Headers

Headers are a very important part of HTTP requests and responses. They contain information about the request/response, like the content type, the server, the date, and more.

Getting request headers

You can get all headers from a request using the all() method on the headers object or the headers() method on the request object.

Request Class

$allHeaders = request()->headers();

Headers Class

$headers = Leaf\Http\Headers::all();

Note that all headers are automatically sanitized by default. If you want to get the raw headers, you can pass false as the first argument to the all() method.

Request Class

$allHeaders = request()->headers(safeHeaders: false);

Headers Class

$headers = Leaf\Http\Headers::all(false);

Getting a single header

You can also grab a single item from the headers using the get() method.

Request Class

$contentType = request()->headers('Content-Type');

Headers Class

$contentType = Leaf\Http\Headers::get('Content-Type');

These headers are automatically sanitized by default. If you want to get the raw headers, you can pass false as the second argument to the get() method.

Request Class

$contentType = request()->headers('Content-Type', false);

Headers Class

$contentType = Leaf\Http\Headers::get('Content-Type', false);

Setting response headers

The most straightforward way to set headers is to use the Leaf's response object. It has a withHeader() method that allows you to set headers.

response()
  ->withHeader('X-Custom-Header', 'value')
  ->json([
    'message' => 'Hello, world!'
  ]);

You can find the full documentation here.

Setting headers using the Headers class

You can also set headers using the Leaf\Http\Headers::set() class. This method gives you finer control over the headers you set. It takes in 4 parameters:

• The header to to set
• Value for header (optional if you pass an array to the first parameter)
• Replace similar header? (optional)
• An http status code (optional)

Leaf\Http\Headers::set('location', '/home', true, 302);

// multiple headers
Leaf\Http\Headers::set([
  'location' => '/home',
  'something' => 'here'
]);

If you want multiple headers with the same name, you can set replace to false. This will force multiple headers of the same type.

Leaf\Http\Headers::set(
  [
    'location' => '/home',
    'location' => '/here'
  ],
  replace: false
);

Removing headers

You can remove headers using the Leaf\Http\Headers::remove() method. This method takes in a single parameter, the header to remove.

Leaf\Http\Headers::remove('WWW-Authenticate');

// remove multiple headers
Leaf\Http\Headers::remove(['WWW-Authenticate', 'Authorization']);

Checking if a header exists

You can check if a header exists using the Leaf\Http\Headers::has() method. This method takes in a single parameter, the header to check and returns a boolean.

$exists = Leaf\Http\Headers::has('Content-Type');

Utility Header methods

Some shortcut methods have been prepared for the most used headers, so you won't need to stress yourself writing a bunch of stuff for simple tasks.

contentPlain

This method set's the content type of the response to text/plain, it also takes in an HTTP status code.

Leaf\Http\Headers::contentPlain(200);

echo 'plain text here';

contentHtml

This method set's the content type of the response to text/html, it also takes in an HTTP status code.

Leaf\Http\Headers::contentHtml(200);

echo 'html here';

contentXml

This method set's the content type of the response to application/xml, it also takes in an HTTP status code.

Leaf\Http\Headers::contentXml(200);

echo 'Xml here';

contentJSON

This method set's the content type of the response to application/json, it also takes in an HTTP status code.

Leaf\Http\Headers::contentJSON(200);

echo 'json here';

accessControl

This method allows you to quickly set Access-Control headers in your app. It takes in 3 parameters:

• The header to set
• The value to set
• A status code (optional)

Leaf\Http\Headers::accessControl('Allow-Origin', 'https://example.com', 200);

You can set mutiple access control headers at once:

Leaf\Http\Headers::accessControl(['Allow-Origin' => '*', 'Allow-Headers' => '*']);