How to get the values from JSON file that looks like this,
["AA-BB-CC-MAKE-SAME.json","SS-ED-SIXSIX-TENSE.json","FF-EE-EE-EE-WW.json","ZS-WE-AS-FOUR-MINE.json","DD-RF-LATERS-LATER.json","FG-ER-DC-ED-FG.json"]
If you actually mean what you wrote, and that the contents of the JSON file is that list of six strings in a single array, formatted on a single line, the simplest way is to treat it as text, trim the opening and closing square brackets, then delimit its fields at every occurrence of a ,. Finally, each individual text item can have the surrounding quotes trimmed as well.
Examining the VBScript, it looks like it uses a very similar process, albeit with regular expressions, which AppleScript doesn't feature but which aren't especially necessary in this simple situation.
Let's assume that the JSON array above is stored in a file on your desktop called "myfile.json". Then:
set home to the path to home folder
set f to the POSIX path of home & "Desktop/myfile.json"
set JSONstr to read POSIX file f
# Trim square brackets
set JSONstr to text 2 thru -2 of JSONstr
# Delimit text fields using comma
set the text item delimiters to ","
set Arr to the text items of JSONstr
# Trim quotes of each item in Arr
repeat with a in Arr
set contents of a to text 2 thru -2 of a
end repeat
# The final array
Arr
I only need the code to get the values of the JSON file to a single array of string values. The above shown example above the VBScript is the how JSON file contents looks like.
The variable Arr now contains the array (referred to as lists in AppleScript) of string values. You can access a particular item in it like this:
item 2 of Arr --> "SS-ED-SIXSIX-TENSE.json"
A More General Solution
I've decided to include a more advanced way to handle JSON in an AppleScript, partly because I've been doing a lot of JSON processing quite recently and this is all fresh on my event horizon; but also to demonstrate that, using AppleScriptObjC, parsing even very complex JSON data is not only possible, but quite simple.
I don't think you'll need it in this specific case, but it could come in useful for some future situation.
The script has three sections: it starts off importing the relevant Objective-C framework that gives AppleScript additional powers; then, I define the actual handler itself, called JSONtoRecord, which I describe below. Lastly, comes the bottom of the script where you can enter your code and do whatever you like with it:
use framework "Foundation"
use scripting additions
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
property ca : a reference to current application
property NSData : a reference to ca's NSData
property NSDictionary : a reference to ca's NSDictionary
property NSJSONSerialization : a reference to ca's NSJSONSerialization
property NSString : a reference to ca's NSString
property NSUTF8StringEncoding : a reference to 4
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
on JSONtoRecord from fp
local fp
set JSONdata to NSData's dataWithContentsOfFile:fp
set [x, E] to (NSJSONSerialization's ¬
JSONObjectWithData:JSONdata ¬
options:0 ¬
|error|:(reference))
if E ≠ missing value then error E
tell x to if its isKindOfClass:NSDictionary then ¬
return it as record
x as list
end JSONtoRecord
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
###YOUR CODE BELOW HERE
#
#
set home to the path to home folder
set f to the POSIX path of home & "Desktop/myfile.json"
JSONtoRecord from f
--> {"AA-BB-CC-MAKE-SAME.json", "SS-ED-SIXSIX-TENSE.json", ¬
--> "FF-EE-EE-EE-WW.json", "ZS-WE-AS-FOUR-MINE.json", ¬
--> "DD-RF-LATERS-LATER.json", "FG-ER-DC-ED-FG.json"}
At the bottom of the script, I've called the JSONtoRecord handler, passing it the location of myfile.json. One of the benefits of this handler is that it doesn't matter whether the file is formatted all on one line, or over many lines. It can also handle complex, nested JSON arrays.
In those instances, what it returns is a native AppleScript record object, with all the JSON variables stored as property values in the record. Accessing the variables then becomes very simple.
This is actually exactly what the JSON Helper application that a couple of people have already mentioned does under the hood.
The one criterion (other than the JSON file containing valid JSON data) is that the path to the file is a posix path written in full, e.g. /Users/CK/Desktop/myfile.json, and not ~/Desktop/myfile.json or, even worse, Macintosh HD:Users:CK:Desktop:myfile.json.
