Question

I’ve a problem with JSON in python.

In fact, if I try to execute this code, python gives me a sorted JSON string!

For example:

values = {
  'profile': 'testprofile',
  'format': 'RSA_RC4_Sealed',
  'enc_key': base64.b64encode(chiave_da_inviare),
  'request': base64.b64encode(data)
}

values_json = json.dumps(values, sort_keys = False, separators = (',', ':'))

And this is the output:

{
  "profile": "testprofile",
  "enc_key": "GBWo[...]NV6w==",
  "request": "TFl[...]uYw==",
  "format": "RSA_RC4_Sealed"
}

As you can see, I tried to use “sort_keys=False” but nothing changed.

How can I stop Python sorting my JSON strings?

Answer 1

You are storing your values into a Python dict which has no inherent notion of ordering at all, it’s just a key-to-value map. So your items lose all ordering when you place them into the values variable.

In fact the only way to get a deterministic ordering would be to use sort_keys=True, which I assume places them in alphanumeric ordering. Why is the order so important?