accept t/f for boolean in Api

and document boolean parameter formats

Change-Id: I70b295e93c6f19b471bfc6f4b31f3a7c3642d8f4
Reviewed-on: https://gerrit.instructure.com/70861
Tested-by: Jenkins
Reviewed-by: Simon Williams <simon@instructure.com>
Product-Review: Cody Cutrer <cody@instructure.com>
QA-Review: Cody Cutrer <cody@instructure.com>

doc/api/README.md

@@ -17,6 +17,8 @@ All API responses are in <a href="http://www.json.org/">JSON format</a>.
 
 All integer ids in Canvas are 64 bit integers.
 
+All boolean parameters can be passed as true/false, t/f, yes/no, y/n, on/off, or 1/0. When using JSON format, a literal true/false is preferred, rather than as a string.
+
 For POST and PUT requests, parameters are sent using standard
 <a href="http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/interact/forms.html#h-17.13.4">HTML form
 encoding</a> (the application/x-www-form-urlencoded content type).
@@ -26,13 +28,13 @@ POST and PUT requests may also optionally be sent in <a href="http://www.json.or
 As an example, this HTML form request:
 
 ```bash
-name=test+name&file_ids[]=1&file_ids[]=2&sub[name]=foo&sub[message]=bar
+name=test+name&file_ids[]=1&file_ids[]=2&sub[name]=foo&sub[message]=bar&flag=y
 ```
 
 would translate into this JSON request:
 
 ```json
-{ "name": "test name", "file_ids": [1,2], "sub": { "name": "foo", "message": "bar" } }
+{ "name": "test name", "file_ids": [1,2], "sub": { "name": "foo", "message": "bar" }, "flag": true }
 ```
 
 With either encoding, all timestamps are sent and returned in ISO 8601 format (UTC time zone):

lib/canvas/plugin.rb

@@ -178,8 +178,8 @@ module Canvas
 
     def self.value_to_boolean(value)
       if value.is_a?(String) || value.is_a?(Symbol)
-        return true if ["yes", "true", "on", "1"].include?(value.to_s.downcase)
-        return false if ["no", "false", "off", "0"].include?(value.to_s.downcase)
+        return true if ["yes", "y", "true", "t", "on", "1"].include?(value.to_s.downcase)
+        return false if ["no", "n", "false", "f", "off", "0"].include?(value.to_s.downcase)
       end
       return value if [true, false].include?(value)
       return value.to_i != 0

spec/lib/canvas/plugin_spec.rb

@@ -24,5 +24,10 @@ describe Canvas::Plugin do
       expect(Canvas::Plugin.value_to_boolean('0')).to eq false
       expect(Canvas::Plugin.value_to_boolean('1')).to eq true
     end
+
+    it "accepts t/f" do
+      expect(Canvas::Plugin.value_to_boolean('f')).to eq false
+      expect(Canvas::Plugin.value_to_boolean('t')).to eq true
+    end
   end
 end