[java] How to convert hashmap to JSON object in Java

How to convert or cast hashmap to JSON object in Java, and again convert JSON object to JSON string?

I'm using Alibaba fastjson, easy and simple:

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.alibaba</groupId>
    <artifactId>fastjson</artifactId>
    <version>VERSION_CODE</version>
</dependency>

and import:

import com.alibaba.fastjson.JSON;

Then:

String text = JSON.toJSONString(obj); // serialize
VO vo = JSON.parseObject("{...}", VO.class); //unserialize

Everything is ok.

Better be late than never. I used GSON to convert list of HashMap to string if in case you want to have a serialized list.

List<HashMap<String, String>> list = new ArrayList<>();
HashMap<String,String> hashMap = new HashMap<>();
hashMap.add("key", "value");
hashMap.add("key", "value");
hashMap.add("key", "value");
list.add(hashMap);

String json = new Gson().toJson(list);

This json produces [{"key":"value","key":"value","key":"value"}]

If you don't really need HashMap then you can do something like that:

String jsonString = new JSONObject() {{
  put("firstName", user.firstName);
  put("lastName", user.lastName);
}}.toString();

Output:

{
  "firstName": "John",
  "lastName": "Doe"
}

we use Gson.

Gson gson = new Gson();
Type gsonType = new TypeToken<HashMap>(){}.getType();
String gsonString = gson.toJson(elements,gsonType);

this works for me :

import groovy.json.JsonBuilder
properties = new Properties()
properties.put("name", "zhangsan")

println new JsonBuilder(properties).toPrettyString()

This solution works with complex JSONs:

public Object toJSON(Object object) throws JSONException {
    if (object instanceof HashMap) {
        JSONObject json = new JSONObject();
        HashMap map = (HashMap) object;
        for (Object key : map.keySet()) {
            json.put(key.toString(), toJSON(map.get(key)));
        }
        return json;
    } else if (object instanceof Iterable) {
        JSONArray json = new JSONArray();
        for (Object value : ((Iterable) object)) {
            json.put(toJSON(value));
        }
        return json;
    }
    else {
        return object;
    }
}

If you need use it in the code.

Gson gsone = new Gson();
JsonObject res = gsone.toJsonTree(sqlParams).getAsJsonObject();

If you use complex objects, you should apply enableComplexMapKeySerialization(), as stated in https://stackoverflow.com/a/24635655/2914140 and https://stackoverflow.com/a/26374888/2914140.

Gson gson = new GsonBuilder().enableComplexMapKeySerialization().create();
Map<Point, String> original = new LinkedHashMap<Point, String>();
original.put(new Point(5, 6), "a");
original.put(new Point(8, 8), "b");
System.out.println(gson.toJson(original));

Output will be:

{
 "(5,6)": "a",
 "(8,8)": "b"
}

This is typically the work of a Json library, you should not try to do it yourself. All json libraries should implement what you are asking for, and you can find a list of Java Json libraries on json.org, at the bottom of the page.

Example using json

Map<String, Object> data = new HashMap<String, Object>();
    data.put( "name", "Mars" );
    data.put( "age", 32 );
    data.put( "city", "NY" );
    JSONObject json = new JSONObject();
    json.putAll( data );
    System.out.printf( "JSON: %s", json.toString(2) );

output::

JSON: {
  "age": 32,
  "name": "Mars",
  "city": "NY"
}

You can also try to use Google's GSON.Google's GSON is the best library available to convert Java Objects into their JSON representation.

http://code.google.com/p/google-gson/

If you are using net.sf.json.JSONObject then you won't find a JSONObject(map) constructor in it. You have to use the public static JSONObject fromObject( Object object ) method. This method accepts JSON formatted strings, Maps, DynaBeans and JavaBeans.

JSONObject jsonObject = JSONObject.fromObject(myMap);

Gson way for a bit more complex maps and lists using TypeToken.getParameterized method:

We have a map that looks like this:

Map<Long, List<NewFile>> map;

We get the Type using the above mentioned getParameterized method like this:

Type listOfNewFiles = TypeToken.getParameterized(ArrayList.class, NewFile.class).getType();
Type mapOfList = TypeToken.getParameterized(LinkedHashMap.class, Long.class, listOfNewFiles).getType();

And then use the Gson object fromJson method like this using the mapOfList object like this:

Map<Long, List<NewFile>> map = new Gson().fromJson(fileContent, mapOfList);

The mentioned object NewFile looks like this:

class NewFile
{
    private long id;
    private String fileName;

    public void setId(final long id)
    {
        this.id = id;
    }

    public void setFileName(final String fileName)
    {
        this.fileName = fileName;
    }
}

The deserialized JSON looks like this:

