Loading JSON in ActionScript 2

Filed under: Coding,Work — Brett @ January 18, 2007 9:43 pm

Because I blew a few hours trying to figure this out the last few days, and finally cracking it, here’s how to fetch some JSON from a web service and have it processed into an object in ActionScript 2.

import JSON; // http://www.theorganization.net/work/jos/JSON.as

var jsonFetcher:LoadVars = new LoadVars();
jsonFetcher.onLoad = function(success:Boolean) {
	if (!success) {
		trace("Error connecting to server.");
	}
};
jsonFetcher.onData = function(thedata) {

	// ...
	// if writing a desktop app or widget, string manip or regexp
	// the JSON data packet out of the JS source provided by many
	// web services at this point..
	// ...

	try {
		var o:Object = JSON.parse(thedata);
		//mytrace(print_r(o));
		trace(print_a(o));
	} catch (ex) {
		trace(ex.name+":"+ex.message+":"+ex.at+":"+ex.text);
	}
};

// get the feed
jsonFetcher.load("url-to-json-feed.php");

// from: http://textsnippets.com/posts/show/633
// recursive function to print out the contents of an array similar to the PHP print_r() function
//
function print_a(obj, indent) {
	if (indent == null) {
		indent = "";
	}
	var out = "";
	for (item in obj) {
		if (typeof (obj[item]) == "object") {
			out += indent+"["+item+"] => Objectn";
		} else {
			out += indent+"["+item+"] => "+obj[item]+"n";
		}
		out += print_a(obj[item], indent+"   ");
	}
	return out;
}

BTW, what’s up with these JSON feeds that serve up JS that’s JSON plus some more code? That’s annoying — you gotta strip it out before you run the JSON converter .

Update: here’s the actionscript 2.0 JSON.as file people were looking for.

17 Comments »

I have been trying to get the as2 json file for a while but the file is missing off the server. I dont suppose you could email it over could you.

I have been trying this address:
http://www.theorganization.net/work/jos/JSON.as

Thanks

#1: Comment by Boxey — January 24, 2007 @ 2:17 am

I have an error with this file (http://www.theorganization.net/work/jos/JSON.as)

#2: Comment by Tanie linie lotnicze — January 26, 2007 @ 10:51 pm

You can get that AS file here:
http://inner.geek.nz/uploads/JSON.as

#3: Comment by Brett
Twitter: glutnix
— January 30, 2007 @ 4:27 pm

Brett thanks for help it works at my site.

Keep up the good work.

Greetings

#4: Comment by Pozycjonowanie — January 31, 2007 @ 1:50 am

Fantastic code. Work great on my site. Again thanks and greetings

#5: Comment by Meble — February 10, 2007 @ 2:52 am

Can you please provide the JSON File you are using as an example?

#6: Comment by Alex — February 15, 2007 @ 6:40 am

the script causing the flash player run slowly… please provide the working as and fla file.

#7: Comment by james — May 1, 2007 @ 2:32 am

Thank yoy it was really helpful especially for my boyfriend because he’s been looking for stuff like that for weeks!

#8: Comment by Tanie tłumaczenia — October 2, 2007 @ 5:15 am

Thank you so much! I’ve been trying to figure this out for the past 2 days. The original class files from json.org and examples I found online were terrible. I was able to load and stringify, but it gave me no solution to extrapolate the values. With your example, I was easily able to just convert the whole thing into an array. Thanks again.

#9: Comment by Jeff — December 19, 2008 @ 9:01 am

absolutely awesome. I just spent 3 hours looking for exactly the code you got here, all other code examples out there were crap

#10: Comment by Robert — August 14, 2009 @ 8:36 am

thanks for this! ideal!!

#11: Comment by AshTemple — January 19, 2011 @ 11:54 pm

Very, very, VERY helpful – finally I’m able to process json-formatted data.

Thanks!

#12: Comment by Martin — August 22, 2011 @ 4:20 am

Hi, this code is awesome and works 100% when I’m in flash. As soon as I place it on a live site it timesout By process of elimination I’ve figured that the problem steps in on the “.onData” function.

My swf embed are set to params.allowscriptaccess = “always”;
I really don’t know what could be the problem.

Does someone have any idea?

#13: Comment by Jacques — August 29, 2011 @ 8:45 pm

Hey! Thanks for the code…. I’d suggest just showing some sample data though, instead of no data…. as I tried to use this and got “undefined” results, and burned about 30 min before I realized the problem was the print_a function not working well with my JSON data…. I incorrectly assumed the problem was with the JSON.as file and looked around for newer revs! Thanks so much for the post!.

#14: Comment by brad — January 5, 2012 @ 3:18 am

I didn’t write this library, just found the only existing copy of it.

#15: Comment by Brett
Twitter: glutnix
— January 6, 2012 @ 11:29 am

Hello, I am trying to learn how to use this with actionscript 2 and address the data to movieclips. Could you email me an example of using JSON with movieclips in flash.

Nathan

#16: Comment by Nathan Scovell — February 2, 2012 @ 12:26 pm

Sorry, I haven’t touched AS2 in many years for good reason, namely AS3 is much better. This post is from 2007 and really should stay there Also, Flash is dying if you haven’t heard.

#17: Comment by Brett
Twitter: glutnix
— February 2, 2012 @ 2:42 pm

Loading JSON in ActionScript 2

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