This is a PHP library for those wanting to build an API and return structured data to the requesting client.
// This $user is the object we want to return to the client requesting the User data.
$user = new User( 74, "Mike", TRUE );
// Create the response object, set the $user as the data you want to return, and
// specify the Transformer you want to use to munge the User data.
$array = \MichaelDrennen\JSONAPI\Response::create()
->setData( $user )
->transformWith( new UserTransformer() )
->toArray();