The API that I am connecting to isn't using JSON-API for its response format, so I am having to serialize the responses for my Ember app.
The problem I am having is that my response from the API looks like this:
{
@type: "application/x.app-name.nurse-collection+json",
@type.item: "application/x.app-name.nurse+json",
@type.collection: "application/x.app-name.nurse-collection+json",
@href: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses{?includePatients}",
@item: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/{id}",
items: [
{
@type: "application/x.app-name.nurse+json",
@type.item: "application/x.app-name.nurse+json",
@type.collection: "application/x.app-name.nurse-collection+json",
@href: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/1{?includePatients}",
id: 1,
Nurse: "Maria Holmes",
NurseTelephoneNo: "123 4567",
NurseMobileNo: "0123345566",
Email: "someone@example.com",
Patients: {
@type: "application/x.app-name.patient-collection+json",
@href: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/1/patients{?name,gender,includeNurse,includeEvents,includeReferrals,includeReviews,includePanels,includeRetrospectives,includePhbs,includeDisputeStage2s,includeDisputeResolutionPanels,includeEthnicity,includeFirstLanguage,includeMaritalStatus,includeReligion,includeSecurityLevel,includeSexualOrientation,includeWhichReview}",
@rel: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/1/patients{?name,gender,includeNurse,includeEvents,includeReferrals,includeReviews,includePanels,includeRetrospectives,includePhbs,includeDisputeStage2s,includeDisputeResolutionPanels,includeEthnicity,includeFirstLanguage,includeMaritalStatus,includeReligion,includeSecurityLevel,includeSexualOrientation,includeWhichReview}"
}
},
{
@type: "application/x.app-name.nurse+json",
@type.item: "application/x.app-name.nurse+json",
@type.collection: "application/x.app-name.nurse-collection+json",
@href: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/2{?includePatients}",
id: 2,
Nurse: "Julie Smart",
NurseTelephoneNo: "543 1234",
NurseMobileNo: null,
Email: "someone@example.com",
Patients: {
@type: "application/x.app-name.patient-collection+json",
@href: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/2/patients{?name,gender,includeNurse,includeEvents,includeReferrals,includeReviews,includePanels,includeRetrospectives,includePhbs,includeDisputeStage2s,includeDisputeResolutionPanels,includeEthnicity,includeFirstLanguage,includeMaritalStatus,includeReligion,includeSecurityLevel,includeSexualOrientation,includeWhichReview}",
@rel: "http://192.168.33.10:3000/api/nurses/2/patients{?name,gender,includeNurse,includeEvents,includeReferrals,includeReviews,includePanels,includeRetrospectives,includePhbs,includeDisputeStage2s,includeDisputeResolutionPanels,includeEthnicity,includeFirstLanguage,includeMaritalStatus,includeReligion,includeSecurityLevel,includeSexualOrientation,includeWhichReview}"
}
},
...
]
}
So in this example, patients could be a collection, but I don't have the id's for the hasMany relationship until I have gone to that endpoint.
I'm wondering if there is a way to serialize this in a way that is JSON-API compliant, but will let me load relationship data asynchronously, once my app has decided to go to the patients endpoint.
I would write a custom serializer that fits this response type instead of converting it to the JSON-API spec.
It doesn't look like there's any information here about the patient records (ie a list of ids), so ignore it here unless you want to set the link attribute for the hasMany.
Loading relationship data asynchronously will work fine with ember-data. When you get an array of patient records and add them to the store they will be available with nurse.get('patients') as long as the loaded records each have a nurse_id.