Convert string into json string and parsing in R

Question

I have a data with a column as json string:

reservation  reasons
1592         [{"name"=>"jorge", "value"=>"MX"}, {"name"=>"Billing phone number", "value"=>"1123"}, {"name"=>"BillingCountry", "value"=>"USA"}]
1597         [{"name"=>"BillingAddress_Country", "value"=>"IN"}, {"name"=>"Billing phone number country code", "value"=>"IN"}, {"name"=>"Latest amount", "value"=>"583000000"}]

I want to parse the column as follows:

reservation   name                                value
1592          jorge                                mx
1592          Billing phone number                 1123
1592          BillingCountry                       USA
1597          BillingAddress_Country               IN
1597          Billing phone number country code    IN
1597          Latest amount                        583000000

I am us ing jsonlite in R. I am getting following error in my code:

data<-read.csv("data.csv")
json<-data$reasons
mydf <- fromJSON(json)
Error: Argument 'txt' must be a JSON string, URL or file.

Can anyone tell me where am I making mistakes? What modifications do I need to do? Many thanks in advance!

Answer 1

This doesn't look like normal JSON to me (or to fromJSON, which makes me feel a little better). Maybe it's some special case of it or something (?). Update: @camille identified it as Ruby Hash.

In any event, we can fix it:

reasons <-  '{"name"=>"jorge", "value"=>"MX"}, {"name"=>"Billing phone number", "value"=>"1123"}, {"name"=>"BillingCountry", "value"=>"USA"}'

reasons <- gsub("=>", ":", reasons)
reasons <- gsub("[{}]", "", reasons)
reasons <- paste0("{",reasons,"}")

fromJSON(reasons)

$`name`
[1] "jorge"

$value
[1] "MX"

$name
[1] "Billing phone number"

$value
[1] "1123"

$name
[1] "BillingCountry"

$value
[1] "USA"

Answer 2

  dat%>%
  mutate(reasons=str_split(gsub("[^=A-Za-z,0-9{} ]+","",reasons),"(?<=\\}),\\s*"))%>%
  unnest()%>%
  mutate(names=str_extract(reasons,"(?<=name=)[^,}]+"),
         values=str_extract(reasons,"(?<=value=)[^,}]+"),
         reasons=NULL)

 reservation                             names    values
1        1592                             jorge        MX
2        1592              Billing phone number      1123
3        1592                    BillingCountry       USA
4        1597             BillingAddressCountry        IN
5        1597 Billing phone number country code        IN
6        1597                     Latest amount 583000000

with this code, if you need the email, just add email=str_extract.. etc etc