Question

Using JSON with JavaScript

Asked by: Teamsite_Noob

Hi Experts,
My question is with regards to using JSON with AJAX. I am just coming out of a meeting where the developers suggested that for the business to have control on our website, they will implement an AJAX solution that uses JSON to create an object of all the data elements being requested and that on the front end we can use JavaScript to pull that data into the page and present it the way we want to using the CSS. I understand this from a high level, but I have never worked with JSON before. I am reasonably comfortable with JavaScript. To give you a better understanding of my situation, the web page in question is mostly content with a search box in the center, the search box runs straight queries into an Oracle Database, and the response to these queries( search results) will be delivered to us as a JSON Object. Now I am tasked with formatting and displaying these results in a simple table format. I just cant figure out how I can use HTML/CSS around this JSON Object. Any pointers will be greatly appreciated.  What would really help me though is some sample code, where a JSON Object is being parsed(??) and delivered on the front end using HTML/CSS formatting.

Thanks !!

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Asked On
2009-06-23 at 11:20:56ID24515697
Tags

JSON

,

JavaScript

,

Web

,

Content Management Systems

,

AJAX

,

HTML

,

Web Design

,

CSS

Topics

JSON

,

Asynchronous Javascript and XML (AJAX)

,

JavaScript

Participating Experts
3
Points
500
Comments
6

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Answers

 

by: jmanGJHS97Posted on 2009-06-23 at 12:37:03ID: 24695273

Here's an overview of JSON to start:

http://www.json.org/

Here's a sample JSON parser for JavaScript:

http://www.json.org/json_parse.js

And here's an example using AJAX to get the JSON object and then display it in HTML.

http://code.activestate.com/recipes/440637/

Hope this helps.

 

by: MorcalavinPosted on 2009-06-23 at 12:39:31ID: 24695302

JSON is native to javascript, so if it is embeded directly into the script, it doesn't need to be parsed.  It becomes a native javascript object.  However, if it's passed as a string, you will need to eval it.

Here is an excellent resource:
http://www.json.org/js.html

var myJsonString = '{"Parents": [{"Name":"Bill", "Age":"60", "Role":"Father", "Deceased":"No"},{"Name":"Jill", "Age":"68", "Role":"Mother", "Deceased":"No"}]}';
 
var myJsonObject = {"Parents": [{"Name":"Bill", "Age":"60", "Role":"Father", "Deceased":"No"},{"Name":"Jill", "Age":"68", "Role":"Mother", "Deceased":"No"}]};
 
//myJsonObject can already be accessed like so:
alert('I have '+ myJsonObject.Parents.length + ' parents'); 
//myJsonString is a string of json, but we can eval it and make it a pure json object!
myEvaledJson = eval('(' + myJsonString + ')');
alert('My father\'s name is ' + myEvaledJson.Parents[0].Name + '.  He is '+ myEvaledJson.Parents[0].Age + ' years old');

                                              
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by: wilq32Posted on 2009-06-23 at 12:44:17ID: 24695353


JSON is a JavaScript Object Notation so if you feel pretty comfortable injavascript then it should be really simple for you :). What to do? Well use javascript to retrieve that JSON object and then parse it. At the end dynamically create elements to fill content with. So function that you will need (read about them on google add 'MDC' at the end of every search to browse trough Mozilla Developer Center - prettty good resources) :

XMLHttpRequest     - to retrieve JSON object
getElementById      - to select existing elements in document to add to
createElement         -  for dynamically creating element,
appendChild            -  for adding those elemens to other elements

eventually:

eval    -  to simply parse JSON data into javascript:

more nice solution would require to use http://json.org  implementation of parsing values from JSON.


So here are simple example:


// JSON_File:
///////////
{
  data:
   [{
    "title": "I love you",
    "text": "Here some description"
     },
    {
    "title": "Yeahh",
    "text": "Here some coool blablabla"
     }]
}


// javascript file:
///////////////////


var XHR=new XMLHttpRequest("GET","JSON_FILE");   // JSON_FILE is a filename for this file on web
                                                // this could be also a web address that will return JSON file
 
XHR.onreadystatechange=function()
{
 
if (this.readyState==4) // if we receive data
{
 
   eval("var retrievedData="+this.responseText);  // here we use eval to parse JSON string to real object
 
   var content=document.getElementById("someContent")  //   now assume that you have a HTML with an elemen
                                                                                             //  <DIV id="someContent"> </DIV>  we can put some data there
 
   for (var i=0;i<retrievedData.data.length;i++)
  {
       var element = document.createElement('div');   // create new element
       element.innerHTML = "Title: "+retrievedData.data[i].title+", Text"+retrievedData.data[i].text;  // put data into element
       content.appendChild(element);     // finally we created newly created div
   }
 
}
 
}
XHR.send(null);  // now execute

                                              
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by: wilq32Posted on 2009-06-23 at 12:45:48ID: 24695387

// finally we created newly created div


of course I mean

// finally we append newly created div into document

:P

 

by: Teamsite_NoobPosted on 2009-07-07 at 17:23:00ID: 24799690

I am being told that I have to use JQuery to achieve this. Is the code any different with JQuery??

 

by: wilq32Posted on 2009-07-08 at 01:24:35ID: 24801635

You dont have to use jQuery to achieve this. JQuery is only using pure javascript so everything there is possible only in javascript. But it might be eventually easier to do that.

In future I advice to answer faster than 2 week, right now I completly dont remember what we spoke about

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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