How can I deserialize JSON to a simple Dictionary string string in ASP NET

Question

I have a simple key value list in JSON being sent back to ASP NET via POST  Example      key1    value1    key2    value2     I AM NOT TRYING TO DESERIALIZE INTO STRONGLY-TYPED  NET OBJECTS  I simply need a plain old Dictionary Of String  String   or some equivalent  hash table  Dictionary Of String  Object   old-school StringDictionary--hell  a 2-D array of strings would work for me   I can use anything available in ASP NET 3 5  as well as the popular Json NET  which I m already using for serialization to the client    Apparently neither of these JSON libraries have this forehead-slapping obvious capability out of the box--they are totally focused on reflection-based deserialization via strong contracts   Any ideas   Limitations    I don t want to implement my own JSON parser Can t use ASP NET 4 0 yet Would prefer to stay away from the older  deprecated ASP NET class for JSON

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Mark Rendle posted this as a comment  I wanted to post it as an answer since it s the only solution that has worked so far to return the success and the error-codes json results from the Google reCaptcha response   string jsonReponseString  wClient DownloadString requestUrl       IDictionary lt string  object gt  dict   new JavaScriptSerializer   DeserializeObject jsonReponseString  as IDictionary lt string  object gt     Thanks again  Mark

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A bit late to the game  but non of the above solutions pointed me in the direction of a pure and simple  NET  no json net solution  So here it is  ended up being very simple  Below a full running example of how it is done with standard  NET Json serialization  the example has dictionary both in the root object and in the child objects   The golden bullet is this cat  parse the settings as second parameter to the serializer   DataContractJsonSerializerSettings settings                          new DataContractJsonSerializerSettings                        settings UseSimpleDictionaryFormat   true    Full code below   using System  using System Collections Generic  using System Runtime Serialization  using System Runtime Serialization Json       namespace Kipon dk               public class JsonTest                       public const string EXAMPLE                         id      some id                      children                        f1                            name      name 1                          subs                            1        name      first sub                            2        name      second sub                                                                f2                            name      name 2                          subs                            37        name       is 37 in key                                                                                                         DataContract              public class Root                                DataMember Name   id                    public string Id   get  set                      DataMember Name    children                    public Dictionary lt string Child gt  Children   get  set                                DataContract              public class Child                                DataMember Name    name                    public string Name   get  set                      DataMember Name    subs                    public Dictionary lt int  Sub gt  Subs   get  set                                DataContract              public class Sub                                DataMember Name    name                    public string Name   get  set                               public static void Test                                 var array   System Text Encoding UTF8 GetBytes EXAMPLE                   using  var mem   new System IO MemoryStream array                                         mem Seek 0  System IO SeekOrigin Begin                       DataContractJsonSerializerSettings settings                          new DataContractJsonSerializerSettings                        settings UseSimpleDictionaryFormat   true                       var ser   new DataContractJsonSerializer typeof Root   settings                       var data    Root ser ReadObject mem                       Console WriteLine data Id                       foreach  var childKey in data Children Keys                                                var child   data Children childKey                           Console WriteLine   Child      childKey         child Name                           foreach  var subKey in child Subs Keys                                                        var sub   child Subs subKey                               Console WriteLine     Sub      subKey         sub Name

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For those searching the internet and stumbling upon this post  I wrote a blog post on how to use the JavaScriptSerializer class   Read more    http   procbits com 2011 04 21 quick-json-serializationdeserialization-in-c   Here is an example   var json       id     13      value    true    var jss   new JavaScriptSerializer    var table   jss Deserialize lt dynamic gt  json   Console WriteLine table  id     Console WriteLine table  value

