Display curl output in readable JSON format in Unix shell script

Question

In my Unix shell script, when I execute a curl command, the result will be displayed as below which I am redirecting to file:

{"type":"Show","id":"123","title":"name","description":"Funny","channelTitle":"ifood.tv","lastUpdateTimestamp":"2014-04-20T20:34:59","numOfVideos":"15"} 

But, I want this output to put in the readable JSON format like below in the file:

{"type":"Show", "id":"123", "title":"name", "description":"Funny", "channelTitle":"ifood.tv", "lastUpdateTimestamp":"2014-04-20T20:34:59", "numOfVideos":"15"} 

How do I format the output this way?

Answer 1

A few solutions to choose from:

json_pp: command utility available in Linux systems for JSON decoding/encoding

echo '{"type":"Bar","id":"1","title":"Foo"}' | json_pp -json_opt pretty,canonical {    "id" : "1",    "title" : "Foo",    "type" : "Bar" } 

You may want to keep the -json_opt pretty,canonical argument for predictable ordering.

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jq: lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor. It is written in portable C, and it has zero runtime dependencies.

echo '{"type":"Bar","id":"1","title":"Foo"}' | jq '.' {   "type": "Bar",   "id": "1",   "title": "Foo" } 

The simplest jq program is the expression ., which takes the input and produces it unchanged as output.

For additinal jq options check the manual

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with python:

echo '{"type":"Bar","id":"1","title":"Foo"}' | python -m json.tool {     "id": "1",     "title": "Foo",     "type": "Bar" } 

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with nodejs and bash:

echo '{"type":"Bar","id":"1","title":"Foo"}' | node -e "console.log( JSON.stringify( JSON.parse(require('fs').readFileSync(0) ), 0, 1 ))" {  "type": "Bar",  "id": "1",  "title": "Foo" }