Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by mirimir 2879 days ago
Sure, simple JSON you can view in browsers.

But with CSV you can just use spreadsheets. Are there n00b-friendly apps based on R, Python, etc?

And can't you always convert JSON to multiple CSV files?
1 comments
PeterisP 2879 days ago
Only if you accept a potentially unlimited number of CSV files/sheets. Many forms of data aren't really easily normalizable to a limited number of flat tables without losing information.
link
mirimir 2879 days ago
OK, then. How would someone who's not technically sophisticated interpret such JSON?

I suppose that some service could handle it. But then there's another level of trust and GDPR compliance.

link
PeterisP 2879 days ago
Open it in any decent plaintext editor/viewer, it'll likely have support for 'prettyprinting' json, and it'll be readable.

If you want to 'do stuff' with the data, then JSON is a very (IMHO most, but your mileage may vary) reasonable format; unless that data really is just a single flat table, it would be hard to blame them from picking this format.

link