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I ve added upon the code submitted by jSnake04 and Dasun herein  I ve added code to create lists of objects from JArray instances  It has two-way recursion but as it is functioning on a fixed  finite tree model  there is no risk of stack overflow unless the data is massive         lt summary gt      Deserialize the given JSON string data   lt paramref name  data   gt   into a       dictionary       lt  summary gt       lt param name  data  gt JSON string  lt  param gt       lt returns gt Deserialized dictionary  lt  returns gt  private IDictionary lt string  object gt  DeserializeData string data        var values   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string  object gt  gt  data        return DeserializeData values           lt summary gt      Deserialize the given JSON object   lt paramref name  data   gt   into a dictionary       lt  summary gt       lt param name  data  gt JSON object  lt  param gt       lt returns gt Deserialized dictionary  lt  returns gt  private IDictionary lt string  object gt  DeserializeData JObject data        var dict   data ToObject lt Dictionary lt String  Object gt  gt          return DeserializeData dict           lt summary gt      Deserialize any elements of the given data dictionary   lt paramref name  data   gt          that are JSON object or JSON arrays into dictionaries or lists respectively       lt  summary gt       lt param name  data  gt Data dictionary  lt  param gt       lt returns gt Deserialized dictionary  lt  returns gt  private IDictionary lt string  object gt  DeserializeData IDictionary lt string  object gt  data        foreach  var key in data Keys ToArray                   var value   data key            if  value is JObject              data key    DeserializeData value as JObject            if  value is JArray              data key    DeserializeData value as JArray              return data          lt summary gt      Deserialize the given JSON array   lt paramref name  data   gt   into a list       lt  summary gt       lt param name  data  gt Data dictionary  lt  param gt       lt returns gt Deserialized list  lt  returns gt  private IList lt Object gt  DeserializeData JArray data        var list   data ToObject lt List lt Object gt  gt          for  int i   0  i  lt  list Count  i                  var value   list i            if  value is JObject              list i    DeserializeData value as JObject            if  value is JArray              list i    DeserializeData value as JArray              return list

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Based on comments above try JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string dynamic gt  gt  json   var json        key1   1   key2     value2      object1      property1     value1     property2    2 3 4 5 6 7      var parsedObject   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string dynamic gt  gt  json     seems to work even for complex objects and lists

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You could use Tiny-JSON  string json       key1     value1      key2     value2      IDictionary lt string  string gt  dict   Tiny Json Decode lt Dictionary lt string  string gt  gt  json

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I just needed to parse a nested dictionary  like         x              a   1           b   2           c   3           where JsonConvert DeserializeObject doesn t help  I found the following approach   var dict   JObject Parse json  SelectToken  x   ToObject lt Dictionary lt string  int gt  gt       The SelectToken lets you dig down to the desired field  You can even specify a path like  x y z  to step further down into the JSON object

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I hope this answer is not considered too off-topic  but I had a similar issue where I was looking for a tool to parse only parts of a nested JSON which is not that straightforward with the accepted solutions  If you have a similar issue  it might be worth to check out JTokken as described in this original post or in my answer to a similar question

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I would suggest using System Runtime Serialization Json that is part of  NET 4 5    DataContract  public class Foo       DataMember Name    data       public Dictionary lt string string gt  Data   get  set        Then use it like this   var serializer   new DataContractJsonSerializer typeof List lt Foo gt     var jsonParams        data        Key     foo     Value     bar         var stream   new MemoryStream Encoding UTF8 GetBytes jsonParams     var obj   serializer ReadObject stream   Console WriteLine obj

