Hjson, the Human JSON

A data format that caters to humans and helps reduce the errors they make.

Intro

See the full intro at laktak.github.io/hjson.

{
  # comments are useful
  "rate": 1000 # specify in requests/second

  # key names do not need to be placed in quotes
  key: "value"

  # most of the time you don't need quotes for strings
  text: look ma, no quotes!

  # commas are optional
  commas:
  {
    one: 1
    two: 2
  }

  # trailing commas are allowed
  trailing:
  {
    one: 1,
    two: 2,
  }

  # multiline string
  haiku:
    '''
    JSON I love you.
    But you strangle my expression.
    This is so much better.
    '''

  # You can still use standard JSON
  favNumbers: [ 1, 2, 3, 6, 42 ]
}

Syntax

The Hjson syntax is a superset of JSON (see json.org) but allows you to

• omit , at the end of a line,
• omit "" for keys that contain only letters and digits,
• omit "" for strings values that
  • do not start with a digit, -, {, [ or #,
  • do not start with the keywords true, false or null and
  • do not use escapes (The string terminates at the newline.)
• add # comments (the parser treats comments like whitespace),
• use multiline strings with proper whitespace handling:
  • starts with triple quotes ''', whitespace on the first line is ignored
  • ''' defines the head, on the following lines all whitespace up to this column is ignored
  • all other whitespace is assumed to be part of the string.
  • ends with triple quotes '''.

Download

• Hjson for JavaScript (Node.js/Browser)
• Conversion Tool/CLI (Node.js)
• Hjson Gulp Task
• Hjson for .Net/C#