deserialize json to 2d array

Question

Does anyone know how to convert a string which contains json that has no parameter names into a C# array. My code receives json from RESTApi That looks like this

[["name","surname","street","phone"],
["alex","smith","sky blue way","07747233279"],
["john","patterson","richmond street","07658995465"]]

Every example I have seen here involved parameter names and their json looked like this

[Name:"alex",Surname:"smith",street:"sky blue way",phone:"07747233279"],
[Name:"john",Surname:"patterson",street:"richmond street",phone:"07658995465"]]

I am trying to use JavaScriptSerializer but i don't know how to properly maintain a Class for such type of JSON

possible duplicate: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/22191167/convert-json-string-to-c-sharp-object-list — jazb, Oct 23 '18 at 08:20
The post You mentioned has dictionary type json (it has keys and values) mine does not and the problem is that i don't know how to properly maintain class for this type of JSON — Alex Shangin, Oct 23 '18 at 08:24
That first json string is... weird. If you have 1 object per line, I'd recommend you to read the string line by line and parse each array of strings — Rui Jarimba, Oct 23 '18 at 08:27
The 1st json string tells me that someone clearly doesn't understand what is json :-) — Rui Jarimba, Oct 23 '18 at 08:28
I agree, That does not look like a json, But that is what i receive from RESTApi (i did not build it) Which should technically be a JSON — Alex Shangin, Oct 23 '18 at 08:31

TheGeneral · Answer 1 · 2018-10-23T08:46:17.883

You could do this, which will give you a list of list of string

var input = "[[\"name\", \"surname\", \"street\", \"phone\"],\r\n\t[\"alex\", \"smith\", \"sky blue way\", \"07747233279\"],\r\n\t[\"john\", \"patterson\", \"richmond street\", \"07658995465\"]]";
var results = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<List<List<string>>>(input);

foreach (var item in results)
    Console.WriteLine(string.Join(", ", item));

Output

name, surname, street, phone
alex, smith, sky blue way, 07747233279
john, patterson, richmond street, 07658995465

Full Demo Here

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 23 '18 at 08:51

This is not quite what the OP is asking (2d array), but my approach to this problem.

It seems that you have a collection of people, so I'd create a Person class like this:

public class Person
{
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public string Surname { get; set; }
    public string Street { get; set; }
    public string Phone { get; set; }
}

And then a parser class that takes the json string as a parameter, and returns a collection of Person:

public class PersonParser
{
    public IEnumerable<Person> Parse(string content)
    {
        if (content == null)
        {
            throw new ArgumentNullException(nameof(content));
        }

        if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(content))
        {
            yield break;
        }

        // skip 1st array, which contains the property names
        var values = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<string[][]>(content).Skip(1);

        foreach (string[] properties in values)
        {
            if (properties.Length != 4)
            {
                // ignore line? thrown exception?
                // ...
                continue;
            }

            var person = new Person
            {
                Name = properties[0],
                Surname = properties[1],
                Street = properties[2],
                Phone = properties[3]
            };

            yield return person;
        }
    }
}

Using the code:

string weirdJson = @"[[""name"",""surname"",""street"",""phone""],
[""alex"",""smith"",""sky blue way"",""07747233279""],
[""john"",""patterson"",""richmond street"",""07658995465""]]";

var parser = new PersonParser();
IEnumerable<Person> people = parser.Parse(weirdJson);

foreach (Person person in people)
{
    Console.WriteLine($"{person.Name} {person.Surname}");
}

deserialize json to 2d array

2 Answers2