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If you re after a lightweight  no-added-references kind of approach  maybe this bit of code I just wrote will work  I can t 100  guarantee robustness though    using System  using System Collections Generic  using System Text  using System Text RegularExpressions   public Dictionary lt string  object gt  ParseJSON string json        int end      return ParseJSON json  0  out end     private Dictionary lt string  object gt  ParseJSON string json  int start  out int end        Dictionary lt string  object gt  dict   new Dictionary lt string  object gt         bool escbegin   false      bool escend   false      bool inquotes   false      string key   null      int cend      StringBuilder sb   new StringBuilder        Dictionary lt string  object gt  child   null      List lt object gt  arraylist   null      Regex regex   new Regex     u  0-9a-z  4     RegexOptions IgnoreCase       int autoKey   0      for  int i   start  i  lt  json Length  i                  char c   json i           if  c          escbegin    escbegin          if   escbegin                        if  c                                       inquotes    inquotes                  if   inquotes  amp  amp  arraylist    null                                        arraylist Add DecodeString regex  sb ToString                          sb Length   0                                    continue                            if   inquotes                                switch  c                                        case                              if  i    start                                                        child   ParseJSON json  i  out cend                               if  arraylist    null  arraylist Add child                               else                                                               dict Add key  child                                   key   null                                                            i   cend                                                    continue                      case                              end   i                          if  key    null                                                        if  arraylist    null  dict Add key  arraylist                               else dict Add key  DecodeString regex  sb ToString                                                        return dict                      case                              arraylist   new List lt object gt                             continue                      case                              if  key    null                                                        key    array    autoKey ToString                                autoKey                                                      if  arraylist    null  amp  amp  sb Length  gt  0                                                        arraylist Add sb ToString                                 sb Length   0                                                    dict Add key  arraylist                           arraylist   null                          key   null                          continue                      case                              if  arraylist    null  amp  amp  key    null                                                        dict Add key  DecodeString regex  sb ToString                                  key   null                              sb Length   0                                                    if  arraylist    null  amp  amp  sb Length  gt  0                                                        arraylist Add sb ToString                                 sb Length   0                                                   continue                      case                              key   DecodeString regex  sb ToString                             sb Length   0                          continue                                                    sb Append c           if  escend  escbegin   false          if  escbegin  escend   true          else escend   false            end   json Length - 1      return dict    theoretically shouldn t ever get here   private string DecodeString Regex regex  string str        return Regex Unescape regex Replace str  match   gt  char ConvertFromUtf32 Int32 Parse match Groups 1  Value  System Globalization NumberStyles HexNumber           I realise that this violates the OP Limitation  1  but technically  you didn t write it  I did

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Tried to not use any external JSON implementation so i deserialised like this   string json       id     13      value    true     var serializer   new JavaScriptSerializer      using System Web Script Serialization   Dictionary lt string  string gt  values   serializer Deserialize lt Dictionary lt string  string gt  gt  json

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Edit  This works  but the accepted answer using Json NET is much more straightforward  Leaving this one in case someone needs BCL-only code   It   s not supported by the  NET framework out of the box  A glaring oversight     not everyone needs to deserialize into objects with named properties  So I ended up rolling my own    lt Serializable   gt  Public Class StringStringDictionary     Implements ISerializable     Public dict As System Collections Generic Dictionary Of String  String      Public Sub New           dict   New System Collections Generic Dictionary Of String  String      End Sub     Protected Sub New info As SerializationInfo              context As StreamingContext          dict   New System Collections Generic Dictionary Of String  String          For Each entry As SerializationEntry In info             dict Add entry Name  DirectCast entry Value  String           Next     End Sub     Public Sub GetObjectData info As SerializationInfo  context As StreamingContext  Implements ISerializable GetObjectData         For Each key As String in dict Keys             info AddValue key  dict Item key           Next     End Sub End Class   Called with   string MyJsonString        key1      value1      key2      value2      System Runtime Serialization Json DataContractJsonSerializer dcjs   new   System Runtime Serialization Json DataContractJsonSerializer      typeof StringStringDictionary    System IO MemoryStream ms   new   System IO MemoryStream Encoding UTF8 GetBytes MyJsonString    StringStringDictionary myfields    StringStringDictionary dcjs ReadObject ms   Response Write  Value of key2      myfields dict  key2       Sorry for the mix of C  and VB NET

