How to return 2 json objects at once?

Question

I have a controller returning a json structure like so: ``` def show # ....... o_json = deep_object_1_to_json(o) render :json => o_json end private def deep_object_1_to_json(o) o.to_json( :include => {....}) end ``` Now I need to extend it to return 2 objects. However the obvious solution is giving me problems: ``` def show # ....... o1_json = deep_object_1_to_json(o) o2_json = deep_object_2_to_json(o) render :json => { :object_1 => o1_json, :object_2 => o2_json } end ``` This returns a json object with 2 strings of escaped json data! The deep_object_2_to_json functions already have several layers of nested includes so I would rather not have to refactor these into a single function. Is there a way to make this easily extendable to add more objects in the future without the double escaping problem above? Thanks for any pointers.

Accepted Answer

Sounds like you should be constructing something upon which `to_json` can easily be called.

The obvious candidate for active record objects is `as_json`. This does everything that `to_json` does (include the `:include` option and so on) except actually turning the object into json. Instead you get back a ruby hash which you can manipulate as you want and then call to_json. For example you could do

```
render :json => {
  :o1 => object1.as_json(:include => :blah),
  :o2 => object2.as_json(:include => :blah)
}
```

How to return 2 json objects at once?

Solution

Problem