json_decode doesn't work on my string - php

Question

I have JSON Object which I have encoded like so
{
"id": "",
"steps": [
{
"target": "purchase_order_items_itemmaster_id",
"title": "",
"placement": "",
"content": "",
"xoffset": "",
"yoffset": ""
}
]
}
$JSONData = json_encode($finalData,JSON_PRETTY_PRINT);
I am taking this JSON data and storing it in a file like so
File::put("path","var tour = \n [ \n\t $JSONData \n ];");
which looks something like this in the file
var tour =
[
{
"id": "",
"steps": [
{
"target": "purchase_order_items_itemmaster_id",
"title": "",
"placement": "",
"content": "",
"xoffset": "",
"yoffset": ""
}
]
}
];
Now I am reading it back form the second line like so
[
{
"id": "",
"steps": [
{
"target": "purchase_order_items_itemmaster_id",
"title": "",
"placement": "",
"content": "",
"xoffset": "",
"yoffset": ""
}
]
}
];
The problem is when I want to decode it back it doesn't happen,this is how I am trying to do that,
$lines = file_get_contents("path",NULL,NULL,10);
$a = json_decode($lines);
Now according to expected output the $a should have the decoded data but it has null.
Can someone point out the mistake?

Answer 1

I believe the issue is the semicolon at the end of the JSON you've read back in from the file. Try chopping that off before attempting json_decode:
$a = json_decode(rtrim($lines, ";"));

Answer 2

pass the second parameter true for recursively decoding
$a = json_decode(chop($lines,";"),true);
check the php mannual here json_decode

Answer 3

It will be
$str = file_get_contents('http://example.com/example.json/');
$json = json_decode($str, true); // decode the JSON into an associative array
See the post
Parsing JSON file with PHP

Answer 4

try to save data in file like
$fp = fopen('path', 'w');
fwrite($fp, json_encode($JSONData)); //if $JSONData is in string
fclose($fp);
instead of
File::put("path","var tour = \n [ \n\t $JSONData \n ];");
//and read like
// Read JSON file
$json = file_get_contents('path');
//Decode JSON
$json_data = json_decode($json,true);
//Print data
print_r($json_data);