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My approach directly deserializes to IDictionary  without JObject or ExpandObject in between  The code uses converter  which is basically copied from ExpandoObjectConverter class found in JSON NET sourcecode  but using IDictionary instead of ExpandoObject   Usage   var settings   new JsonSerializerSettings         Converters     new DictionaryConverter         var result   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt IDictionary lt string  object gt  gt  json  settings     Code      based on ExpandoObjectConverter  but using arrays instead of IList  to behave similar to System Web Script Serialization JavaScriptSerializer public class DictionaryConverter   JsonConverter       public override void WriteJson JsonWriter writer  object value  JsonSerializer serializer                   public override object ReadJson JsonReader reader  Type objectType  object existingValue  JsonSerializer serializer                return ReadValue reader              public override bool CanConvert Type objectType                return  objectType    typeof IDictionary lt string  object gt                public override bool CanWrite               get   return false               private object ReadValue JsonReader reader                while  reader TokenType    JsonToken Comment                        if   reader Read                    throw JsonSerializationExceptionCreate reader   Unexpected end when reading IDictionary lt string  object gt                         switch  reader TokenType                        case JsonToken StartObject                  return ReadObject reader               case JsonToken StartArray                  return ReadList reader               default                  if  IsPrimitiveToken reader TokenType                       return reader Value                   throw JsonSerializationExceptionCreate reader  string Format CultureInfo InvariantCulture   Unexpected token when converting IDictionary lt string  object gt    0    reader TokenType                         private object ReadList JsonReader reader                List lt object gt  list   new List lt object gt              while  reader Read                          switch  reader TokenType                                case JsonToken Comment                      break                  default                      object v   ReadValue reader                        list Add v                       break                  case JsonToken EndArray                      return list                                   throw JsonSerializationExceptionCreate reader   Unexpected end when reading IDictionary lt string  object gt                 private object ReadObject JsonReader reader                IDictionary lt string  object gt  dictionary   new Dictionary lt string  object gt             while  reader Read                          switch  reader TokenType                                case JsonToken PropertyName                      string propertyName   reader Value ToString                         if   reader Read                            throw JsonSerializationExceptionCreate reader   Unexpected end when reading IDictionary lt string  object gt                           object v   ReadValue reader                        dictionary propertyName    v                      break                  case JsonToken Comment                      break                  case JsonToken EndObject                      return dictionary                                   throw JsonSerializationExceptionCreate reader   Unexpected end when reading IDictionary lt string  object gt                   based on internal Newtonsoft Json JsonReader IsPrimitiveToken     internal static bool IsPrimitiveToken JsonToken token                switch  token                        case JsonToken Integer              case JsonToken Float              case JsonToken String              case JsonToken Boolean              case JsonToken Undefined              case JsonToken Null              case JsonToken Date              case JsonToken Bytes                  return true              default                  return false                          based on internal Newtonsoft Json JsonSerializationException Create     private static JsonSerializationException JsonSerializationExceptionCreate JsonReader reader  string message  Exception ex   null                return JsonSerializationExceptionCreate reader as IJsonLineInfo  reader Path  message  ex                 based on internal Newtonsoft Json JsonSerializationException Create     private static JsonSerializationException JsonSerializationExceptionCreate IJsonLineInfo lineInfo  string path  string message  Exception ex                message   JsonPositionFormatMessage lineInfo  path  message            return new JsonSerializationException message  ex                 based on internal Newtonsoft Json JsonPosition FormatMessage     internal static string JsonPositionFormatMessage IJsonLineInfo lineInfo  string path  string message                if   message EndsWith Environment NewLine                         message   message Trim                 if   message EndsWith      StringComparison Ordinal                   message                      message                            message    string Format CultureInfo InvariantCulture   Path   0     path            if  lineInfo    null  amp  amp  lineInfo HasLineInfo                message    string Format CultureInfo InvariantCulture     line  0   position  1    lineInfo LineNumber  lineInfo LinePosition            message                  return message

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I added a check for null values in the JSON to the other answer   I had same problem so I wrote this my self  This solution is differentiated from other answers because it can deserialize in to multiple levels    Just send json string in to deserializeToDictionary function it will return non strongly-typed Dictionary lt string  object gt  object   private Dictionary lt string  object gt  deserializeToDictionary string jo        var values   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string  object gt  gt  jo       var values2   new Dictionary lt string  object gt         foreach  KeyValuePair lt string  object gt  d in values                if  d Value    null  amp  amp  d Value GetType   FullName Contains  Newtonsoft Json Linq JObject                          values2 Add d Key  deserializeToDictionary d Value ToString                        else                       values2 Add d Key  d Value                       return values2      Ex  This will return Dictionary lt string  object gt  object of a Facebook JSON response   private void button1 Click object sender  EventArgs e        string responsestring       id     721055828     name     Dasun Sameera         Weerasinghe     first name     Dasun     middle name     Sameera     last name     Weerasinghe     username     dasun     gender     male     locale     en US            hometown   id    108388329191258    name    Moratuwa  Sri Lanka            Dictionary lt string  object gt  values   deserializeToDictionary responsestring       Note  hometown further deserialize into a Dictionary lt string  object gt  object

