JSON, which stands for “JavaScript Object Notation”, is a format typically used to exchange data between a client and a server. It can also structure and store data temporarily. This way, in web applications, users do not need to refresh the settings they change every time. A text-only JSON file uses the .json extension. JSON feeds can be loaded asynchronously very easily.
The easy-to-access format organizes the information. In short, it provides a collection of data that is human readable and that you can access in a way that actually makes sense. The data consists of value and key pairs. The values can be any data type such as numeric, value, boolean or string, while the key can only be a string. The data is linked together with the {} (curly bracket) opening and closing and is called a JSON object.
It is a lighter and simpler format than XML with similar functionality. These formats work in concert so that data can be loaded asynchronously. This means you don’t need to refresh your website page to update the information. It allows users to request data from a different domain by implementing “script” tags with a method called JSONP. Otherwise, you cannot transfer data between domains due to the same root policy. JSON is frequently used in social media applications.
JSON Syntax: Keys and Values
Creating a JSON file is a matter of following the correct syntax. A JSON object has two main parts: keys and values. Together they form a key/value binary.
Key: JSON data type. Keys consist of strings. It always contains a string of characters surrounded by quotation marks.
Value: One of the valid data types. A value can be a number, array, string, logical expression, space or object.
Key/Value Pair: A key/value pair starts and ends using curly braces {} and curly braces {}. The beginning of the object is represented by the left curly bracket “{” and the end of the object is represented by the right curly bracket “}”. Data in JSON is organized by key-value pairs. The right side data represents the value and the left side data represents the key. A colon “:” separates both the value and the key. Keys must be valid JSON and text data types. A set of key – value pairs is separated from one another using a comma “,”. Arrays are defined inside a JSON object using “[]” square brackets. An example is the following:
{“country”: “UK”, “city”: “London”}
In the example, we have two key and value pairs. District and city are keys, while London and UK are values.
JSON Data Types
JSON supports many data types, including browser extensions for websites that are widely used in JavaScript-based applications: Number: Represents an integer. Array: Lists or collections of data enclosed in closed parentheses []. It is an associative value.
Object: Refers to unordered pairs of associated keys and values.
String: A Unicode character string.
It usually means a word formed by several plain text characters together. Boolean (true / false): a true – false data type. Although JSON is language independent, programmers use C family languages. JSON also uses content that programmers know. JSON programming can organize objects according to your needs. Objects help you to use keys as parameters and to be reusable by creating definitions for various situations.
JSON Examples: https://www.w3schools.com/js/js_json_intro.asp
What is JSON Used For?
With the rapid rise of AJAX-powered sites, it becomes important for sites to be able to load data asynchronously and quickly without delaying page load. It allows you, the user, to experience that there is no need to refresh the page to change the content of an item. JSON is widely used in many applications, especially for transferring data between web applications and servers. This is because JSON is text-based and can only receive all data as text.
It is often used for small file sizes in HTTP requests and responses. It helps to serialize and transmit all kinds of structured data. Social media networks like Facebook and Twitter can also be used when working with APIs made possible by NASA. It facilitates data transfer for data-heavy social media applications and is therefore highly preferred. Instagram has value lists of users, images, videos and likes. NASA shares astronomical and scientific data with the public through a public API in JSON format for free. You can work with this data using Python.
You can use the request library to work with data available on the internet. The request library allows you to send and receive data over a network connection. You can see that NASA also uses the request library to store and retrieve data from the API. By developing LoT applications, data comes from JSON format to devices and sensors in LoT applications. To develop LoT applications, you need to master JSON. JavaScript and JSON browser plugins are very well integrated. JSON is also used to write JavaScript-based applications. It is a subset of JavaScript. This means that everything you write is also valid in JavaScript. JSON can be used as a connection between systems and can test that connection.
What are the Differences Between JSON and XML?
Any web server can use both XML and JSON to retrieve data. JSON is widely used for mobile and web applications due to its simple design, ease of use, flexibility and ease of understanding. It is used as an alternative to XML for semi-structured data. This allows even more compressed objects to be used. JSON allows better representation of hierarchy objects in a stream. It has less redundancy in the repetition of names. It is different and less complex than XML. Data exchange is lightweight. XML is a markup language or a meta-language.
JSON, a subset of Javascript, can perform Javascript operations faster than XML. JSON is easier to read. XML uses more words than necessary, so a lot of time is wasted reading and writing. While JSON can be parsed with a standard JavaScript function, XML can only be parsed by an XML parser. XML is therefore difficult to parse. Especially large XML files are not only very slow to parse, but also require a lot of memory. The non-intuitive XML structure makes it difficult to represent in code.
JSON is intuitive and compact. This makes it easier to read objects in the programming language. It moves data quickly and efficiently. JSON distinguishes objects such as integers, strings, booleans, etc. by type, whereas XML does not distinguish objects by type. JSON is lighter than XML. JSON does not use schema. JSON data is easily accessible, whereas XML data needs to be parsed and allocated to variables using an API. JSON is more convenient and accessible than XML. JSON, which has various usage areas from LoT applications to QA tests, allows serializing and transmitting data between two systems over a network connection.
Find out about gRPC: https://devopstipstricks.com/what-is-grpc-and-how-to-implement-it-grpc-with-microservice-architecture/
Sources:
https://www.json.org/json-en.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JSON
