Reference a JSON array that has no name

Question

I have a JSON array saved to its own file, gamedata.json. If this were instead just a regular array of objects like gamedata.js loaded into my HTML, I could just give the array a name var gameObjects = array [{lots of objects}]; and then if I wanted to look through the array I could just reference gameObjects, even from other JS files loaded into the same HTML page.

But since this is a JSON file, how can I reference it? This is my first time working with JSON but I learned that I can't set the array to a variable in the .json file. So how can I get access to it's data from other JS files?

I can use VanillaJS or jQuery, its a large array, around 13000 lines, so efficiency matters.

What is the context - Node.js or a browser or something else? You have to import the JSON as text, parse it with `JSON.parse()`, and assign the result of that to a JavaScript variable. Exactly how you do that depends on the relationship between the execution environment of the JavaScript code that needs access, and the location/situation of the JSON file. — Pointy, Jan 02 '16 at 21:49
The above comment is correct. THere are two very different approaches to reading data from the filesystem. I think you are in the browser since you mentioned jquery. — t3dodson, Jan 02 '16 at 21:53
Sorry, should have been more clear. Browser. How do you import it the JSON as text? — Chirpizard, Jan 02 '16 at 22:05

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 02 '16 at 22:13

1

Possible solution could be:

var myJson;
$.getJSON("z.json", function(data) {
  myJson = data;
});

answered Jan 02 '16 at 22:13

gaetanoM

41,594
6
42
61

This solution works. Pretty simple. It happens asynchronously, right? So when I'm trying to reference ```myJson``` it says undefined. So I just put the code that will reference ```myJson``` inside of the ```getJSON``` function. Is this alright to do? It seems to work. – Chirpizard Jan 02 '16 at 22:31
@Chirpizard Yes, it's asynchronous. Could you accept and upvote? – gaetanoM Jan 02 '16 at 22:32

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 02 '16 at 22:24

Using fetch, which is supported in some modern browsers, but can be polyfilled

fetch( 'gamedata.json' )
  .then( res => res.json() ) 
  .then( data => {
    // data is available here and has been parsed into an array already
  })
  .catch( err => errorHandler )

If you use browserify then it'll pull the json file into your javascript bundle and expose that as a module (not sure if other bundlers such as webpack or jspm have the same mechanism) i.e.

var data = require( 'gamedata.json' )

But note that it does this at build time, if your json file is dynamic then this implementation wont work for you.

Reference a JSON array that has no name

2 Answers2