fast-json-stringify

fast-json-stringify  

fast-json-stringify is significantly faster than JSON.stringify() for small payloads. Its performance advantage shrinks as your payload grows. It pairs well with flatstr, which triggers a V8 optimization that improves performance when eventually converting the string to a Buffer.

Benchmarks:

Node 8.11.2:

JSON.stringify array x 3,602 ops/sec ±1.58% (92 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify array x 4,554 ops/sec ±1.42% (93 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified array x 4,505 ops/sec ±1.60% (92 runs sampled)
JSON.stringify long string x 10,363 ops/sec ±2.00% (90 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify long string x 10,547 ops/sec ±1.63% (90 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified long string x 10,136 ops/sec ±2.27% (88 runs sampled)
JSON.stringify short string x 4,392,858 ops/sec ±2.18% (87 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify short string x 9,363,875 ops/sec ±1.90% (90 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified short string x 9,541,809 ops/sec ±0.70% (95 runs sampled)
JSON.stringify obj x 1,640,678 ops/sec ±1.94% (85 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify obj x 3,685,948 ops/sec ±0.98% (93 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified obj x 3,669,155 ops/sec ±1.19% (89 runs sampled)

Node 10.4.0:

JSON.stringify array x 3,269 ops/sec ±1.48% (86 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify array x 5,945 ops/sec ±1.51% (87 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified array x 5,720 ops/sec ±1.18% (89 runs sampled)
JSON.stringify long string x 9,325 ops/sec ±1.22% (88 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify long string x 9,678 ops/sec ±0.99% (92 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified long string x 9,578 ops/sec ±1.12% (92 runs sampled)
JSON.stringify short string x 3,307,218 ops/sec ±1.54% (92 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify short string x 28,213,341 ops/sec ±1.72% (83 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified short string x 29,130,846 ops/sec ±1.34% (87 runs sampled)
JSON.stringify obj x 1,441,648 ops/sec ±2.14% (87 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify obj x 5,345,003 ops/sec ±1.02% (91 runs sampled)
fast-json-stringify-uglified obj x 5,331,581 ops/sec ±0.73% (91 runs sampled)

Table of contents:

• Example
• API
• fastJsonStringify
• Specific use cases
• Required
• Missing fields
• Pattern Properties
• Additional Properties
• AnyOf
• Reuse - $ref
• Long integers
• Uglify
• Acknowledgements
• License

Example

const fastJson = require('fast-json-stringify')
const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    firstName: {
      type: 'string'
    },
    lastName: {
      type: 'string'
    },
    age: {
      description: 'Age in years',
      type: 'integer'
    },
    reg: {
      type: 'string'
    }
  }
})

console.log(stringify({
  firstName: 'Matteo',
  lastName: 'Collina',
  age: 32,
  reg: /"([^"]|\\")*"/
}))

API

fastJsonStringify(schema)

Build a stringify() function based on jsonschema.

Supported types:

• 'string'
• 'integer'
• 'number'
• 'array'
• 'object'
• 'boolean'
• 'null'

And nested ones, too.

Specific use cases

Instance	Serialized as
Date	string via toISOString()
RegExp	string

Required

You can set specific fields of an object as required in your schema by adding the field name inside the required array in your schema.
Example:

const schema = {
  title: 'Example Schema with required field',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      type: 'string'
    },
    mail: {
      type: 'string'
    }
  },
  required: ['mail']
}

If the object to stringify is missing the required field(s), fast-json-stringify will throw an error.

Missing fields

If a field is present in the schema (and is not required) but it is not present in the object to stringify, fast-json-stringify will not write it in the final string.
Example:

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      type: 'string'
    },
    mail: {
      type: 'string'
    }
  }
})

const obj = {
  mail: '[e-mail]'
}

console.log(stringify(obj)) // '{"mail":"[e-mail]"}'

Defaults

fast-json-stringify supports default jsonschema key in order to serialize a value if it is undefined or not present.

Example:

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      type: 'string',
      default: 'the default string'
    }
  }
})

console.log(stringify({})) // '{"nickname":"the default string"}'
console.log(stringify({nickname: 'my-nickname'})) // '{"nickname":"my-nickname"}'

Pattern properties

fast-json-stringify supports pattern properties as defined by JSON schema.
patternProperties must be an object, where the key is a valid regex and the value is an object, declared in this way: { type: 'type' }.
patternProperties will work only for the properties that are not explicitly listed in the properties object.
Example:

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      type: 'string'
    }
  },
  patternProperties: {
    'num': {
      type: 'number'
    },
    '.*foo$': {
      type: 'string'
    }
  }
})

const obj = {
  nickname: 'nick',
  matchfoo: 42,
  otherfoo: 'str'
  matchnum: 3
}

console.log(stringify(obj)) // '{"matchfoo":"42","otherfoo":"str","matchnum":3,"nickname":"nick"}'

Additional properties

fast-json-stringify supports additional properties as defined by JSON schema.
additionalProperties must be an object or a boolean, declared in this way: { type: 'type' }.
additionalProperties will work only for the properties that are not explicitly listed in the properties and patternProperties objects.

