Can't process JSON data

Question

User565442435 posted

I'm trying to parse a simple JSON string
[{"url":"http://loyalty.bosselman.com/Home/tabid/57/Default.aspx","position":"0","roles":"All Users;Administrators;"}]

You can find it here

http://loyalty.bosselman.com/DesktopModules/MyServices/API/Welcome/GetMenu?key

When I run this code

            var baseUrl = "http://loyalty.bosselman.com/DesktopModules/MyServices/API/Welcome/GetMenu?key";

            WebClient client = new WebClient();
            var data = client.DownloadString(baseUrl);


            var obj = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(data);

            JObject job = JObject.Parse(obj.ToString());

            foreach (JProperty prop in job.Properties())
            {
                Response.Write(prop["url"]);
            }

I get this error

Error reading JObject from JsonReader. Current JsonReader item is not an object: StartArray. Path '', line 1, position 1.

If I inspect my obj element it looks like this

"[{\"url\":\"http://loyalty.bosselman.com/Home/tabid/57/Default.aspx\",\"position\":\"0\",\"roles\":\"All Users;Administrators;\"}]"

I'm not sure why the \" are getting in there and obj.replace("\\", ""); does not remove them. What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

User-488622176 posted

what if you remove the "[" and "]" ?

Answer 2

User565442435 posted

I tried that, I think the prolem is for some reason, it's escaping the ". i.e. "url":"http... becomes \"url\":\"http...

I'm just using the newton json stuff. To create the Json string I have an object

        /// <summary>
        /// this is the class for the items to set in a menu
        /// </summary>
        public class MenuHolder{

            [JsonProperty]
            public string url {get; set;}

            [JsonProperty]
            public int position { get; set; }

            [JsonProperty]
            public string roles {get; set;}

        }

Then a list of it that I add the class MenuHolder to multiple times

List<MyFunctions.MenuHolder> jsobObjs = new List<MyFunctions.MenuHolder>();

So something like

MyFunctions.MenuHolder obj1 = new MyFunctions.MenuHolder();
            MyFunctions.MenuHolder obj2 = new MyFunctions.MenuHolder();
            MyFunctions.MenuHolder obj3 = new MyFunctions.MenuHolder();

            obj1.url = "http://somedomain.com";
            obj1.position = 1;
            obj1.roles = "Administrator";

            obj2.url = "http://somedomain.com";
            obj2.position = 2;
            obj2.roles = "Administrator";

            obj3.url = "http://somedomain.com";
            obj3.position = 3;
            obj3.roles = "Administrator";

            jsobObjs.Add(obj1);
            jsobObjs.Add(obj2);
            jsobObjs.Add(obj3);

Then I return

JsonConvert.SerializeObject(jsobObjs);

My code is more complicated on how it gets the values for the objects, but I simplified it for here. Like I said, if you browse to that url, you can see the json string and it looks correct, but when I try to parse it, I get escaped stuff.

Answer 3

User-488622176 posted

Alternative : try to convert/pars JArray (as there is a [ and ] in the result...

Answer 4

User565442435 posted

I tried every form of jobject, jarray, deserialize I could think of. Ended up just changing my web service to deliver xml because I needed to get it done.