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📝 add note on parsing ordered_json #3325
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nlohmann committed Feb 10, 2022
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The [JSON standard](https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc8259.html) defines objects as "an unordered collection of zero or more name/value pairs". As such, an implementation does not need to preserve any specific order of object keys.

## Default behavior: sort keys

The default type `nlohmann::json` uses a `std::map` to store JSON objects, and thus stores object keys **sorted alphabetically**.

??? example
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}
```

## Alternative behavior: preserve insertion order

If you do want to preserve the **insertion order**, you can try the type [`nlohmann::ordered_json`](https://github.com/nlohmann/json/issues/2179).

??? example
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```

Alternatively, you can use a more sophisticated ordered map like [`tsl::ordered_map`](https://github.com/Tessil/ordered-map) ([integration](https://github.com/nlohmann/json/issues/546#issuecomment-304447518)) or [`nlohmann::fifo_map`](https://github.com/nlohmann/fifo_map) ([integration](https://github.com/nlohmann/json/issues/485#issuecomment-333652309)).

### Notes on parsing

Note that you also need to call the right [`parse`](../api/basic_json/parse.md) function when reading from a file.
Assume file `input.json` contains the JSON object above:

```json
{
"one": 1,
"two": 2,
"three": 3
}
```

!!! success "Right way"

The following code correctly calls the `parse` function from `nlohmann::ordered_json`:

```cpp
std::ifstream i("input.json");
auto j = nlohmann::ordered_json::parse(i);
std::cout << j.dump(2) << std::endl;
```

The output will be:

```json
{
"one": 1,
"two": 2,
"three": 3
}
```

??? failure "Wrong way"

The following code incorrectly calls the `parse` function from `nlohmann::json` which does not preserve the
insertion order, but sorts object keys. Assigning the result to `nlohmann::ordered_json` compiles, but does not
restore the order from the input file.

```cpp
std::ifstream i("input.json");
nlohmann::ordered_json j = nlohmann::json::parse(i);
std::cout << j.dump(2) << std::endl;
```

The output will be:

```json
{
"one": 1,
"three": 3
"two": 2,
}
```

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