Ruby Hash not converting to JSON in Rails Console

Question

I'm using the Locu API and I've currently got the results from an HTTParty request into a ruby hash called data.

I've tried to call data.to_json, and this puts backslashes in my hash:

data.to_json
 => "{\"meta\":{\"limit\":25,\"cache-expiry\":3600}

Somebody else posted the same problem that was solved as follows:

puts data.to_json

Unfortunately, that does not alter my hash at all. Any ideas?

Answer 1

I've tried to call data.to_json, and this puts backslashes in my hash:

Two things: The output of that is not a hash. It's a string representing your Hash in JSON. Second, the backslashes are ok. It's only to disambiguate the double-quotes from the leading and trailing double quotes.

Instead of

data.to_json

do

puts data.to_json

Which will print as you expected:

 => {"meta":{"limit":25,"cache-expiry":3600}

Answer 2

It is working as intended.

What you've done is serialize a hash into a JSON String, used for passing data around via HTTP or something similar.