How to convert JSON to GeoJSON

Question

I am very new in my learnings of javascript and my rudimentary knowledge has hit a wall. I have setup a Leaflet map which I am wishing to plot divIcon based markers from cords on it from JSON. Through my countless research of trying to get it to work. I learned why my JSON file wasn't working even though I confirmed in the console it was being read. I learned Leaflet prefers it to be in GeoJSON. So I spent several more hours researching how to convert this. Most of my findings were outdated and did not work anymore or did not apply to me. This is what I did try through my rigorous research.

To start off I have set a variable for the path to my test JSON file as defined like this.

var jsonData = "./data/tracking.json";

In my attempt to convert the JSON to GeoJSON I tried this.

var outGeoJson = {}
outGeoJson['properties'] = jsonData
outGeoJson['type']= "Feature"
outGeoJson['geometry']= {"type": "Point", "coordinates":
    [jsonData['lat'], jsonData['lon']]}

console.log(outGeoJson)

Checked the console and found the coordinates in the array from JSON file are undefined.

My search for a reason why this was coming up undefined fell short. My theory here is maybe because the JSON has a key of positions prior to the array and the fact it is an array. I continue to search for a valid solution that could possibly handle this issue. I tried this solution next.

var geojson = {
  type: "FeatureCollection",
  features: [],
};

for (i = 0; i < jsonData.positions.length; i++) {
  if (window.CP.shouldStopExecution(1)) {
    break;
  }
  geojson.features.push({
    "type": "Feature",
    "geometry": {
      "type": "Point",
      "coordinates": [jsonData.positions[i].longitude, jsonData.positions[i].latitude]
    },
    "properties": {
      "report_at": jsonData.positions[i].report_at,
      "lat": jsonData.positions[i].lat,
      "lon": jsonData.positions[i].lon,
      "dir": jsonData.positions[i].dir,
      "first": jsonData.positions[i].first,
      "last": jsonData.positions[i].last
    }
  });
}

window.CP.exitedLoop(1);

console.log(geojson)

This solution gave me an error in the console of Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read property 'length' of undefined.

Attempted to troubleshoot that solution for several more hours and that has fallen short as well. Here is a sample of the test JSON file I am working with.

{
  "positions": [
    {
      "report_at": "2015-01-21 21:00:08",
      "lat": "38.9080658",
      "lon": "-77.0030365",
      "elev": "0",
      "dir": "0",
      "gps": "0",
      "callsign": "WX2DX",
      "email": "",
      "phone": "",
      "ham": "WX2DX",
      "ham_show": "0",
      "freq": "",
      "note": "",
      "im": "",
      "twitter": null,
      "web": "",
      "unix": "1421874008",
      "first": "William",
      "last": "Smith",
      "marker": "36181"
    }
  ]
}

All I really need from it is the report_at, lat, lon, dir, first, last anyways. The rest I can do without. Is the above mentioned examples I tried a good or proper way to convert it? If not, then does anyone have a better suggestion than what I have been trying that I might be missing or overlooking which is a pretty good possibility due to be very green to this language? Thanks in advance!

EDIT: Since it has been brought to my attention I am not loading the JSON file this is what I have done to load it since the suggestions do not work as they apply to node.js and not a part of native javascript.

    $.getJSON("./data/tracking.json", function(jsonData) {
  var outGeoJson = {}
  outGeoJson['properties'] = jsonData
  outGeoJson['type']= "Feature"
  outGeoJson['geometry']= {"type": "Point", "coordinates":
      [jsonData['lat'], jsonData['lon']]}

  console.log(outGeoJson)
});

This does load the file as it is displaying in the console as converted to GeoJSON. I will leave this as is for now unless there is a better solution.

Answer 1

If you do have jQuery in your project added, then you are almost there:

$.getJSON("./data/tracking.json", function(jsonData) {
    /* 
    Here the anonymous function is called when the file has been downloaded.
    Only then you can be sure that the JSON data is present and you can work with it's data.
    You have to keep in mind if you are getting the file synchronously or asynchronously (default).
   */
});

Answer 2

var jsonData = "./data/tracking.json";

try replacing this with the next line.

var jsonData = require("./data/tracking.json"); or

import jsonData from "./data/tracking.json"; #es6 style

as @PatrickEvans mentioned you have to actually load the data rather than giving path as a string.