A "json" command for working with JSON on the command line. It is a single-file node.js script with no external deps (other than node itself). Here is a taste:

$ echo '{"foo":"bar"}' | json
{
  "foo": "bar"
}
$ echo '{"foo":"bar"}' | json foo
bar

Use it to:

• pretty-print JSON to help read it
• extract particular values (see LOOKUPS in usage)
• get details on JSON syntax errors (handy for config files)
• filter input JSON (see -e and -c options)

Follow @trentmick for updates to jsontool.

See http://trentm.com/json for full docs and many examples.

Installation

1. Get node.

2. npm install -g jsontool

OR manually:

2. Get the 'json' script and put it on your PATH somewhere (it is a single file with no external dependencies). For example:

    cd ~/bin
    curl -L https://github.com/trentm/json/raw/master/lib/jsontool.js > json
    chmod 755 json
   

You should now have "json" on your PATH:

$ json --version
json 3.1.2

Test suite

make test

You can also limit (somewhat) which tests are run with the TEST_ONLY envvar, e.g.:

cd test && TEST_ONLY=executable nodeunit test.js

I test against node 0.4, 0.6, 0.7 and (occassionally) node master.

License

MIT (see the fine LICENSE.txt file).

Command-Line Usage

<something generating JSON on stdout> | json [OPTIONS] [LOOKUPS...]
json -f FILE [OPTIONS] [LOOKUPS...]

See json --help output for full details.

Module Usage

Since v1.3.1 you can use "jsontool" as a node.js module:

var jsontool = require('jsontool');

However, so far the module API isn't that useful and the CLI is the primary focus.

Alternatives you might prefer

• json:select: http://jsonselect.org/
• jsonpipe: https://github.com/dvxhouse/jsonpipe
• json-command: https://github.com/zpoley/json-command
• JSONPath: http://goessner.net/articles/JsonPath/, http://code.google.com/p/jsonpath/wiki/Javascript
• jsawk: https://github.com/micha/jsawk
• jshon: http://kmkeen.com/jshon/