How to convert provided single line of cURL code with inline parameters to a format using curl_setopt()

Question

I'm trying to use an API from avalara.net to get sales tax data and their API documentation lists what appears to be essentially a single line of code with a long string in JSON format for connecting to their API via cURL; I'm not familiar with this single string style and am trying to convert it into a format that follows the php manual's style, for example setting options via curl_setopt() instead of as inline commands like -u and -d but I'm not getting anywhere.

I already looked at php - implement curl command line to php, tried but getting error and added their solution - since I didn't get any error message I don't know if my problem was the same but it seemed like it wouldn't hurt to add CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION. Didn't seem to make any difference.

I also looked at convert curl line command in php code but it didn't help as I already had curl_exec() in my code and had been reading the php manual pages.

Their code can be seen at https://github.com/avadev/AvaTax-Calc-REST-cURL/blob/master/tax-get-POST.txt and in relevant part is:

curl -u <AccountNumber>:<LicenseKey> -H "Content-Type: text/json" -d '{
--long string of data omitted; see link above for full data--
}' "https://development.avalara.net/1.0/tax/get"

I did some research and discovered that -u is for a username/password, -H is a special header, and -d is for the data to be sent... so this is what I put together:

// Identify the target URL
$url = 'https://development.avalara.net/1.0/tax/get';

// Start the process
$curl = curl_init($url);

// Tell cURL to fail if an error occurs
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_FAILONERROR, 1);

// Allow for redirects; we don't know how avalara might route requests
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, 1);

// Assign the returned data to a variable
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);

// Set the timeout
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_TIMEOUT, 5);

// Make sure to use POST method
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_POST, 1);

// Set cURL to use a login:password for access
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_USERPWD, "[1100033004]:[1FC8AED1543C699B]");

// Add some custom header info
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, array('Content-type: text/json'));

// Use Heredoc syntax to encapsulate data, to avoid having to escape a million quotes
$data = <<<EOD
{
"DocDate": "2013-12-23",
"CustomerCode": "12345678123456781234567812345678",
"CompanyCode": "EGU",
"DocType": "SalesInvoice",
"Commit": false,
"Client": "Cool ERP,3,5",
"DocCode": "29",
"DetailLevel": "Tax",
"CustomerUsageType": "G",
"ExemptionNo": "12334",
"Discount": 0,
"PurchaseOrderNo":"PO 23423",                                        
"ReferenceCode":"",                                                        
"PosLaneCode":"",                                                                        
"BusinessIdentificationNo":"",
"TaxOverride":
{
"Reason":"Item Returned",
"TaxDate":"2013-05-05",
"TaxOverrideType":"TaxDate"
},
"Addresses":
[
{
"AddressCode": "Origin",
"Line1": "269",
"Line2": "7723 Tylers Place Blvd",
"City": "West Chester",
"Region": "OH",
"PostalCode": "45069-4684",
"Country": "US"
},
{
"AddressCode": "Dest",
"Line1": "1060 W. Addison St",
"City": "Chicago",
"Region": "IL",
"PostalCode": "60613-4566",
"Country": "US"
}
],
"Lines":
[
{
"LineNo": "00001",
"DestinationCode": "Dest",
"OriginCode": "Origin",
"ItemCode": "SP-001",
"Description": "Eyeglasses",
"TaxCode": "PC030147",
"Qty": 1,
"Amount": 100
}
]
}
EOD;
// That EOD ends the encapsulation via Heredoc syntax
// Note that the actual code does not indent the closing of Heredoc; only indented for stack overflow code view

// Set the POST data
curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $data);

// Execute the transaction
$r = curl_exec($curl);

// Close the connection
curl_close($curl);

// Print the results for debugging
print_r($r);

However, when I try to view the web page, I see nothing - no error message, no results, nothing.

I've looked at some of the other posts here on stackoverflow and in the php manual - I'm not sure at this point how to even debug it as I'm not getting any error messages back. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Answer 1

This is a demo example to demonstrate the using of API in PHP this may help you to post some data to the API

$url = '<your url here>';
$curl = curl_init($url);

$data_string = '[
    {
        "FirstName": "Value"
    },
    {
        "EmailAddress": "Value"
    },
    {
        "Phone": "Value"
    }
]';

    curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST, "POST");
    curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
    curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);
    curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $data_string);
    curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER, false);
    curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, array(
                                                'Content-Type:application/json',
                                                'Content-Length:'.strlen($data_string)

                                            ));

    $json_response = curl_exec($curl);
    $curl_errorno = curl_errno($curl);
    $status = curl_getinfo($curl, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);

    if ($status) {
        echo 'Status is 200 OK! ';
    }else{
        echo "Sorry Something went wrong. Please retry!";
        curl_close($curl);
    }

figure out what you're getting in status code that will help you. EDIT

this will be the value of your

$data_string=
'{
    "DocDate": "2013-12-23",
    "CustomerCode": "12345678123456781234567812345678",
    "CompanyCode": "EGU",
    "DocType": "SalesInvoice",
    "Commit": false,
    "Client": "Cool ERP,3,5",
    "DocCode": "29",
    "DetailLevel": "Tax",
    "CustomerUsageType": "G",
    "ExemptionNo": "12334",
    "Discount": 0,
    "PurchaseOrderNo": "PO 23423",
    "ReferenceCode": "",
    "PosLaneCode": "",
    "BusinessIdentificationNo": "",
    "TaxOverride": {
        "Reason": "Item Returned",
        "TaxDate": "2013-05-05",
        "TaxOverrideType": "TaxDate"
    },
    "Addresses": [
        {
            "AddressCode": "Origin",
            "Line1": "269",
            "Line2": "7723 Tylers Place Blvd",
            "City": "West Chester",
            "Region": "OH",
            "PostalCode": "45069-4684",
            "Country": "US"
        },
        {
            "AddressCode": "Dest",
            "Line1": "1060 W. Addison St",
            "City": "Chicago",
            "Region": "IL",
            "PostalCode": "60613-4566",
            "Country": "US"
        }
    ],
    "Lines": [
        {
            "LineNo": "00001",
            "DestinationCode": "Dest",
            "OriginCode": "Origin",
            "ItemCode": "SP-001",
            "Description": "Eyeglasses",
            "TaxCode": "PC030147",
            "Qty": 1,
            "Amount": 100
        }
    ]
}'

ANSWER Remoe the braces form this line like this

curl_setopt($curl, CURLOPT_USERPWD, "1100033004:1FC8AED1543C699B");