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For anyone who is trying to convert JSON to dictionary just for retrieving some value out of it  There is a simple way using Newtonsoft JSON using Newtonsoft Json Linq      JObject o   JObject Parse   quot      CPU    Intel      Drives          DVD read writer        500 gigabyte hard drive        quot     string cpu    string o  quot CPU quot       Intel  string firstDrive    string o  quot Drives quot   0      DVD read writer  IList lt string gt  allDrives   o  quot Drives quot   Select t   gt   string t  ToList       DVD read writer    500 gigabyte hard drive

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Annoyingly enough  if you want to use the default model binders  it looks like you will have to use numerical index values like a form POST   See the following excerpt from this article http   msdn microsoft com en-us magazine hh781022 aspx      Though it   s somewhat counterintuitive  JSON requests have the same   requirements   they  too  must adhere to the form post naming syntax    Take  for example  the JSON payload for the previous UnitPrice   collection  The pure JSON array syntax for this data would be   represented as           Code    USD    Amount   100 00         Code    EUR    Amount   73 64           However  the default value providers and model binders require the   data to be represented as a JSON form post        UnitPrice 0  Code    USD      UnitPrice 0  Amount   100 00      UnitPrice 1  Code    EUR      UnitPrice 1  Amount   73 64         The complex object collection scenario is perhaps one of the most   widely problematic scenarios that developers run into because the   syntax isn   t necessarily evident to all developers  However  once you   learn the relatively simple syntax for posting complex collections    these scenarios become much easier to deal with

