JSON as a string? How can I access it? - ios

Question

I am getting back some data from an API and the data is a string.
po JSON
$22 = 0x26305840 {
"thing_id" = 5192f9053000001;
status = "{\"thing_request_id\":\"51c3a0608906f101f\",\"thing_id\":\"5192f9053000001\",\"status\":\"PICKUP\"}";
}
How can I access the inner status key? NOT the "stat =" one.
I am getting access to the data via a socketIO connection.

Answer 1

What you are looking for is NSJSONSerialization.
you can use it like:
NSData *data = [stringJSON dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
NSError *error;
id *yourJSON = [JSONObjectWithData:webData options:0 error:&error];
if(error) {
NSLog(#"Error: %#", error);
} else {
NSLog(#"You JSON: %#", yourJSON);
}
It is important to observe that it can return an array or a dictionary, this code is only an example.
Documentation:
http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/Foundation/Reference/NSJSONSerialization_Class/Reference/Reference.html

Answer 2

This code work well for fixing JSON with unquoted key. I got it from https://coderwall.com/p/tdra3w
- (NSString *)fixJSON:(NSString *)s {
NSRegularExpression *regexp = [NSRegularExpression regularExpressionWithPattern:#"[{,]\\s*(\\w+)\\s*:"
options:0
error:NULL];
NSMutableString *b = [NSMutableString stringWithCapacity:([s length] * 1.1)];
__block NSUInteger offset = 0;
[regexp enumerateMatchesInString:s
options:0
range:NSMakeRange(0, [s length])
usingBlock:^(NSTextCheckingResult *result, NSMatchingFlags flags, BOOL *stop) {
NSRange r = [result rangeAtIndex:1];
[b appendString:[s substringWithRange:NSMakeRange(offset, r.location - offset)]];
[b appendString:#"\""];
[b appendString:[s substringWithRange:r]];
[b appendString:#"\""];
offset = r.location + r.length;
}];
[b appendString:[s substringWithRange:NSMakeRange(offset, [s length] - offset)]];
return b;
}

Answer 3

I would suggest adding JSONKit which will make it simple to put it in a dictionary and access each element.
NSData *jsonData = [yourJSONString dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8String];
NSDictionary *dictionary = [jsonData objectFromJSONData];
Then you can access each element the same as you would a normal NSDictionary.
[dictionary objectForKey:#"status"];//etc
You can get JSONKit here

Answer 4

Not efficient code but I just simply call it twice and it works.
NSError *jsonParsingError = nil;
NSDictionary *JSON =
[NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData: [packet.args[0] dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding]
options: NSJSONReadingMutableContainers
error: &jsonParsingError];
NSString *lastStatus = [JSON objectForKey:#"status"];
NSDictionary *lastStatusDict = [JSON objectForKey:#"status"];
NSError *jsonParsingError = nil;
NSDictionary *INNERJSON =
[NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData: [lastStatus dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding]
options: NSJSONReadingMutableContainers
error: &jsonParsingError];
NSString *innerStatus = [INNERJSON objectForKey:#"status"];
THEN I CAN USE IT
if ([innerStatus isEqualToString:kSENT]) { .....