Ruby - How to parse string to array of hashes
arrays, hash, ruby
Solution
That format is called JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) and can be parsed by a builtin Ruby library:
require 'json'
images_str = '[{"id":1,"type":"Image","image_id":"asdf123"},{"id":2,"type":"Image","image_id":"asdf456"},{"id":3,"type":"Image","image_id":"asdf890"}]'
images = JSON.parse(images_str)
images.size # => 3
images[0].class # => Hash
images[0]['image_id'] # => "asdf123"
images.each { |x| puts "#{x['id']}: #{x['image_id']}" }
# 1: asdf123
# 2: asdf456
# 3: asdf890
Problem
I have a string stored in a database like so: ``` images = '[{"id":1,"type":"Image","image_id":"asdf123"},{"id":2,"type":"Image","image_id":"asdf456"},{"id":3,"type":"Image","image_id":"asdf890"}]' ``` And would like to convert it to an array so I can do something like: ``` images.each do |image| puts image.image_id end ``` Is it really just a matter of removing the outer square brackets and then following the procedure from this question Converting a Ruby String into an array or is there a more direct/elegant method?