From bd089836a138bc845eac5f89a071d2768bcf2e0e Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Tom Christie Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2013 22:01:33 +0000 Subject: [PATCH] Note on setting ContentType. Fixes #589. Refs #586. --- docs/api-guide/parsers.md | 13 +++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 13 insertions(+) diff --git a/docs/api-guide/parsers.md b/docs/api-guide/parsers.md index de9685578..3a1918f4e 100644 --- a/docs/api-guide/parsers.md +++ b/docs/api-guide/parsers.md @@ -14,6 +14,18 @@ REST framework includes a number of built in Parser classes, that allow you to a The set of valid parsers for a view is always defined as a list of classes. When either `request.DATA` or `request.FILES` is accessed, REST framework will examine the `Content-Type` header on the incoming request, and determine which parser to use to parse the request content. +--- + +**Note**: When developing client applications always remember to make sure you're setting the `Content-Type` header when sending data in an HTTP request. + +If you don't set the content type, most clients will default to using `'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'`, which may not be what you wanted. + +As an example, if you are sending `json` encoded data using jQuery with the [.ajax() method][jquery-ajax], you should make sure to include the `contentType: 'application/json'` setting. + +If you're working with the API using the command line tool `curl`, you can use the `-H` flag to include a `ContentType` header. For example, to set the content type to `json` use `-H 'content-type: application/json'`. + +--- + ## Setting the parsers The default set of parsers may be set globally, using the `DEFAULT_PARSER_CLASSES` setting. For example, the following settings would allow requests with `YAML` content. @@ -169,6 +181,7 @@ The following third party packages are also available. [MessagePack][messagepack] is a fast, efficient binary serialization format. [Juan Riaza][juanriaza] maintains the [djangorestframework-msgpack][djangorestframework-msgpack] package which provides MessagePack renderer and parser support for REST framework. +[jquery-ajax]: http://api.jquery.com/jQuery.ajax/ [cite]: https://groups.google.com/d/topic/django-developers/dxI4qVzrBY4/discussion [messagepack]: https://github.com/juanriaza/django-rest-framework-msgpack [juanriaza]: https://github.com/juanriaza