Welcome to Json-lib

JSON-lib is a java library for transforming beans, maps, collections, java arrays and XML to JSON and back again to beans and DynaBeans.

It is based on the work by Douglas Crockford in http://www.json.org/java.

The following tables sumarizes the types conversion between java and javascript:

JSON Java
string<=>java.lang.String, java.lang.Character, char
number<=>java.lang.Number, byte, short, int, long, float, double
true|false<=>java.lang.Boolean, boolean
null<=>null
function<=>net.sf.json.JSONFunction
array<=>net.sf.json.JSONArray (object, string, number, boolean, function)
object<=>net.sf.json.JSONObject


The function type from javascript is not part of the JSON format "officially" (please refer to http://www.json.org) but it is supported as well.

Json-lib comes in two flavors, depending on the jdk compatibility. json-lib-x.x-jdk13 is compatible with JDK 1.3.1 and upwards. json-lib-x.x-jdk15 is compatible with JDK 1.5, includes support for Enums in JSONArray and JSONObject. Please reffer to the appropriate javadoc links available in the project menu.

Json-lib requires (at least) the following dependencies in your classpath:

  • jakarta commons-lang 2.3
  • jakarta commons-beanutils 1.7.0
  • jakarta commons-collections 3.2
  • jakarta commons-logging 1.1
  • ezmorph 1.0.4
Other dependencies are needed if working with XML, Groovy and JRuby. Please review the Dependencies report to know more about those extra dependencies.

What is JSON ?

JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) is a lightweight data-interchange format. It is easy for humans to read and write. It is easy for machines to parse and generate. It is based on a subset of the JavaScript Programming Language, Standard ECMA-262 3rd Edition - December 1999. JSON is a text format that is completely language independent but uses conventions that are familiar to programmers of the C-family of languages, including C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Perl, Python, and many others.

These properties make JSON an ideal data-interchange language.