{_x000D_
  "1": [_x000D_
    {_x000D_
      "id": 12232,_x000D_
      "fileName": "test.html"_x000D_
    },_x000D_
    {_x000D_
      "id": 12233,_x000D_
      "fileName": "file.txt"_x000D_
    },_x000D_
    {_x000D_
      "id": 12234,_x000D_
      "fileName": "obj.json"_x000D_
    }_x000D_
  ],_x000D_
 "2": [_x000D_
    {_x000D_
      "id": 122321,_x000D_
      "fileName": "test2.html"_x000D_
    },_x000D_
    {_x000D_
      "id": 122332,_x000D_
      "fileName": "file2.txt"_x000D_
    },_x000D_
    {_x000D_
      "id": 122343,_x000D_
      "fileName": "obj2.json"_x000D_
    }_x000D_
  ]_x000D_
}

    import org.json.JSONObject;

    HashMap<Object, Object> map = new HashMap<>();
    String[] list={"Grader","Participant"};
    String[] list1={"Assistant","intern"};
    map.put("TeachingAssistant",list);
    map.put("Writer",list1);
    JSONObject jsonObject = new JSONObject(map);
    System.out.printf(jsonObject.toString());

    // Result: {"TeachingAssistant":["Grader","Participant"],"Writer":["Assistant","intern"]}

I faced a similar problem when deserializing the Response from custom commands in selenium. The response was json, but selenium internally translates that into a java.util.HashMap[String, Object]

If you are familiar with scala and use the play-API for JSON, you might benefit from this:

import play.api.libs.json.{JsValue, Json}
import scala.collection.JavaConversions.mapAsScalaMap


object JsonParser {

  def parse(map: Map[String, Any]): JsValue = {
    val values = for((key, value) <- map) yield {
      value match {
        case m: java.util.Map[String, _] @unchecked => Json.obj(key -> parse(m.toMap))
        case m: Map[String, _] @unchecked => Json.obj(key -> parse(m))
        case int: Int => Json.obj(key -> int)
        case str: String => Json.obj(key -> str)
        case bool: Boolean => Json.obj(key -> bool)
      }
    }

    values.foldLeft(Json.obj())((temp, obj) => {
      temp.deepMerge(obj)
    })
  }
}

Small code description:

The code recursively traverses through the HashMap until basic types (String, Integer, Boolean) are found. These basic types can be directly wrapped into a JsObject. When the recursion is unfolded, the deepmerge concatenates the created objects.

'@unchecked' takes care of type erasure warnings.

You can convert Map to JSON using Jackson as follows:

Map<String,Object> map = new HashMap<>();
//You can convert any Object.
String[] value1 = new String[] { "value11", "value12", "value13" };
String[] value2 = new String[] { "value21", "value22", "value23" };
map.put("key1", value1);
map.put("key2", value2);
map.put("key3","string1");
map.put("key4","string2");

String json = new ObjectMapper().writeValueAsString(map);
System.out.println(json);

Maven Dependencies for Jackson :

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
    <artifactId>jackson-core</artifactId>
    <version>2.5.3</version>
    <scope>compile</scope>
</dependency>

<dependency>
    <groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
    <artifactId>jackson-databind</artifactId>
    <version>2.5.3</version>
    <scope>compile</scope>
</dependency>

If you are using JSONObject library, you can convert map to JSON as follows:

Map<String, Object> map = new HashMap<>();
// Convert a map having list of values.
String[] value1 = new String[] { "value11", "value12", "value13" };
String[] value2 = new String[] { "value21", "value22", "value23" };
map.put("key1", value1);
map.put("key2", value2);

JSONObject json = new JSONObject(map);
System.out.println(json);

Maven Dependencies for JSONObject :

<dependency>
    <groupId>org.json</groupId>
    <artifactId>json</artifactId>
    <version>20140107</version>
</dependency>

Hope this will help. Happy coding.

If you are using JSR 374: Java API for JSON Processing ( javax json ) This seems to do the trick:

    JsonObjectBuilder job = Json.createObjectBuilder((Map<String, Object>) obj);
    JsonObject jsonObject = job.build();

Late to the party but here is my GSON adhoc writer for serializing hashmap. I had to write map of key-value pairs as json string attributes, expect one specific to be integer type. I did not want to create custom JavaBean wrapper for this simple usecase.

GSON JsonWriter class is easy to use serializer class containing few strongly typed writer.value() functions.

// write Map as JSON document to http servlet response
Map<String,String> sd = DAO.getSD(123);
res.setContentType("application/json; charset=UTF-8");
res.setCharacterEncoding("UTF-8");
JsonWriter writer = new JsonWriter(new OutputStreamWriter(res.getOutputStream(), "UTF-8"));
writer.beginObject();
for(String key : sd.keySet()) {
    String val = sd.get(key);
    writer.name(key);
    if (key.equals("UniqueID") && val!=null)
        writer.value(Long.parseLong(val));
    else
        writer.value(val);
}
writer.endObject();
writer.close();

If none of the custom types be needed I could have just use toJson() function. gson-2.2.4.jar library is just under 190KB without any brutal dependencies. Easy to use on any custom servlet app or standalone application without big framework integrations.

