guile-json is a JSON module for Guile. It supports parsing and building JSON documents according to the http://json.org specification.

• Complies with http://json.org specification.
• Builds JSON documents programmatically using scheme data types.
• Allows JSON pretty printing.

Download the latest tarball and untar it:

• guile-json-4.3.2.tar.gz

If you are cloning the repository make sure you run this first:

$ autoreconf -vif

Then, run the typical sequence:

$ ./configure --prefix=<guile-prefix>
$ make
$ sudo make install

Where <guile-prefix> should preferably be the same as your system Guile installation directory (e.g. /usr).

If everything installed successfully you should be up and running:

$ guile
scheme@(guile-user)> (use-modules (json))
scheme@(guile-user)> (scm->json #(1 2 3))
[1,2,3]

It might be that you installed guile-json somewhere differently than your system’s Guile. If so, you need to indicate Guile where to find guile-json, for example:

$ GUILE_LOAD_PATH=/usr/local/share/guile/site guile

A pkg-list.scm file is also provided for users of the Guildhall/Dorodango packaging system.

guile-json provides a few procedures to parse and build a JSON document. A JSON document is transformed into or from native Guile values according to the following table:

Why are JSON arrays converted to vectors and JSON objects to alists? See this discussion for details.

By default the value of JSON “null” is mapped to the symbol ‘null. However, all guile-json functions allow changing the default null value by specifying the #:null keyword argument with another value. This other value needs to be recognized by eq?.

To start using guile-json procedures and macros you first need to load the module:

scheme@(guile-user)> (use-modules (json))

• (json->scm #:optional port #:key null) : Reads a JSON document from the given port, or from the current input port if none is given.

  Optional arguments:

  • port : is optional, it defaults to the current input port.

  Keyword arguments:

  • null : value for JSON’s null, it defaults to the ‘null symbol.
• (json-string->scm str #:key null) : Reads a JSON document from the given string.

  Keyword arguments:

  • null : value for JSON’s null, it defaults to the ‘null symbol.
• (scm->json native #:optional port #:key escape unicode pretty validate null) : Creates a JSON document from the given native Guile value. The JSON document is written into the given port, or to the current output port if non is given.

  Optional arguments:

  • port : it defaults to the current output port.

  Keyword arguments:

  • solidus : if true, the slash (/ solidus) character will be escaped (defaults to false).
  • unicode : if true, additional to control characters, non-ASCII characters will be escaped as well (defaults to false).
  • null : value for JSON’s null (defaults to the ‘null symbol).
  • validate : if true, the native value will be validated before starting to print the JSON document (defaults to true).
  • pretty : if true, the JSON document will be pretty printed (defaults to false).
• (scm->json-string native #:key escape unicode pretty validate) : Creates a JSON document from the given native Guile value into a string.

  Keyword arguments:

  • solidus : if true, the slash (/ solidus) character will be escaped (defaults to false).
  • unicode : if true, additional to control characters, non-ASCII characters will be escaped as well (defaults to false).
  • null : value for JSON’s null (defaults to the ‘null symbol).
  • validate : if true, the native value will be validated before starting to print the JSON document (defaults to true).
  • pretty : if true, the JSON document will be pretty printed (defaults to false).

  Note that when using alists to build JSON objects, symbols or numbers might be used as keys and they both will be converted to strings.

A json-invalid exception is thrown if an error is found during the JSON parsing with a single port argument. The line or column where the error occured can be easily obtained from the port by calling port-line or port-column.

When building a JSON document from a native type a json-invalid exception might be thrown with the offending value as an argument (see table above for supported types).

guile-json 4.2.0 introduces a new feature to allow converting a JSON object into a record type and vice versa. This feature works very well, for example, when creating REST APIs.

• (define-json-mapping rtd ctor pred json->record [<=> record->json] (field getter spec …) …) : Define a new mapping between a JSON object and a record type, à la SRFI-9.
  • rtd : the name of the record type.
  • ctor : the name for the record constructor procedure.
  • pred : a predicate procedure to check if a given argument holds a record of this type.
  • json->record : the name of the procedure to convert a JSON object into a record of this type.
  • <=> record->json : optional name of the procedure to convert a record of this type to JSON object.
  • ((field getter spec …) …) : a series of field specifications.
    • field : the name of a JSON object field.
    • getter : the name of the procedure to get the value of this field given a record of this type.
    • spec : a different name for the field of this JSON object. If given, this name will be used instead of field.
    • json->value : an optional procedure that will be used to convert the JSON value to the value contained in the record.
    • value->json : an optional procedure that will be used to convert the the value contained in the record to the JSON value.

• A simple example that defines an account type with two fields: id and username:

  > (define-json-mapping <account>
      make-account
      account?
      json->account <=> account->json
      (id       account-id)
      (username account-username))
      

• We can create a new account and check its contents as with regular records:

  > (define my-account (make-account "11111" "user-one"))
  > (account-id my-account)
  "11111"
  > (account-username my-account)
  "user-one"
      

• Now we can convert it to a JSON object:

  > (account->json my-account)
  "{\"id\":\"11111\",\"username\":\"user-one\"}"
      

• Or, given a JSON object we can create a new record:

  > (define json-account "{\"id\":\"22222\",\"username\":\"user-two\"}")
  > (define my-other-account (json->account json-account))
  > (account-id my-other-account)
  "22222"
  > (account-username my-other-account)
  "user-two"
      

• Build the string “hello world”:

  > (scm->json "hello world")
  "hello world"
      

• Build the [1, 2, 3] array:

  > (scm->json #(1 2 3))
  [1,2,3]
      

• Build the object { “project” : “foo”, “author” : “bar” } using an alist:

  > (scm->json '(("project" . "foo") ("author" . "bar")))
  {"project":"foo","author":"bar"}
      

• Build the same object but this time using symbols:

  > (scm->json '((project . foo) ("author" . "bar")))
  {"project":"foo","author":"bar"}
      

• Build the object { “values” : [ 234, 98.56 ] }:

  > (scm->json '(("values" . #(234 98.56))))
  {"values":[234,98.56]}
      

• Build the object { “values” : [ 234, 98.56 ] } again, this time using a variable:

  > (define values #(234 98.56))
  > (scm->json `(("values" . ,values)))
  {"values":[234,98.56]}
      

• Default null value is the ‘null symbol:

  > (scm->json 'null)
  null
      

• The default null value can be changed to something else:

  > (scm->json #nil #:null #nil)
  null
      

Copyright (C) 2013-2020 Aleix Conchillo Flaque <[email protected]>

guile-json is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

guile-json is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with guile-json. If not, see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/.