Trying to parse JSON: Current JsonReader item is not an object - json

Question

I already know to parse JSON in Java, but when I try to do it in VB.NET I get this error:
Newtonsoft.Json.JsonReaderException: 'Error reading JObject from JsonReader. Current JsonReader item is not an object: StartArray. Path '', line 1, position 1.'*
This is the code:
Dim requestUrl = "https://financialmodelingprep.com/api/v3/quote/TSLA?apikey={API_KEY}"
Dim jsonCode As String = New WebClient().DownloadString(requestUrl)
Dim json As JObject = JObject.Parse(jsonCode)
Dim price = json.SelectToken("price")
MsgBox(price)
End Sub
The message contained in the JSON is this:
[ {
"symbol" : "TSLA",
"name" : "Tesla, Inc.",
"price" : 431.38000000,
"changesPercentage" : 0.33000000,
"change" : 1.43000000,
"dayLow" : 427.76000000,
"dayHigh" : 452.50000000,
"yearHigh" : 502.49000000,
"yearLow" : 65.42000000,
"marketCap" : 408905547776.00000000,
"priceAvg50" : 423.72656000,
"priceAvg200" : 306.00583000,
"volume" : 28554811,
"avgVolume" : 63881259,
"exchange" : "NASDAQ",
"open" : 439.50000000,
"previousClose" : 429.95000000,
"eps" : 0.52300000,
"pe" : 824.81836000,
"earningsAnnouncement" : "2020-10-21T16:07:16.000+0000",
"sharesOutstanding" : 947901033,
"timestamp" : 1604951080
} ]
I would like to extract "price" and put it in a double.

Answer 1

Since you know what the incoming payload looks like, you should go ahead and create a class to represent the object:
Public Class Quote
Public Property symbol As String
Public Property name As String
Public Property price As Double
Public Property changesPercentage As Double
Public Property change As Double
Public Property dayLow As Double
Public Property dayHigh As Double
Public Property yearLow As Double
Public Property marketCap As Double
Public Property priceAvg50 As Double
Public Property priceAvg200 As Double
Public Property volume As Double
Public Property avgVolume As Double
Public Property exchange As String
Public Property open As Double
Public Property previousClose As Double
Public Property eps As Double
Public Property pe As Double
Public Property earningsAnnouncement As DateTimeOffset
Public Property sharesOutstanding As UInteger
Public Property timestamp As UInteger
End Class
From here you can use the DeserializeObject method to deserialize the array, get the first item in the collection, and then get the necessary properties:
Dim quotes = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(Of List(Of Quote))(jsonCode)
Dim tesla = quotes?.SingleOrDefault()
If (tesla IsNot Nothing) Then
Console.WriteLine(tesla.price)
End If