Gson gson = new Gson(); 
String json = gson.toJson(myMap); 

I found another way to handle it.

Map obj=new HashMap();    
obj.put("name","sonoo");    
obj.put("age",new Integer(27));    
obj.put("salary",new Double(600000));   
String jsonText = JSONValue.toJSONString(obj);  
System.out.print(jsonText);

Hope this helps.

Thanks.

No need for Gson or JSON parsing libraries. Just using new JSONObject(Map<String, JSONObject>).toString(), e.g:

/**
 * convert target map to JSON string
 *
 * @param map the target map
 * @return JSON string of the map
 */
@NonNull public String toJson(@NonNull Map<String, Target> map) {
    final Map<String, JSONObject> flatMap = new HashMap<>();
    for (String key : map.keySet()) {
        try {
            flatMap.put(key, toJsonObject(map.get(key)));
        } catch (JSONException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
    try {
        // 2 indentSpaces for pretty printing
        return new JSONObject(flatMap).toString(2);
    } catch (JSONException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        return "{}";
    }
}

You can use XStream - it is really handy. See the examples here

package com.thoughtworks.xstream.json.test;

import com.thoughtworks.xstream.XStream;
import com.thoughtworks.xstream.io.json.JettisonMappedXmlDriver;

public class WriteTest {

    public static void main(String[] args) {

      HashMap<String,String> map = new HashMap<String,String>();
      map.add("1", "a");
      map.add("2", "b");
      XStream xstream = new XStream(new JettisonMappedXmlDriver());

      System.out.println(xstream.toXML(map));       

    }

}

For those using org.json.simple.JSONObject, you could convert the map to Json String and parse it to get the JSONObject.

JSONObject object = (JSONObject) new JSONParser().parse(JSONObject.toJSONString(map));

First convert all your objects into valid Strings

HashMap<String, String> params = new HashMap<>();
params.put("arg1", "<b>some text</b>");
params.put("arg2", someObject.toString());

Then insert the entire map into a org.json.JSONObject

JSONObject postData = new JSONObject(params);

Now you can get the JSON by simply calling the object's toString

postData.toString()
//{"arg1":"<b>some text<\/b>" "arg2":"object output"}

Create a new JSONObject

JSONObject o = new JSONObject(postData.toString());

Or as a byte array for sending over HTTP

postData.toString().getBytes("UTF-8");

You can just enumerate the map and add the key-value pairs to the JSONObject

Method :

private JSONObject getJsonFromMap(Map<String, Object> map) throws JSONException {
    JSONObject jsonData = new JSONObject();
    for (String key : map.keySet()) {
        Object value = map.get(key);
        if (value instanceof Map<?, ?>) {
            value = getJsonFromMap((Map<String, Object>) value);
        }
        jsonData.put(key, value);
    }
    return jsonData;
}

In my case I didn't want any dependancies. Using Java 8 you can get JSON as a string this simple:

Map<String, Object> map = new HashMap<>();
map.put("key", "value");
map.put("key2", "value2");
String json = "{"+map.entrySet().stream()
    .map(e -> "\""+ e.getKey() + "\"" + ":\"" + String.valueOf(e.getValue()) + "\"")
    .collect(Collectors.joining(", "))+"}";

Underscore-java library can convert hash map or array list to json and vice verse.

import com.github.underscore.lodash.U;
import java.util.*;

public class Main {

    public static void main(String[] args) {

        Map<String, Object> map = new LinkedHashMap<>();
        map.put("1", "a");
        map.put("2", "b");

        System.out.println(U.toJson(map));
        // {
        //    "1": "a",
        //    "2": "b"
        // }
    }
}

Gson can also be used to serialize arbitrarily complex objects.

Here is how you use it:

Gson gson = new Gson(); 
String json = gson.toJson(myObject); 

Gson will automatically convert collections to JSON arrays. Gson can serialize private fields and automatically ignores transient fields.

Here my single-line solution with GSON:

myObject = new Gson().fromJson(new Gson().toJson(myHashMap), MyClass.class);

You can use Gson. This library provides simple methods to convert Java objects to JSON objects and vice-versa.

Example:

GsonBuilder gb = new GsonBuilder();
Gson gson = gb.serializeNulls().create();
gson.toJson(object);

You can use a GsonBuilder when you need to set configuration options other than the default. In the above example, the conversion process will also serialize null attributes from object.

However, this approach only works for non-generic types. For generic types you need to use toJson(object, Type).

More information about Gson here.

Remember that the object must implement the Serializable interface.