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Jitendra

Posted on Apr 5, 2021

Library to support JSON with comments and trailing comma in PHP

#php #json #jsoncomment #webdev

Unlike XML and YAML, JSON lacks native support for comments which is often missed. In addition, the trailing comma which would make diff on multiline value neat is also not available in JSON. If you are on PHP, then here is a little library adhocore/json-comment to fix it in the userland.

Thanks to this library, a JSON like this will be possible:

{
  "name": "adhocore/json-comment",
  "description": "JSON comment stripper library for PHP",
  "type":/* This is creepy comment */ "library",
  "keywords": [
    "json",
    "comment",
    // Single line comment, Notice the comma below:
    "strip-comment",
  ],
  "license": "MIT",
  /*
   * This is a multiline comment.
   */
  "authors": [
    {
      "name": "Jitendra Adhikari",
      "email": "jiten.adhikary@gmail.com",
    },
  ],
  "autoload": {
      "psr-4": {
          "Ahc\\Json\\": "src/",
      },
  },
  "autoload-dev": {
      "psr-4": {
          "Ahc\\Json\\Test\\": "tests/",
      },
  },
  "require": {
      "php": ">=7.0",
      "ext-ctype": "*",
  },
  "require-dev": {
      "phpunit/phpunit": "^6.5 || ^7.5 || ^8.5",
  },
  "scripts": {
      "test": "phpunit",
      "echo": "echo '// This is not comment'",
      "test:cov": "phpunit --coverage-text",
  },
}

Installation and Usage

composer req adhocore/json-comment

use Ahc\Json\Comment;

// Only strip and do not decode it already:
(new Comment)->strip('{
  "a":1,
  // Hmmm
  "b":2,,
}');

// Strip comment and decode as JSON:
Comment::parse('{
  "a":1,
  // Hmmm
  "b":2,,
}', true);

// Read JSON file, strip comments and decode as JSON:
Comment::parseFromFile('/path/to/commented.json', true);

PS: A new version 1.1.0 of this library has been just released.

Please use it and let know in the feedback or repo ticket if any issues.

adhocore / php-json-comment

Lightweight JSON comment and trailing comma stripper library for PHP with support for literal newlines and nested JSON strings.

adhocore/json-comment

Lightweight JSON comment stripper library for PHP.
Makes possible to have comment in any form of JSON data.
Supported comments: single line // comment or multi line /* comment */.
Also strips trailing comma at the end of array or object, eg
- [1,2,,] => [1,2]
- {"x":1,,} => {"x":1}
Handles literal LF (newline/linefeed) within string notation so that we can have multiline string
Supports JSON string inside JSON string (see ticket #15 and PR #16)
Zero dependency (no vendor bloat).

Installation

composer require adhocore/json-comment

# for php5.6
composer require adhocore/json-comment:^0.2

Usage

use Ahc\Json\Comment
// The JSON string!
$someJsonText = '{"a":1,
"b":2,// comment
"c":3 /* inline comment */,
// comment
"d":/* also a comment */"d",
/* creepy comment*/"e":2.3,
/* multi line
comment */
"f":"f1",}';

// OR
$someJsonText = file_get_contents('...');

// Strip only!
(new