[phobos] Plans for std.json

[Andrei Alexandrescu]

I strongly believe std.json must be replaced. Here is my list of 
grievances and requirements:

* JSONValue is utterly unsafe because it relies on an open tagged union. 
Essentially memory safety is entirely dependent on the user.

* Even if the union were made safe, handling things with an enum is 
antiquated. The code should use types throughout, a la Algebraic, or - 
better yet - use Algebraic itself:

struct JSONFalse {};
struct JSONTrue {};
struct JSONNull {};

alias Algebraic!(
     string,
     long,
     This[string],
     This[],
     JSONTrue,
     JSONFalse,
     JSONNull
) JSONValue;

* The function parseJSON takes a range but not by reference, which means 
there is no way for the caller to know the new range position after 
having parsed one json object.

* toJSON returns a string, which is inefficient for large objects. It 
should take an output range.

Even if we later add serialization based on json transport, a simple, 
independent API would be beneficial for many. I'm thinking in fact of 
adding support for Json in std.format by means of %j. So then you can 
read and write Json stuff with writef and readf.


Andrei

On 10/23/10 20:09 CDT, Robert Jacques wrote:
> On Sat, 23 Oct 2010 20:14:14 -0400, Brian Schott
> <briancschott at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> What are the plans for this module? The last I heard, there were plans
>> for removing it or rewriting it,and nobody knew why it was included in
>> Phobos in the first place.
>>
>> The documentation
>> (http://www.digitalmars.com/d/2.0/phobos/std_json.html) makes no mention
>> of this. If this is scheduled for removal (or a rewrite), can the
>> documentation please make a note of this? (Even something simple like
>> the comment in std.contracts would be sufficient to warn people)
>> _______________________________________________
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>
> I'd also like to know the plans for this module. I've commented before
> that the implementation is both buggy and non-complaint. I have an my
> own JSON implementation that I've just started to clean up to Phobos
> quality. I'm been holding off on cleaning it up mainly because I need it
> for serialization/de-serialization and I don't want to add a naive JSON
> serialization routine, just to have std.serialization(?) deprecate it.
> Also, Sean commented he'd like to have a SAX style JSON parser, which is
> something I don't have yet.
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