Skip to main content

JSON: What is JSON?

JSON is an acronym for JavaScript Object Notation, is an open standard format, which is lightweight and text-based, designed explicitly for human-readable data interchange. It is a language-independent data format. It supports almost every kind of language, framework, and library.

In the early 2000s, JSON was initially specified by Douglas Crockford. In 2013, JSON was standardized as ECMA-404, and RCF 8259 was published in 2017.

JSON is an open standard for exchanging data on the web. It supports data structures like objects and arrays. So, it is easy to write and read data from JSON.

In JSON, data is represented in key-value pairs, and curly braces hold objects, where a colon is followed after each name. The comma is used to separate key-value pairs. Square brackets are used to hold arrays, where each value is comma-separated.

What is JSON​

  • JSON stands for JavaScript Object Notation.
  • JSON is an open standard data-interchange format.
  • JSON is lightweight and self-describing.
  • JSON originated from JavaScript.
  • JSON is easy to read and write.
  • JSON is language independent.
  • JSON supports data structures such as arrays and objects.

Features of JSON​

  • Simplicity
  • Openness
  • Self-Describing
  • Internationalization
  • Extensibility
  • Interoperability

Why do we use JSON?​

Since JSON is an easy-to-use, lightweight language data interchange format in comparison to other available options, it can be used for API integration. Following are the advantages of JSON:

  • Less Verbose: In contrast to XML, JSON follows a compact style to improve its users' readability. While working with a complex system, JSON tends to make substantial enhancements.
  • Faster: The JSON parsing process is faster than that of the XML because the DOM manipulation library in XML requires extra memory for handling large XML files. However, JSON requires less data that ultimately results in reducing the cost and increasing the parsing speed.
  • Readable: The JSON structure is easily readable and straightforward. Regardless of the programming language that you are using, you can easily map the domain objects.
  • Structured Data: In JSON, a map data structure is used, whereas XML follows a tree structure. The key-value pairs limit the task but facilitate the predictive and easily understandable model.

Table of Contents