How do I parse JSON with Objective-C?

Question

I am new to iPhone. Can anyone tell me the steps to follow to parse this data and get the activity details, first name, and last name?

{
    \"#error\": fals         


        

Answer 1

With the perspective of the OS X v10.7 and iOS 5 launches, probably the first thing to recommend now is NSJSONSerialization, Apple's supplied JSON parser. Use third-party options only as a fallback if you find that class unavailable at runtime.

So, for example:

NSData *returnedData = ...JSON data, probably from a web request...

// probably check here that returnedData isn't nil; attempting
// NSJSONSerialization with nil data raises an exception, and who
// knows how your third-party library intends to react?

if(NSClassFromString(@"NSJSONSerialization"))
{
    NSError *error = nil;
    id object = [NSJSONSerialization
                      JSONObjectWithData:returnedData
                      options:0
                      error:&error];

    if(error) { /* JSON was malformed, act appropriately here */ }

    // the originating poster wants to deal with dictionaries;
    // assuming you do too then something like this is the first
    // validation step:
    if([object isKindOfClass:[NSDictionary class]])
    {
        NSDictionary *results = object;
        /* proceed with results as you like; the assignment to
        an explicit NSDictionary * is artificial step to get 
        compile-time checking from here on down (and better autocompletion
        when editing). You could have just made object an NSDictionary *
        in the first place but stylistically you might prefer to keep
        the question of type open until it's confirmed */
    }
    else
    {
        /* there's no guarantee that the outermost object in a JSON
        packet will be a dictionary; if we get here then it wasn't,
        so 'object' shouldn't be treated as an NSDictionary; probably
        you need to report a suitable error condition */
    }
}
else
{
    // the user is using iOS 4; we'll need to use a third-party solution.
    // If you don't intend to support iOS 4 then get rid of this entire
    // conditional and just jump straight to
    // NSError *error = nil;
    // [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:...
}