Timestamp index for pandas dataframe from read_json()

Question

I'm reading a single JSON line from file data.json with this content:

[
  {
    "timestamp": 1436266865,
    "rates": {
      "EUR": 0.911228,
      "JPY": 122.5463,
      "AUD": 1.346118
    }
  },
  {
    "timestamp": 1436277661,
    "rates": {
      "JPY": 122.4789,
      "AUD": 1.348871,
      "EUR": 0.91433
    }
  }
]

into a pandas DataFrame. I want to use the "timestamp" as the DataFrame's index. I achieve this by:

df = pandas.read_json('data.json')
df.index = df['timestamp']
df.drop('timestamp', axis=1, inplace=1)

Is it possible to do it in just one line?

Answer 1

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_json('data.json')
df.set_index('timestamp',inplace=True)
print(df)

What this will do is set timestamp to your index. inplace=True will prevent you having to do df=df.set_index('timestamp') and by default it'll drop the column.

                                                        rates
timestamp                                                    
1436266865  {'EUR': 0.9112279999999999, 'JPY': 122.5463, '...
1436277661  {'JPY': 122.4789, 'AUD': 1.348871, 'EUR': 0.91...