Files
json/api/basic_json_view/materialize.md
T
2026-10-28 20:27:06 +00:00

122 lines
5.1 KiB
Markdown

# <small>nlohmann::basic_json_view::</small>materialize
```cpp
BasicJsonType materialize() const;
```
Builds the `BasicJsonType` value of this subtree: the value [`BasicJsonType::parse()`](../basic_json/parse.md) would
have produced for the same source text, allocated for the first time by this call.
## Return value
The `BasicJsonType` value of this subtree, or a discarded `BasicJsonType` value (`#!cpp BasicJsonType(value_t::discarded)`)
if the view is [discarded](is_discarded.md).
## Exception safety
Strong guarantee: there are no changes to the view or the document it refers to (nothing about either is mutated by
this function).
## Exceptions
May throw `#!cpp std::bad_alloc` (via `BasicJsonType`'s allocator) if constructing the result fails.
## Complexity
Linear in the size of the subtree.
## Notes
`materialize()` replays the subtree through the same SAX builder [`BasicJsonType::parse()`](../basic_json/parse.md)
uses, so the result matches it exactly — including, for an object, that a repeated key keeps only its
last value. The replay is iterative, so it is not limited by the call stack the way a naive recursive conversion
would be; the JSON nesting depth is limited only by available memory, as for `BasicJsonType::parse()` itself.
With [`JSON_DIAGNOSTIC_POSITIONS`](../macros/json_diagnostic_positions.md) enabled, the values get the source
positions [`BasicJsonType::parse()`](../basic_json/parse.md) would give them, also for the subtree of a view (the
positions are those in the document's whole source text), and exceptions about them name the same bytes. For values of
an [editable document](../json_editable_document.md), positions are all-or-nothing, and [`start_pos()`](../basic_json/start_pos.md)
and [`end_pos()`](../basic_json/end_pos.md) return `std::string::npos` for
- a value written by an edit (a copy of an array or object of the document is also new; copies of its scalars keep
their positions),
- an array or object whose elements were changed (its elements keep theirs), and
- an array or object whose last element has no positions (its end is found from that element).
This differs from a `basic_json` value, whose positions are not updated when it is changed: they stay as they were
parsed, even if they no longer match the value (see [`start_pos()`](../basic_json/start_pos.md)).
Documents [loaded](../basic_json_document/load.md) from an image have the positions of the saved document. Its strings
with escapes have positions only if the document was parsed with `JSON_DIAGNOSTIC_POSITIONS`: the position of their
opening quote is recorded while parsing, and `save()` and `load()` keep it whether or not they are compiled with the
macro.
Calling `materialize()` on the same view repeatedly builds a new, independent `BasicJsonType` value each time; it
never caches the result.
## Examples
??? example
The example below skips messages that are not useful — a discarded value, or an empty array — using only
[`is_array()`](is_array.md) and [`empty()`](empty.md), and calls `materialize()` only for the messages that are
actually used, so no `BasicJsonType` value (and none of its per-element allocations) is ever built for the
skipped ones.
```cpp
#include <array>
#include <iostream>
#include <nlohmann/json_view.hpp>
using nlohmann::json_document;
int main()
{
// three incoming messages; skip the ones that are not useful without ever
// building a nlohmann::json value for them
json_document heartbeat = json_document::parse("null");
json_document empty_batch = json_document::parse("[]");
json_document batch = json_document::parse(R"([{"id": 1}, {"id": 2}, {"id": 3}])");
std::array<const json_document*, 3> messages = {{&heartbeat, &empty_batch, &batch}};
for (const json_document* d : messages)
{
// is_array()/empty() only look at the flat index: a discarded
// heartbeat or an empty batch is never turned into a nlohmann::json
// value, so no per-element allocation happens for them
if (!d->root().is_array() || d->root().empty())
{
std::cout << "skipped\n";
continue;
}
// materialize() replays the subtree through the same SAX builder
// basic_json::parse() uses, so the result is exactly what
// basic_json::parse() would have produced for the same text
nlohmann::json value = d->root().materialize();
std::cout << value.dump() << '\n';
}
}
```
Output:
```json
skipped
skipped
[{"id":1},{"id":2},{"id":3}]
```
## See also
- [`root`](../basic_json_document/root.md) - the view of a document's root value
- [`BasicJsonType::parse`](../basic_json/parse.md) - build a `BasicJsonType` value directly from a JSON text
- [`JSON_DIAGNOSTIC_POSITIONS`](../macros/json_diagnostic_positions.md) - source positions on parsed values
- [Zero-copy JSON views](../../features/json_view.md#getting-values-out-without-copying) - when to build a basic_json value from a view
## Version history
- Added in version 3.13.0.