JSON in C# (preferably without third-party tools) - asp.net

Question

I've seen quite a few ways to output JSON in C#. None of them, however, seem easy. This may very well be due to my lack of knowledge of C#, though.
Question: If you were to write JSON (for use in JavaScript later on), how would you do it? I would prefer to not use third-party tools; however this is not an ultimatum of any kind. Is JSON doable in C# ASP.NET out of the box?
Example of JSON I wish to write:
{
"Trips": [
{
"from": "here",
"to": "there",
"stops": [
{
"place": "middle1",
"KMs": 37
},
{
"place": "middle2",
"KMs": 54
}
]
},
{
"from": "there",
"to": "here",
"stops": [
{
"place": "middle2",
"KMs": 37
},
{
"place": "middle1",
"KMs": 54
}
]
}
]
}

Answer 1

How about JavaScriptSerializer? Nice integrated solution, allowed to be expanded upon with JavaScriptConverters.
Demo of what you were after:
using System;
using System.Web.Script.Serialization;
using System.Text;
public class Stop
{
public String place { get; set; }
public Int32 KMs { get; set; }
}
public class Trip
{
public String from { get; set; }
public String to { get; set; }
public Stop[] stops { get; set; }
}
public class MyJSONObject
{
public Trip[] Trips { get; set; }
public override String ToString()
{
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
foreach (Trip trip in this.Trips)
{
sb.AppendFormat("Trip:\r\n");
sb.AppendFormat("\t To: {0}\r\n", trip.to);
sb.AppendFormat("\t From: {0}\r\n", trip.from);
sb.AppendFormat("\tStops:\r\n");
foreach (Stop stop in trip.stops)
{
sb.AppendFormat("\t\tPlace: {0}\r\n", stop.place);
sb.AppendFormat("\t\t KMs: {0}\r\n", stop.KMs);
}
sb.AppendLine();
}
return sb.ToString();
}
}
public class Test
{
public static void Main()
{
String example = "{\"Trips\":[{\"from\":\"here\",\"to\":\"there\",\"stops\":[{\"place\":\"middle1\",\"KMs\":37},{\"place\":\"middle2\",\"KMs\":54}]},{\"from\":\"there\",\"to\":\"here\",\"stops\":[{\"place\":\"middle2\",\"KMs\":37},{\"place\":\"middle1\",\"KMs\":54}]}]}";
JavaScriptSerializer serializer = new JavaScriptSerializer();
// Parse the string to our custom object
MyJSONObject result = serializer.Deserialize<MyJSONObject>(example);
Console.WriteLine("Object deserialized:\r\n\r\n{0}\r\n\r\n", result);
// take our custom object and dump it in to a string
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
serializer.Serialize(result, sb);
Console.WriteLine("Object re-serialized:\r\n\r\n{0}\r\n\r\n", sb);
// check step
Console.WriteLine(example.Equals(sb.ToString()) ? "MATCH" : "NO match");
}
}
And the output:
Object deserialized:
Trip:
To: there
From: here
Stops:
Place: middle1
KMs: 37
Place: middle2
KMs: 54
Trip:
To: here
From: there
Stops:
Place: middle2
KMs: 37
Place: middle1
KMs: 54
Object re-serialized:
{"Trips":[{"from":"here","to":"there","stops":[{"place":"middle1","KMs":37},{"pl
ace":"middle2","KMs":54}]},{"from":"there","to":"here","stops":[{"place":"middle
2","KMs":37},{"place":"middle1","KMs":54}]}]}
MATCH
Press any key to continue . . .

Answer 2

There is JavaScriptSerializer from System.Web.Extensions.dll (.NET 3.5 SP1)
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.web.script.serialization.javascriptserializer.aspx

Answer 3

You should really take a look at Json.NET
Not only does this library perform superbly it can parse JSON as well. Which means you can easily round trip stuff and communicate over JSON without involving a WCF service layer. It also does other neat things such as providing a queryable dynamic object model.