ToJSON

Tojson is a function name used in several computing environments to serialize data into JSON-formatted text. It is not a universal standard, and its exact behavior depends on the host tool, but it generally takes a value such as an object, array, or primitive and returns a string containing its JSON representation. The function is commonly used for displaying data, debugging, or preparing data for transmission.

Common contexts

- MongoDB shell (mongosh): tojson converts a BSON document to a JSON-formatted string for display or logging. It is often used alongside other display helpers such as printjson.

- jq: a lightweight command-line JSON processor that includes tojson as a function to produce a JSON-encoded string from its input, preserving structure and escaping characters as needed.

- Other environments: Some SQL clients, data integration tools, or scripting environments provide a similar helper named tojson or an equivalent serializer (often with a different naming convention, such as to_json or JSON.stringify in other languages).

Usage and behavior

- The function generally returns a string containing valid JSON. Depending on the environment, it may offer options for compact versus pretty-printed output.

- The serialization typically handles common JSON types (null, booleans, numbers, strings, arrays, objects) and applies escaping rules appropriate to JSON.

- Some environments may apply special representations for domain-specific types (for example, dates, binary data, or database identifiers) when converting to JSON.

See also

- JSON.stringify and to_json: language- or tool-specific JSON serialization functions with similar purposes.

- JSON: the data-interchange format that tojson targets.