Update: Added NKJSON.rootKey class variable used for accesing the whole underlaying JSON dictionary. See Example 6 for details

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#NKJSON ######The Swift class you were missing for those pesky JSON chunks of data

So, what's NKJSON? Well, it's a simple JSON class that let's you easily parse and map JSON data to your own model objects

######Where do you start? Clone this repo here and import NKJSON.swift file into your project. That's it! You're ready to use it!

######How do you do that? Well, first of define your model objects. Remember! You can have any kind of properties you'd like. Even Arrays and or Dictionaries of your own objects

Once that's done just grab your JSON data from your server as you normally do and feed it to NKJSON class.

######Example Imagine you have the following JSON data coming from your server:

{
    "name": "Mickey",
    "id": {
    "series": "TC",
        "number": 123456
    }
}

and you want to map it to your custom classes defined as bellow:

class UserID {
    var series: String!
    var number: Int = 0
}

class User {
    var name: String!
    var id: UserID!
}

Well, with NKJSON all you have to do is have your classes implement the JSONParsable protocol like this:

class UserID: JSONParsable {
    var series: String!
    var number: Int = 0

    required init(JSON: NKJSON) {
        series <> JSON["series"]
        number <> JSON["number"]
    }
}

class User {
    var name: String!
    var id: UserID!

    required init(JSON: NKJSON) {
        name <> JSON["name"]
        id <*> JSON["id"] // See what this means bellow
    }
}

After that's done just feed the JSON data to NKJSON and grab your User object in no time!

let JSONData: NSData! // your JSON data goes here
let user: User = NKJSON.parse(JSONData)

Easy, right? Told you!

######There's more! Yup, there is more. You can have NKJSON parse an array of objects using the root of the JSON data or a specified key.

Example 1:

JSONData:

[{
    "name": "Mickey",
    "id": {
        "series": "TC",
        "number": 123456
    }
},
{
    "name": "Andu",
    "id": {
        "series": "JI",
        "number": 789012
    }
}]

Parsing it:

let JSONData: NSData! // your JSON data hoes here
let users: [User] = NKJSON.parse(JSONData)

Example 2:

JSONData:

{"data": [
    {
        "name": "Mickey",
        "id": {
            "series": "TC",
            "number": 123456
        }
    },
    {
        "name": "Andu",
        "id": {
            "series": "JI",
            "number": 789012
        }
    }
]}

Parsing it:

let JSONData: NSData! // your JSON data hoes here
let users: [User] = NKJSON.parse(JSONData, key: "data")

Example 3:

JSONData:

{
    "name": "Mickey",
    "id": {
        "series": "TC",
        "number": 123456
    },
    "country": {
    	"id": 123,
    	"name": "Romania"
    },
    "languages": [
    	{
    		"id": 123,
    		"name": "English"
    	},
    	{
    		"id": 456,
    		"name": "Romanian"
    	}
    ]
}

class User {
    var name: String!
    var countryName: String!
    var lastLanguageName: String!
    
    required init(JSON: NKJSON) {
        name <> JSON["name"]
        countryName <> JSON["country.name"] // Yup! You can even do that!
        lastLanguageName <> JSON["languages.1.name"] // Even that! Or any other combination for that matter
    }
}

Parsing it:

let JSONData: NSData! // your JSON data hoes here
let user: User = NKJSON.parse(JSONData)

Example 4:

JSONData:

{
    "name": "Mickey",
    "birthDay": "19.09.1988"
}
    
class User {
    var name: String!
    var birthDay: NSDate!
    
    func dateFormatter(object: AnyObject?) -> NSDate? {
    	if let dateString = object as? String {
        	let dateFormatter = NSDateFormatter()
            dateFormatter.locale = NSLocale.systemLocale()
	        dateFormatter.dateFormat = "dd.MM.yyyy"
    	    return dateFormatter.dateFromString(dateString)
        }
        return nil
	}
    
    required init(JSON: NKJSON) {
        name <> JSON["name"]
        birthDay <> JSON["birthDay"] <<>> dateFormatter
    }
}

Parsing it:

let JSONData: NSData! // your JSON data hoes here
let user: User = NKJSON.parse(JSONData)

Example 5:

JSONData:

{
	"data": {
		"users": [
			{
				"name": "Mickey",
		        "birthDay": "19.09.1988"
			},
			{
				"name": "Andu",
		        "birthDay": "25.05.1986"
			}
		]
	}
}
    
class User {
    var name: String!
    var birthDay: NSDate!
    
    func dateFormatter(object: AnyObject?) -> NSDate? {
    	if let dateString = object as? String {
        	let dateFormatter = NSDateFormatter()
            dateFormatter.locale = NSLocale.systemLocale()
	        dateFormatter.dateFormat = "dd.MM.yyyy"
    	    return dateFormatter.dateFromString(dateString)
        }
        return nil
	}
    
    required init(JSON: NKJSON) {
        name <> JSON["name"]
        birthDay <> JSON["birthDay"] <<>> dateFormatter
    }
}

Parsing it:

let JSONData: NSData! // your JSON data hoes here
let mickey: User = NKJSON.parse(JSONData, key:"data.users.0")
let andu: User = NKJSON.parse(JSONData, key:"data.users.1")
let allUsers: [User] = NKJSON.parse(JSONData, key:"data.users")

Example 6:

Usually you initialize JSONParsable object using NKJSON.parse method. But maybe sometimes maybe all you want is a dictionary, or an array, or whatever else but NOT an JSONParsable object. Well take a look bellow to see how to do just that.

JSONData:

{
	"data": {
		"users": [
			{
				"name": "Mickey",
		        "birthDay": "19.09.1988"
			}
		]
	}
}

Parsing it:

var dictioanry: [String: AnyObject]!
if let JSON = NKJSON.parse(userString) {
    var dictionary: [String: AnyObject]!
	dictionary <> JSON[NKJSON.rootKey]
}

######What about those weird operators? Oh, I see! You are paying attention! Well, it's easy. Those operators do the magic trick. And there's a couple of them:

• <> allows you to extract any Foundation object (String, Int, Float, etc) from the JSON data to your specified property
• <*> allows you to extract any JSONParsable object from the JSON data to your specified property
• <|*|> allows you to extract an array of JSONParsable objects from the JSON data to your specified property
• <|*|*|> allows you to extract a dictionary of with Strings as keys and JSONParsable objects as values from the JSON data to your specified property
• <<>> allows you to pass the JSON data through a data formatter before assigning it to your model's property. Very usefull for NSDate properties for example (see Example 4) or whenever you want to manipulate the data a bit more before assiging it

##Recap

So with NKJSON you can easily parse JSON and map it to your objects. All your have to do is follow these steps:

1. Have your model objects implement the JSONParsable protocol
2. Map your model's properties to JSON values using on of the above operator
3. Feed the JSON data to NKJSON and enjoy!

Remember! You can use dot(.) notation for accesing child properties of JSON values as seen in Example 3 and Example 5