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It seems all of these answers here just assume you can get that little string out of a bigger object    for people looking to simply deserealize a large object with such a dictionary somewhere inside the mapping  and who are using the System Runtime Serialization Json DataContract system  here s a solution   An answer on gis stackexchange com had this interesting link  I had to recover it with archive org  but it offers a pretty much perfect solution  a custom IDataContractSurrogate class in which you implement exactly your own types  I was able to expand it easily   I made a bunch of changes in it  though  Since the original source is no longer available  I ll post the entire class here   using System  using System CodeDom  using System Collections Generic  using System Collections ObjectModel  using System IO  using System Linq  using System Reflection  using System Runtime Serialization  using System Runtime Serialization Json  using System Text   namespace JsonTools            lt summary gt          Allows using Dictionary amp lt String String amp gt  and Dictionary amp lt String Boolean amp gt  types  and any others you d like to add          Source  https   web archive org web 20100317222656 my6solutions com post 2009 06 30 DataContractSerializer-DataContractJsonSerializer-JavaScriptSerializer-XmlSerializer-for-serialization aspx          lt  summary gt      public class JsonSurrogate   IDataContractSurrogate                    lt summary gt              Deserialize an object with added support for the types defined in this class               lt  summary gt               lt typeparam name  T  gt Contract class lt  typeparam gt               lt param name  json  gt JSON String lt  param gt               lt param name  encoding  gt Text encoding lt  param gt               lt returns gt The deserialized object of type T lt  returns gt          public static T Deserialize lt T gt  String json  Encoding encoding                        if  encoding    null                  encoding   new UTF8Encoding false               DataContractJsonSerializer deserializer   new DataContractJsonSerializer                  typeof T   new Type 0   int MaxValue  true  new JsonSurrogate    false               using  MemoryStream stream   new MemoryStream encoding GetBytes json                                  T result    T deserializer ReadObject stream                   return result                                      make sure all values in this are classes implementing JsonSurrogateObject          private static Dictionary lt Type  Type gt  KnownTypes                new Dictionary lt Type  Type gt                                   typeof Dictionary lt String  String gt    typeof SSDictionary                     typeof Dictionary lt String  Boolean gt    typeof SBDictionary                            region Implemented surrogate dictionary classes           Serializable          public class SSDictionary   SurrogateDictionary lt String gt                        public SSDictionary     base                  protected SSDictionary  SerializationInfo info  StreamingContext context    base info  context                        Serializable          public class SBDictionary   SurrogateDictionary lt Boolean gt                        public SBDictionary     base                  protected SBDictionary  SerializationInfo info  StreamingContext context    base info  context                         endregion               lt summary gt Small interface to easily extract the final value from the object  lt  summary gt          public interface JsonSurrogateObject                       Object DeserializedObject   get                            lt summary gt              Class for deserializing any simple dictionary types with a string as key               lt  summary gt               lt typeparam name  T  gt Any simple type that will be deserialized correctly  lt  typeparam gt               Serializable          public abstract class SurrogateDictionary lt T gt    ISerializable  JsonSurrogateObject                       public Object DeserializedObject   get   return dict                  private Dictionary lt String  T gt  dict               public SurrogateDictionary                                 dict   new Dictionary lt String  T gt                                   deserialize             protected SurrogateDictionary SerializationInfo info  StreamingContext context                                dict   new Dictionary lt String  T gt                     foreach  SerializationEntry entry in info                                           This cast will only work for base types  of course                      dict Add entry Name   T entry Value                                                  serialize             public void GetObjectData SerializationInfo info  StreamingContext context                                foreach  String key in dict Keys                                        info AddValue key  dict key                                                             lt summary gt                  Uses the KnownTypes dictionary to get the surrogate classes               lt  summary gt               lt param name  type  gt  lt  param gt               lt returns gt  lt  returns gt          public Type GetDataContractType Type type                        Type returnType              if  KnownTypes TryGetValue type  out returnType                                 return returnType                            return type                     public object GetObjectToSerialize object obj  Type targetType                        throw new NotImplementedException                            lt summary gt                  Gets the object out of the surrogate datacontract object  This function is the reason all surrogate objects need to implement the JsonSurrogateObject class               lt  summary gt               lt param name  obj  gt Result of the deserialization lt  param gt               lt param name  targetType  gt Expected target type of the deserialization lt  param gt               lt returns gt  lt  returns gt          public object GetDeserializedObject object obj  Type targetType                        if  obj is JsonSurrogateObject                                return   JsonSurrogateObject obj  DeserializedObject                            return obj                     public Type GetReferencedTypeOnImport string typeName  string typeNamespace  object customData                        return null                      region not implemented          public object GetCustomDataToExport MemberInfo memberInfo  Type dataContractType                        throw new NotImplementedException                       public object GetCustomDataToExport Type clrType  Type dataContractType                        throw new NotImplementedException                       public void GetKnownCustomDataTypes Collection lt Type gt  customDataTypes                        throw new NotImplementedException                       public CodeTypeDeclaration ProcessImportedType CodeTypeDeclaration typeDeclaration  CodeCompileUnit compileUnit                        throw new NotImplementedException                        endregion           To add new supported types to the class  you just need to add your class  give it the right constructors and functions  look at SurrogateDictionary for an example   make sure it inherits JsonSurrogateObject  and add its type mapping to the KnownTypes dictionary  The included SurrogateDictionary can serve as basis for any Dictionary lt String T gt  types where T is any type that does deserialize correctly   Calling it is really simple   MyObjtype newObj   JsonSurrogate Deserialize lt MyObjtype gt  jsonStr  encoding     Note that for some reason this thing has trouble using key strings which contain spaces  they were simply not present in the final list  Might just be it s simply against json specs and the api I was calling was poorly implemented  mind you  I dunno  Anyway  I solved this by regex-replacing them with underscores in the raw json data and fixing the dictionary after the deserialization

