outputjson

outputjson refers to a function, library, or tool designed to emit data in JSON. It serves as a means to serialize in-memory data structures—such as dictionaries, lists, and basic scalar values—into a JSON text representation that can be stored, transmitted, or consumed by other systems. In practice, outputjson can be a dedicated function in an application, a wrapper around a language’s standard JSON serializer, or a command-line utility that writes JSON to standard output. Common features include options for pretty printing (indentation), controlling character escaping, and streaming support to emit large data sets in chunks rather than loading everything into memory.

Usage patterns include returning JSON from web APIs, exporting data in ETL processes, and producing log entries in JSON format for easier parsing. When streaming, outputjson implementations may emit valid JSON fragments or generate a JSON array incrementally, depending on the design. Language ecosystems often provide built-in serializers (e.g., Python’s json.dumps, JavaScript’s JSON.stringify) that fulfill the same role as an outputjson-like tool; outputjson may thus be understood as a higher-level convenience wrapper.

Design considerations include faithful data encoding, handling of non-ASCII characters, time and date representations, and custom serialization rules. It is important to prevent injection risks when JSON is embedded in environments that parse HTML or scripts. Performance can be affected by memory usage and the choice between streaming and full-buffer serialization. The JSON text should conform to RFC 8259 and related standards, ensuring interoperability.

See also: JSON, serialization, JSON Lines, API response, ETL.