If additionalProperties is not present or is set to false, every property that is not explicitly listed in the properties and patternProperties objects,will be ignored, as described in Missing fields.
If additionalProperties is set to true, it will be used by JSON.stringify to stringify the additional properties. If you want to achieve maximum performance, we strongly encourage you to use a fixed schema where possible.
Example:

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      type: 'string'
    }
  },
  patternProperties: {
    'num': {
      type: 'number'
    },
    '.*foo$': {
      type: 'string'
    }
  },
  additionalProperties: {
    type: 'string'
  }
})

const obj = {
  nickname: 'nick',
  matchfoo: 42,
  otherfoo: 'str'
  matchnum: 3,
  nomatchstr: 'valar morghulis',
  nomatchint: 313
}

console.log(stringify(obj)) // '{"matchfoo":"42","otherfoo":"str","matchnum":3,"nomatchstr":"valar morghulis",nomatchint:"313","nickname":"nick"}'

AnyOf

fast-json-stringify supports the anyOf keyword as defined by JSON schema. anyOf must be an array of valid JSON schemas. The different schemas will be tested in the specified order. The more schemas stringify has to try before finding a match, the slower it will be.

anyOf uses ajv as a JSON schema validator to find the schema that matches the data. This has an impact on performance—only use it as a last resort.

Example:

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    'undecidedType': {
      'anyOf': [{
	type: 'string'
      }, {
	type: 'boolean'
      }]
    }
  }
}

If/then/else

fast-json-stringify supports if/then/else jsonschema feature. See ajv documentation.

Example:

const stringify = fastJson({
  'type': 'object',
  'properties': {
  },
  'if': {
    'properties': {
      'kind': { 'type': 'string', 'enum': ['foobar'] }
    }
  },
  'then': {
    'properties': {
      'kind': { 'type': 'string', 'enum': ['foobar'] },
      'foo': { 'type': 'string' },
      'bar': { 'type': 'number' }
    }
  },
  'else': {
    'properties': {
      'kind': { 'type': 'string', 'enum': ['greeting'] },
      'hi': { 'type': 'string' },
      'hello': { 'type': 'number' }
    }
  }
})

console.log(stringify({
  kind: 'greeting',
  foo: 'FOO',
  bar: 42,
  hi: 'HI',
  hello: 45
})) // {"kind":"greeting","hi":"HI","hello":45}
console.log(stringify({
  kind: 'foobar',
  foo: 'FOO',
  bar: 42,
  hi: 'HI',
  hello: 45
})) // {"kind":"greeting","foo":"FOO","bar":42}

NB: don't declare the properties twice or you'll print them twice!

Reuse - $ref

If you want to reuse a definition of a value, you can use the property $ref.
The value of $ref must be a string in JSON Pointer format.
Example:

const schema = {
  title: 'Example Schema',
  definitions: {
    num: {
      type: 'object',
      properties: {
        int: {
          type: 'integer'
        }
      }
    },
    str: {
      type: 'string'
    }
  },
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      $ref: '#/definitions/str'
    }
  },
  patternProperties: {
    'num': {
      $ref: '#/definitions/num'
    }
  },
  additionalProperties: {
    $ref: '#/definitions/def'
  }
}

const stringify = fastJson(schema)

If you need to use an external definition, you can pass it as an option to fast-json-stringify.
Example:

const schema = {
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    nickname: {
      $ref: 'strings#/definitions/str'
    }
  },
  patternProperties: {
    'num': {
      $ref: 'numbers#/definitions/num'
    }
  },
  additionalProperties: {
    $ref: 'strings#/definitions/def'
  }
}

const externalSchema = {
  numbers: {
    definitions: {
      num: {
        type: 'object',
        properties: {
          int: {
            type: 'integer'
          }
        }
      }
    }
  },
  strings: require('./string-def.json')
}

const stringify = fastJson(schema, { schema: externalSchema })

Long integers

Long integers (64-bit) are supported using the long module. Example:

const Long = require('long')

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    id: {
      type: 'integer'
    }
  }
})

const obj = {
  id: Long.fromString('18446744073709551615', true)
}

console.log(stringify(obj)) // '{"id":18446744073709551615}'

Uglify

If you want to squeeze a little bit more performance out of the serialization at the cost of readability in the generated code, you can pass uglify: true as an option. Note that you have to manually install uglify-es in order for this to work. Only version 3 is supported. Example:

Note that if you are using Node 8.3.0 or newer, there are no performance gains from using Uglify. See https://www.nearform.com/blog/node-js-is-getting-a-new-v8-with-turbofan/

const stringify = fastJson({
  title: 'Example Schema',
  type: 'object',
  properties: {
    id: {
      type: 'integer'
    }
  }
}, { uglify: true })

// stringify is now minified code
console.log(stringify({ some: 'object' })) // '{"some":"object"}'

Acknowledgements

This project was kindly sponsored by nearForm.

License

MIT