Hydrating DTOs

The from method allows you to create DTO instances from arrays or JSON.

Basic Usage

Use the static from method to hydrate the DTO from an array or JSON:

// From an array
$user = User::from([
    'name' => 'John Doe',
    'email' => 'john.doe@example.com',
]);

// From a JSON string
$user = User::from('{"name": "John Doe", "email": "john.doe@example.com"}');

Nested DTOs

Carapace automatically handles nested DTOs:

final class Address extends ImmutableDTO
{
    public function __construct(
        public string $street,
        public string $city,
        public string $zipCode,
    ) {}
}

final class User extends ImmutableDTO
{
    public function __construct(
        public string $name,
        public string $email,

        #[CastWith(Address::class)]
        public Address $address,
    ) {}
}

$user = User::from([
    'name' => 'John Doe',
    'email' => 'john@example.com',
    'address' => [
        'street' => '123 Main St',
        'city' => 'Anytown',
        'zipCode' => '12345',
    ],
]);

echo $user->address->city; // Outputs: Anytown

Collections of DTOs

You can also work with collections of DTOs:

final class Team extends ImmutableDTO
{
    public function __construct(
        public string $name,

        #[CastWith(User::class)]
        /** @var User[] */
        public array $members,
    ) {}
}

$team = Team::from([
    'name' => 'Engineering',
    'members' => [
        ['name' => 'John', 'email' => 'john@example.com'],
        ['name' => 'Jane', 'email' => 'jane@example.com'],
    ],
]);

echo $team->members[0]->name; // Outputs: John

Important: The @var is to help IDEs understand the type of the members property. Carapace will automatically cast each using theCastWith item in the array to the specified DTO type.