Use this tool to output JSON data from CSV.
1. support big csv file content
2. support code syntax highlighting
3. auto format
4. convert fast
Over 2 years ago, a close friend of mine encouraged me to get back into coding. In order to learn through application, he challenged me to create a simple program that would take a csv file and convert it to JSON (he helped me when I was stuck).
To my (pleasant) surprise, I am finding a need for that program. A (soon to be official) consulting job I am working on had me create a large spreadsheet filled with publicly accessible data, and now I’m tasked with interacting with that data to help write a report. I’m not a master of using Excel to its fullest extent with things like pivot tables, but even if I was I’m pretty sure I would dislike working with Excel. I know it’s a very robust tool that has withstood the test of time, but it’s still cumbersome to use and definitely not the most enjoyable user experience.
While I was working on the report and scrolling through the data, I thought to myself, “Wouldn’t it be nice if this was in JSON so I can import it into Mongo and build a basic querying app around it?” Then I realized I do have an app that can convert it into JSON! Unfortunately, my gripe with Excel was instantiated when I realized that Excel will have entries with various character encodings and display an alert that you have compatibility issues with the data, but it won’t let you convert everything into a standard encoding like UTF-8. The problem probably lies more with the creators of the data, but if Excel can recognize the error one would hope it can help fix it as well. Luckily, a quick Google search helped me find a solution, which was to have Google help with the encoding conversion by uploading it to Google Docs then downloading it again as a csv file.
Now I have a csv file using the correct character encodings. I ran it through my program and I got the JSON file I wanted. The next steps are to import it into my local MongoDB and start building a basic app that will query the data. We’ll see how far I go in terms of data visualization. I have another app that takes priority because I need to get it done by the end of this month.
