README

Give JSON a shape — typed objects for your database JSON columns in Laravel.

A JSON column comes back from Eloquent as a plain array: no autocomplete, no static analysis, and a typo only blows up at runtime. JsonShape turns that array into a typed object you define once, while staying a thin wrapper you can still treat like an array.

class Example extends Model
{
    public function casts(): array
    {
        return ['trace' => AsJsonShape::of(TraceShape::class)];
    }
}

$example->trace->traceId;       // string, with autocomplete
$example->trace->getDuration(); // int
$example->save();               // encoded back to JSON

Installation

Requires PHP 8.4+ and Laravel 13.

composer require plumthedev/json-shape

Documentation

Full guides and examples live at plumthedev.github.io/json-shape:

• The example shape
• Reading properties
• Setting properties
• Eloquent support
• Common tools

Development

This project is developed entirely inside Docker, so the only tools you need on your machine are Docker (with the Compose plugin) and Make.

make composer install      # install dependencies
make code-style-check      # Pint (code style)
make phpstan               # PHPStan (static analysis)
make phpunit               # PHPUnit (tests)
make docs-preview          # preview the docs site locally

The default PHP version is 8.4; override it per command with PHP_VERSION (82, 83, 84), e.g. make phpunit PHP_VERSION=83.

License

Released under the MIT License.