default controller
            normalization_context: {'groups': ['foobar']}

Or in XML:

<!-- src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<resources xmlns="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata"
           xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
           xsi:schemaLocation="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata
           https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata/metadata-2.0.xsd">
    <resource class="AppBundle\Entity\Answer">
        <collectionOperations>
            <collectionOperation name="api_questions_answer_get_subresource">
                <attribute name="method">GET</attribute>
                <attribute name="normalization_context">
                  <attribute name="groups">
                    <group>foobar</group>
                  </attribute>
                </attribute>
            </collectionOperation>
        </collectionOperations>
    </resource>
</resources>

Note that the operation name, here api_questions_answer_get_subresource, is the important keyword. It’ll be automatically set to $resources_$subresource(s)_get_subresource. To find the correct operation name you may use bin/console debug:router.

# Control the Path of Subresources

You can control the path of subresources with the path option of the subresourceOperations parameter:

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Question.php

/**
 * @ORM\Entity()
 * @ApiResource(
 *      subresourceOperations={
 *          "answer_get_subresource"= {
 *              "method"="GET",
 *              "path"="/questions/{id}/all-answers",
 *          },
 *      },
 * )
 */
class Question
{
}

# Control the Depth of Subresources

You can control depth of subresources with the parameter maxDepth. For example, if Answer entity also have subresource such as commentsand you don’t want the route api/questions/{id}/answers/{id}/comments to be generated. You can do this by adding the parameter maxDepth in ApiSubresource annotation or yml/xml file configuration.

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Question.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiProperty;
use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;
use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiSubresource;
use Doctrine\ORM\Mapping as ORM;

/**
 * @ORM\Entity
 * @ApiResource
 */
class Question
{
    /**
     * @ORM\Column(type="integer")
     * @ORM\Id
     * @ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
     */
    private $id;

    /**
     * @ORM\Column
     */
    public $content;

    /**
     * @ORM\OneToOne(targetEntity="Answer", inversedBy="question")
     * @ORM\JoinColumn(referencedColumnName="id", unique=true)
     * @ApiSubresource(maxDepth=1)
     */
    public $answer;

    public function getId()
    {
        return $this->id;
    }
}

# Creating Custom Operations and Controllers

API Platform can leverage the Symfony routing system to register custom operation related to custom controllers. Such custom controllers can be any valid Symfony controller, including standard Symfony controllers extending the Symfony\Bundle\FrameworkBundle\Controller\Controller helper class.

However, API Platform recommends to use action classes instead of typical Symfony controllers. Internally, API Platform implements the Action-Domain-Responder pattern (ADR), a web-specific refinement of MVC.

Note: the event system should be preferred over custom controllers when applicable.

The distribution of API Platform also eases the implementation of the ADR pattern: it automatically registers action classes stored in src/AppBundle/Action and src/AppBundle/Controller as autowired services.

Thanks to the autowiring feature of the Symfony Dependency Injection container, services required by an action can be type-hinted in its constructor, it will be automatically instantiated and injected, without having to declare it explicitly.

In the following example, the built-in GET operation is registered as well as a custom operation called special. The special operation reference the Symfony route named book_special.

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Entity/Book.php

use ApiPlatform\Core\Annotation\ApiResource;

/**
 * @ApiResource(itemOperations={
 *     "get"={"method"="GET"},
 *     "special"={"route_name"="book_special"}
 * })
 */
class Book
{
    //...
}

Or in YAML:

# src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.yml
AppBundle\Entity\Book:
    itemOperations:
        get:
            method: 'GET'
        special:
            route_name: 'book_special'

Or in XML:

<!-- src/AppBundle/Resources/config/api_resources/resources.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<resources xmlns="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata"
           xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
           xsi:schemaLocation="https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata
           https://api-platform.com/schema/metadata/metadata-2.0.xsd">
    <resource class="AppBundle\Entity\Book">
        <itemOperations>
            <itemOperation name="get">
                <attribute name="method">GET</attribute>
            </itemOperation>
            <itemOperation name="special">
                <attribute name="route_name">book_special</attribute>
            </itemOperation>
        </itemOperations>
    </resource>
</resources>

API Platform will automatically map this special operation with the route book_special. Let’s create a custom action and its related route using annotations:

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Action/BookSpecial.php

namespace AppBundle\Action;

use AppBundle\Entity\Book;
use Doctrine\Common\Persistence\ManagerRegistry;
use Sensio\Bundle\FrameworkExtraBundle\Configuration\Method;
use Symfony\Component\Routing\Annotation\Route;

class BookSpecial
{
    private $myService;

    public function __construct(MyService $myService)
    {
        $this->myService = $myService;
    }

    /**
     * @Route(
     *     name="book_special",
     *     path="/books/{id}/special",
     *     defaults={"_api_resource_class"=Book::class, "_api_item_operation_name"="special"}
     * )
     * @Method("PUT")
     */
    public function __invoke($data) // API Platform retrieves the PHP entity using the data provider then (for POST and
                                    // PUT method) deserializes user data in it. Then passes it to the action. Here $data
                                    // is an instance of Book having the given ID. By convention, the action's parameter
                                    // must be called $data.
    {
        $this->myService->doSomething($data);

        return $data; // API Platform will automatically validate, persist (if you use Doctrine) and serialize an entity
                      // for you. If you prefer to do it yourself, return an instance of Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response
    }
}

This custom operation behaves exactly like the built-in operation: it returns a JSON-LD document corresponding to the id passed in the URL.

It is mandatory to set the _api_resource_class and _api_item_operation_name (or _api_collection_operation_name for a collection operation) in the parameters of the route (defaults key). It allows API Platform and the Symfony routing system to hook together.

Here we consider that the autowiring enabled for controller classes (the default when using the API Platform distribution). This action will be automatically registered as a service (the service name is the same as the class name: AppBundle\Action\BookSpecial).

API Platform automatically retrieves the appropriate PHP entity then deserializes it, and for POST and PUT requests updates the entity with data provided by the user.

If you want to bypass the automatic retrieval of the entity, you can set the parameter _api_receive to false. This way, it will skip the Read, Deserialize and Validate listeners (see the event system for more information).

Services ($myService here) are automatically injected thanks to the autowiring feature. You can type-hint any service you need and it will be autowired too.

The __invoke method of the action is called when the matching route is hit. It can return either an instance of Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response (that will be displayed to the client immediately by the Symfony kernel) or, like in this example, an instance of an entity mapped as a resource (or a collection of instances for collection operations). In this case, the entity will pass through all built-in event listeners of API Platform. It will be automatically validated, persisted and serialized in JSON-LD. Then the Symfony kernel will send the resulting document to the client.

Alternatively, you can also use standard Symfony controller and YAML or XML route declarations. The following example does exactly the same thing than the previous example in a more Symfony-like fashion:

<?php
// src/AppBundle/Controller/BookController.php

namespace AppBundle\Controller;

use AppBundle\Entity\Book;
use Symfony\Bundle\FrameworkBundle\Controller\Controller;

class BookController extends Controller
{
    public function specialAction($data)
    {
        return $this->get('my_service')->doSomething($data);
    }
}

# app/config/routing.yml
book_special:
    path: '/books/{id}/special'
    methods:  ['PUT']
    defaults:
        _controller: 'AppBundle:Book:special'
        _api_resource_class: 'AppBundle\Entity\Book'
        _api_item_operation_name: 'special'

Operations

Table of Contents

# Enabling and Disabling Operations

# Configuring Operations

# Subresources

# Control the Path of Subresources

# Control the Depth of Subresources

# Creating Custom Operations and Controllers