Json Array Utility

Use Case

Unity's built-in JsonUtility does not support JSON strings which have an array at root level: To solve this, the JsonArrayUtility was implemented.

JsonArrayUtility is e.g. useful when communicating with a Web API that returns list of objects for a query.

JsonArrayUtility is only required if the JSON array is on the root level of the JSON string. If it is part of a JSON object, Unity's JsonUtility can handle it.

Usage

The usage of JsonArrayUtility is identical to JsonUtility:

Serialize to JSON

To serialize an array to JSON, call ToJson. It returns a JSON object with one key "array". The value of this key is the array.

int[] intArray = { 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 };
string serializedJson = JsonArrayUtility.ToJson(intArray);
// result is:
// {"array":[1,2,3,4,5]}

Deserialize from JSON

If the JSON string already has the from where the array is encapuslated into the "array" key-value pair, you can use FromJson to deserialize and unwrap the array.

string wrappedArray = "{\"array\":[1,2,3,4,5]}";
int[] deserializedArray = JsonArrayUtility.FromJson<int>(wrappedArray);

If the JSON string is not encapsulated but has the array on its root level, first call EncapsulateInWrapper and then FromJson.

string jsonArray = "[1,2,3,4,5]";
string wrappedArray = JsonArrayUtility.EncapsulateInWrapper(jsonArray);
int[] deserializedArray = JsonArrayUtility.FromJson<int>(wrappedArray);

Functionality

JsonArrayUtility wraps arrays into an object so that the array is not at root level anymore. After that, it uses Unity's JsonUtility to serialize the JSON string.

To deserialize, EncapsulateInWrapper adds the JSON object wrapper around the JSON string. The FromJson deserializes the wrapped JSON string to the wrapper object. After that, it unpacks the wrapper object and returns the contained array.