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I did discover  NET has a built in way to cast the JSON string into a Dictionary lt String  Object gt  via the System Web Script Serialization JavaScriptSerializer type in the 3 5 System Web Extensions assembly  Use the method DeserializeObject String     I stumbled upon this when doing an ajax post  via jquery  of content type  application json  to a static  net Page Method and saw that the method  which had a single parameter of type Object  magically received this Dictionary

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Json NET does this     string json        key1     value1     key2     value2       var values   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string  string gt  gt  json     More examples  Serializing Collections with Json NET

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System Text Json This can now be done using System Text Json which is built-in to  NET Core 3 0   It s now possible to deserialize JSON without using third-party libraries  var json     quot   quot  quot key1 quot  quot   quot  quot value1 quot  quot   quot  quot key2 quot  quot   quot  quot value2 quot  quot   quot   var values   JsonSerializer Deserialize lt Dictionary lt string  string gt  gt  json    Also available in NuGet package System Text Json if using  NET Standard or  NET Framework

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I had the same problem  so I wrote this my self  This solution is differentiated from other answers because it can deserialize in to multiple levels    Just send JSON string in to deserializeToDictionary function it will return non strongly-typed Dictionary lt string  object gt  object   Old code  private Dictionary lt string  object gt  deserializeToDictionary string jo        var values   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string  object gt  gt  jo       var values2   new Dictionary lt string  object gt         foreach  KeyValuePair lt string  object gt  d in values                   if  d Value GetType   FullName Contains  Newtonsoft Json Linq JObject            if  d Value is JObject                        values2 Add d Key  deserializeToDictionary d Value ToString                        else                       values2 Add d Key  d Value                       return values2      Ex  This will return Dictionary lt string  object gt  object of a Facebook JSON response   Test  private void button1 Click object sender  EventArgs e        string responsestring       id     721055828     name     Dasun Sameera Weerasinghe     first name     Dasun     middle name     Sameera     last name     Weerasinghe     username     dasun     gender     male     locale     en US     hometown   id    108388329191258    name    Moratuwa  Sri Lanka            Dictionary lt string  object gt  values   deserializeToDictionary responsestring          Note  hometown further deserilize into a Dictionary lt string  object gt    object    Update  My old answer works great if there is no array on JSON string  This one further deserialize in to a List lt object gt  if an element is an array   Just send a JSON string in to deserializeToDictionaryOrList function it will return non strongly-typed Dictionary lt string  object gt  object or List lt object gt    private static object deserializeToDictionaryOrList string jo bool isArray false        if   isArray                isArray   jo Substring 0  1                    if   isArray                var values   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt Dictionary lt string  object gt  gt  jo           var values2   new Dictionary lt string  object gt             foreach  KeyValuePair lt string  object gt  d in values                        if  d Value is JObject                                values2 Add d Key  deserializeToDictionary d Value ToString                                else if  d Value is JArray                                values2 Add d Key  deserializeToDictionary d Value ToString    true                              else                               values2 Add d Key  d Value                                   return values2       else               var values   JsonConvert DeserializeObject lt List lt object gt  gt  jo           var values2   new List lt object gt             foreach  var d in values                        if  d is JObject                                values2 Add deserializeToDictionary d ToString                                else if  d is JArray                                values2 Add deserializeToDictionary d ToString    true                              else                               values2 Add d                                   return values2

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I just implemented this in RestSharp  This post was helpful to me   Besides the code in the link  here is my code  I now get a Dictionary of results when I do something like this   var jsonClient   new RestClient url Host   jsonClient AddHandler  application json   new DynamicJsonDeserializer     var jsonRequest   new RestRequest url Query  Method GET   Dictionary lt string  dynamic gt  response   jsonClient Execute lt JObject gt  jsonRequest  Data ToObject lt Dictionary lt string  dynamic gt  gt       Be mindful of the sort of JSON you re expecting - in my case  I was retrieving a single object with several properties  In the attached link  the author was retrieving a list

[json] How can I deserialize JSON to a simple Dictionary<string,string> in ASP.NET?

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