All You Need To Know About Python JSON Module

Hello everybody,
I'm Aya Bouchiha,
on this amazing day, we'll discuss using the JSON module in python

What's JSON

JSON: (JavaScript Object Notation) is a syntax for serializing objects, arrays, numbers, strings, booleans, and null. It is based upon JavaScript syntax but is distinct from it: some JavaScript is not JSON.

www.developer.mozilla.org

JSON Syntax rules

Data have to be written as key-value pairs.

Data is separated by commas.

Curly braces hold objects.

Square brackets hold arrays.

string has to be written inside double quotes "", instead of single quotes ''.

[
    {
        "id": 1,
        "name": "Aya Bouchiha",
        "job": "full-stack developer",
        "contact_info": {
            "email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com",
            "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"
        },
        "isMoroccan": true,
        "facebook_account": null,
        "favorite_subjects": [
            "programming",
            "math",
            "physics",
            "english",
            "french"
        ]
    }
]

Example of a JSON file

tasks.json

[
    {
        "id": 1,
        "username": "Aya Bouchiha",
        "title": "eat fruits",
        "completed": true
    },
    {
        "id": 2,
        "username": null,
        "title": "go to gym",
        "completed": true
    },
    {
        "id": 3,
        "username": null,
        "title": "drink an orange jus",
        "completed": true
    },
    {
        "id": 4,
        "username": "John Doe",
        "title": "practice english",
        "completed": false
    }
]

Using JSON in python

Python objects and their equivalent conversion to JSON

python	json
str	string
int, long or float	number
list	array
dict	object
True	true
False	false
None	null

Importing JSON module in python

json is a built-in package in python for encoding and decoding JSON data.

import json

Serializing JSON

json.dumps

json.dumps(): lets you convert a python dictionary to JSON as a string.

import json

task = {
        'id': 1,
        'username': None,
        'title': 'eat fruits',
        'completed': True
}

print(json.dumps(task))

Output:

{"id": 1, "name": null, "title": "eat fruits", "completed": true}

<class 'str'>

json.dump()

json.dump() lets you converts a python dictionnary to JSON in a specified file.

import json

user_dict =  {
    'id': 1,
    'name': 'Aya Bouchiha',
    'job': 'full-stack developer',
    'contact_info': {
       'email': 'developer.aya.b@gmail.com',
       'telegram': 'https://t.me/AyaBouchiha'
    },
   'isMoroccan': True,
   'facebook_account': None,
   'favorite_subjects': ['programming', 'math', 'physics', 'english', 'french']
}


with open('user.json', "w") as user_file:
    json.dump(user_dict, user_file)

Output:

user.json

{"id": 1, "name": "Aya Bouchiha", "job": "full-stack developer", "contact_info": {"email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com", "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"}, "isMoroccan": true, "facebook_account": null, "favorite_subjects": ["programming", "math", "physics", "english", "french"]}

There is a problem here, we find that our json data is not organized and not easy to read, that's why the indent parameter comes, it lets you specify the indentation size for nested structures. this parameter takes by default None. To understand better let's try the same example with an indentation size of 2.

with open('user.json', "w") as user_file:
    json.dump(user_dict, user_file, indent=2)

Output:

user.json

{
  "id": 1,
  "name": "Aya Bouchiha",
  "job": "full-stack developer",
  "contact_info": {
    "email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com",
    "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"
  },
  "isMoroccan": true,
  "facebook_account": null,
  "favorite_subjects": [
    "programming",
    "math",
    "physics",
    "english",
    "french"
  ]
}

What about indent=4 :) ?

with open('user.json', "w") as user_file:
    json.dump(user_dict, user_file, indent=4)

Output:

user.json

{
    "id": 1,
    "name": "Aya Bouchiha",
    "job": "full-stack developer",
    "contact_info": {
        "email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com",
        "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"
    },
    "isMoroccan": true,
    "facebook_account": null,
    "favorite_subjects": [
        "programming",
        "math",
        "physics",
        "english",
        "french"
    ]
}

Now, our json file looks better, but how can we sort our keys?

sort_keys: lets you sort keys in ascending order if it is True, however, sort_keys takes by default False.
Let's take an example

import json

user_dict =  {
    'id': 1,
    'name': 'Aya Bouchiha',
    'job': 'full-stack developer',
    'contact_info': {
       'email': 'developer.aya.b@gmail.com',
       'telegram': 'https://t.me/AyaBouchiha'
    },
   'isMoroccan': True,
   'facebook_account': None,
   'favorite_subjects': ['programming', 'math', 'physics', 'english', 'french']
}


with open('user.json', "w") as user_file:
    json.dump(user_dict, user_file, indent=4, sort_keys=True)

Output:

user.json

{
    "contact_info": {
        "email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com",
        "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"
    },
    "facebook_account": null,
    "favorite_subjects": [
        "programming",
        "math",
        "physics",
        "english",
        "french"
    ],
    "id": 1,
    "isMoroccan": true,
    "job": "full-stack developer",
    "name": "Aya Bouchiha"
}

Note:

You can use indent and sort_key parameters in json.dump() and also json.dumps().

Deserializing JSON

json.loads()

json.loads(): translate JSON string to a Python object.

import json

user_json ='''[
    {
        "id": 1,
        "name": "Aya Bouchiha",
        "job": "full-stack developer",
        "contact_info": {
            "email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com",
            "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"
        },
        "isMoroccan": true,
        "facebook_account": null,
        "favorite_subjects": [
            "programming",
            "math",
            "physics",
            "english",
            "french"
        ]
    }
]'''

user = json.loads(user_json)

print(user)
print(type(user))

Output:

[{'id': 1, 'name': 'Aya Bouchiha', 'job': 'full-stack developer', 'contact_info': {'email': 'developer.aya.b@gmail.com', 'telegram': 'https://t.me/AyaBouchiha'}, 'isMoroccan': True, 'facebook_account': None, 'favorite_subjects': ['programming', 'math', 'physics', 'english', 'french']}]
<class 'list'>

json.load()

json.load(): lets you read a JSON document from a file and translate it to a python object.

user.json

[
    {
        "id": 1,
        "name": "Aya Bouchiha",
        "job": "full-stack developer",
        "contact_info": {
            "email": "developer.aya.b@gmail.com",
            "telegram": "https://t.me/AyaBouchiha"
        },
        "isMoroccan": true,
        "facebook_account": null,
        "favorite_subjects": [
            "programming",
            "math",
            "physics",
            "english",
            "french"
        ]
    }
]

file.py:

import json

with open('user.json', 'r') as user_file:
    user = json.load(user_file)

print(user)
print(type(user))

output:

[{'id': 1, 'name': 'Aya Bouchiha', 'job': 'full-stack developer', 'contact_info': {'email': 'developer.aya.b@gmail.com', 'telegram': 'https://t.me/AyaBouchiha'}, 'isMoroccan': True, 'facebook_account': None, 'favorite_subjects': ['programming', 'math', 'physics', 'english', 'french']}]
<class 'list'>