hide attributes in Laravel API Resource

Question

I want to hide an attribute in the Collection API Resource I don't want to do it always, so I need something like makeHidden() to do it when I want.

But API Resource return Illuminate\Support\Collection instance that has not makeHidden() method the Eloquent Collection Class is Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Collection

how can I do that ?

Answer 1

If you want to customize a response for some case, you could create a second Resource class that will only contain your desired attributes:

class FirstResource extends JsonResource {

    public function toArray($request)
    {
        return [
            'first_value' => $this->first_value,
            'second_value' => $this->second_value,
            'third_value' => $this->third_value,
            'fourth_value' => $this->fourth_value,
        ];
    }
}

class SecondResource extends JsonResource {

    public function toArray($request)
    {
        return [
            'first_value' => $this->first_value,
            'second_value' => $this->second_value,
        ];
    }
}

Then use them whenever you need one of them:

public function aControllerMethod()
{
    $model = MyModel::find($id);

    return new FirstResource($model);
}

public function anotherControllerMethod()
{
    $model = MyModel::find($id);

    return new SecondResource($model);
}

Now you will have two different responses from the same model (or collection).