having trouble drilling down into response json using alamofire. Swift - json

Question

Ok so im having trouble drilling down into the response json that is retrieved in the below code.
Snapshot 1:
Snapshot 2:
I get the json above as a response, yet when I try to drill down into the json I cannot access the key "Address" or any other key that is held under bookings. it finds bookings but then assigns the variables i created for each key's value (address, state, zipcode, and city) and assigns these variables as null. My only theory is that the response json has "()" right after bookings instead of the normal "{}". Those brakets do appear after the parentheses, so how would i drill into that with out a key? I am still new to the app dev world so i could be completely wrong, just this request method has worked for me in the past when i've received "{}" after the first key.

Answer 1

1) You are using method valueForKeyPath() to get value from dictionary.
Change it to valueForKey().
2) Value for key "bookings" will give you array.
Try this code.
let data = JSON as! NSDictionary;
//value for key "bookings" will give you array
if let bookings = data.valueForKey("bookings") as? NSArray {
let bookingObj = bookings[0] as! NSDictionary;
self.address = bookingObj.valueForKey("address");
self.state = bookingObj.valueForKey("state");
self.zip = bookingObj.valueForKey("zip");
self.city = bookingObj.valueForKey("city");
}
FYI Please Note that, method valueForKeyPath() returns array of value for particular key from the array of dictionaries.
e.g. suppose you have multiple objects of bookings array, and you use
let arrayAddresses = bookings.valueForKeyPath("address") as! NSArray
this will return string array containing only address of all object.
Another point, '()' means Array Value, '{}' means Dictionary value.

Answer 2

I'd suggest using Swift types (like [String: AnyObject]) instead of Foundation types (like NSDictionary), and on top of that, you should print out when something fails so you know what's wrong. So starting from your let data = ... line, try this instead:
if let data = JSON as? [String: AnyObject],
bookings = data["bookings"] as? [[String: AnyObject]],
booking = bookings[0] {
self.address = booking["address"] as? String
self.state = booking["state"] as? String
self.zipCode = booking["zip"] as? String
self.city = booking["city"] as? String
print(self.address)
} else {
print("Couldn't parse booking from JSON")
}
More on why typing is important (and why you should use [[String: AnyObject]] instead of NSArray) in this article. You can be more specific and more concise if you use proper types.