Extract objects from JSON array to list

Question

I'm working in C# code and the JSON service result I get looks like this:

[
{"value":"{\"code\":\"MO\",\"description\":\"Monday\",\"isSet\":false}","nr":1}
,{"value":"{\"code\":\"TU\",\"description\":\"Tuesday\",\"isSet\":true}","nr":2}
]

I want to work with a list of deserialized value objects from this array. But my impression is that my code is a bit cumbersome.

JArray j = JArray.Parse(task.Result); 
List<Booking> b = j.Select(x => JObject.Parse(x["value"].ToString()).ToObject<Booking>()).ToList();

Is selecting strings and parsing them as objects which then get casted really the way to do this? Or can this be done more efficient?

Mahdi · Accepted Answer · 2018-04-11 07:37:19Z

1

Use the following classes:

public class Value
{
    public string Code { get; set; }
    public string Description { get; set; }
    public bool IsSet { get; set; }
}

public class RootObject
{
    [JsonProperty("Booking")]
    public Value Value { get; set; }
    public int Nr { get; set; }
}

and then deserialize your JSON string like this:

var test = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<List<RootObject>>(json);

The JSON string needs to be unescaped:

[
{"value":{"code":"MO","description":"Monday","isSet":false},"nr":1},
{"value":{"code":"TU","description":"Tuesday","isSet":true},"nr":2}
]

Also the issue with the value is the double quotes. Remove them, and the deserialization works fine.

Update

If you do not want to manipulate the JSON string you can deserialize it twice. For this, I changed the classes like follows:

public class Value
{
    public string Code { get; set; }
    public string Description { get; set; }
    public bool IsSet { get; set; }
}

public class RootObject
{
    public string Value { get; set; }
    public int Nr { get; set; }
}

public class ResultRootObject
{
    public Value Value { get; set; }
    public int Nr { get; set; }
}

Then I could deserialize it to ResultRootObject:

var rootObjects = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<List<RootObject>>(badJson, new JsonSerializerSettings());
var result = rootObjects.Select(item => new ResultRootObject
{
    Value = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<Value>(item.Value),
    Nr = item.Nr
}).ToList();

edited Apr 11, 2018 at 7:37

answered Apr 10, 2018 at 12:21

Mahdi

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6 Comments

Tys Over a year ago

Yes, that was the other path I examined. But there are a couple of issues. A. Deserializing crashes because it seems that the value property doesn't contain a proper object, but a string that looks like an object. B. My Value object is not named Value, but booking. So I was wondering how to get from Value to Booking, without that becoming to cumbersome as well.

Tys Over a year ago

Yes it does. I also found that out by manually manipulating the JSON. Taking out those additional quotes. But, can this be done automatically as well? With some parameter on the deserializer for example?

Mahdi Over a year ago

@Tys regular expression is the only way I can think of.

Tys Over a year ago

Feels a bit weird to start doing such things. What could be the reason for the service developers to produce a result like this?

Mahdi Over a year ago

@Tys it does but interestingly, I tried this: freeformatter.com/json-formatter.html and it could extract the inner object.

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