NSJSONSerialization not mapping boolean correctly

Question

I am reading data from The Joys of Code. The API returns data in JSON format where boolean variables are written as so:

{ "obj" :
   { 
      "sharing":false,
      "modified":"tuesday"
   }
}

Notice, sharing:false does not have quotation marks around the word false. I am then using NSJSONSerialization to parse this JSON into an object (NSDictionary in this example).

The problem is, "sharing":false or "sharing":true is always creating an object with sharing = 0, where 0 is an NSNumber with value 0.

My question is if this is valid JSON and NSJSONSerialization is not working correctly, or if the original JSON is invalid.

all's good with that. must be in how you attempt to read the dictionary gotten from the NSJSON — Daij-Djan, Dec 09 '12 at 10:11
Ok. I should have checked this first. The problem is the server. It always returns false. — Paul de Lange, Dec 09 '12 at 10:15
:) Im also often quick to blame system classes and am generally wrong :/ — Daij-Djan, Dec 09 '12 at 10:17
@PauldeLange, Thats what I told. If it is true, you will get it as 1. Not zero. — iDev, Dec 09 '12 at 10:20

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 09 '12 at 10:11

NSJSONSerialization works fine for me with the above json (putting in false and true) :

NSData *json = [@"{ \"obj\" : \
                { \
                \"sharing\":false, \
                \"modified\":\"tuesday\" \
                } \
                }" dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
id dict = [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:json options:0 error:nil];
id sharing = dict [@"obj"][@"sharing"];
NSLog(@"%d", [sharing boolValue]);

json = [@"{ \"obj\" : \
                { \
                \"sharing\":true, \
                \"modified\":\"tuesday\" \
                } \
                }" dataUsingEncoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
dict = [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:json options:0 error:nil];
sharing = dict [@"obj"][@"sharing"];
NSLog(@"%d", [sharing boolValue]);

Thanks. I just did exactly the same thing and it works. -> was a server bug always returning false. — Paul de Lange, Dec 09 '12 at 10:16

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 09 '12 at 10:00

0

It is valid. You can always get BOOL from NSNumber as [number boolValue] and check it as

if ([number boolValue])

or

if ([number boolValue] == YES)

answered Dec 09 '12 at 10:00

iDev

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Ok so it is valid? Do you have a reference so I can query Apple about why NSJSONSerialization always maps it to NO? – Paul de Lange Dec 09 '12 at 10:03
@PauldeLange, It shouldn't be `NO` always.. It should be 0 for false and 1 for true. – iDev Dec 09 '12 at 10:03
1

@PauldeLange, Are you asking about technical support, https://developer.apple.com/support/technical/submit/.. Just checked few other question about bool and json and looks like my above answer should help in this situation. See this question here http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7530173/how-to-parse-json-in-ios-app.. Not sure why you are not getting true there.. – iDev Dec 09 '12 at 10:09

NSJSONSerialization not mapping boolean correctly

2 Answers2