josn

josn-cli is a command-line JSON viewer, written in JavaScript and TypeScript.

I felt the need for a JSON browser when I was working on iaseth/top-100-yc-companies. I primarily use it to verify the JSON data collected in my web scraping projects. I have created a similar tool (jsonplus) in C++, which is a lot more limited in functionality.

Four of my other projects, josnlib, whichtype, jslice and jtransform, actually started out as modules within josn, but were later made separate packages to allow for easier testing and code reuse.

I am using readmix for generating this README. You can view the source file here.

Table of contents

• josn
  • Table of contents
  • Installation
  • Updating JOSN
  • Usage
  • Demos
  • List of flags
  • Package details
  • Dependencies
  • Dev dependencies
  • License

Installation

You can install josn-cli with the following command:

npm i -g josn-cli

Now you should be able to run the josn command in your terminal.

Updating JOSN

You can update josn with the following command:

npm i -g josn-cli@latest

Usage

• Printing whole files

  Provide the filepath as the first argument.

  • This will print the whole file as indented JSON:

    josn filename.json
    

  • When you supply a path that is a directory, josn will automatically select the package.json inside that directory:

    josn reactapp
    

    This is equivalent to writing:

    josn reactapp/package.json
    

  • When you supply a path that is a directory but it does not contain a package.json, josn will try to find a json file in that directory:

    josn mydata/
    

    If the directory contains a single JSON file, then josn will select it. Otherwise, it will list all the JSON files in that directory.

• Printing an object

  You can use the keyName to traverse inside an object.

  • This will print the dependencies object inside package.json:

    josn package.json dependencies
    

  • josn is case insensitive, so you might as well write this:

    josn package.json Dependencies
    

  • Or even this:

    josn package.json DEPENDENCIES
    

  • And you can skip parts of the key name if it is unique enough:

    josn package.json dep
    

    This will print the first key that starts with the prefix dep.
  • You can use a colonArg for selecting just the keys or values in an object:

    josn package.json dependencies :keys
    

    josn package.json dependencies :values
    

    Both, :keys and :values have a shorthand syntax:

    josn package.json dependencies :k
    

    josn package.json dependencies :v
    

• Printing an array element

  You can use numbers to select array elements.

  • This will print the first element of the data array:

    josn data.json data 0
    

  • You can also use negative indexes to select an element from the end:

    josn data.json data -1
    

    This will print last element of data array.
  • You can use a colonArg for selecting just the even or odd elements in an Array:

    josn data.json data :even
    

    josn data.json data :odd
    

    Keep in mind that array indexes start at 0, so :even will select elements at 0, 2, 4, etc and vice-versa.
  • You can use a colonArg for slicing an Array:

    josn data.json data :10         // select first 10 elements
    

    josn data.json data -10:        // select last 10 elements
    

    josn data.json data 2:5         // select elements from 2 to 4
    

    The slice syntax is heavily inspired by its counterpart in Python.

Demos

JOSN comes with a bunch of demo JSON files to get you started.

Title	Name	Source	Description
HTML Colors	colors.json	iaseth/html-color-names
HTML Color Palettes	colorpalettes.json	iaseth/html-color-names
YC Company Data	yc-companies.json	iaseth/top-100-yc-companies
YC Color Palettes	yc-palettes.json	iaseth/top-100-yc-companies
YC Tailwind Colors	yc-tailwind.json	iaseth/top-100-yc-companies
Big Tech Market Cap Data	bigtech-market-cap.json	iaseth/bigtech-json-data

Use the following command to view the list of available demo JSON files in your josn installation:

josn --print-demos

You can open a demo file with the @demoname syntax:

josn @colors.json colors :10 --table

You can omit the extension .json for demos:

josn @colors colors :10 --table

List of flags

Short	Long	Description	Status
-c	--console	Use console.log() for printing selected object.	✓
-d	--dir	Use console.dir() for printing selected object.	✓
-D	--debug	Turns debug mode ON.	✗
-E	--exact	Turns exact mode ON.	✗
-F	--force	Force update files.	✗
-g	--green	Green is for the environment.	✗
-h	--help	Show help.	✓
-i	--ignore-case	Ignore case (default).	✗
	--license	Print the LICENSE.	✗
-l	--list	List all input files.	✗
-m	--minify	Minify the output.	✓
-n	--no-ignore-case	Do not ignore case.	✗
-p	--plaintext	Output plaintext.	✗
	--print-args	Just print the arguments.	✓
	--print-demos	Just print the demos.	✓
	--print-flags	Just print the flags.	✓
-q	--quiet	Turns quiet mode ON.	✗
	--repl	Opens the REPL.	✗
-s	--spaces2	Indent with 2 spaces.	✓
-S	--spaces4	Indent with 4 spaces.	✓
-t	--table	Print output as a table.	✓
-T	--tabs	Indent with Tabs.	✓
-v	--version	Print version.	✓
-w	--watch	Watch input files for changes.	✗
-x	--experimental	Turns experimental mode ON.	✗
-Z	--zen	Turns zen mode ON.	✗

Package details

Name	Value
Name	josn-cli
Description	JOSN is a command line JSON viewer.
Version	0.34.0
Author	iaseth
Homepage	https://github.com/iaseth/josn
Repository	iaseth/josn
License	MIT
Dependencies	1

Dependencies

	Package	Version
1	josnlib	^0.18.0

Dev dependencies

	Package	Version
1	@types/jest	^29.5.1
2	jest	^29.5.0

License

MIT License

Copyright (c) Ankur Seth.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

Credit

This file was generated using readmix.