# JSON parsing with select

**URL:** <https://forum.ansible.com/t/json-parsing-with-select/20999>\
**Category:** Ansible Project\
**Created:** [March 28, 2016, 3:55pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/json-parsing-with-select/20999 "2016-03-28T15:55:55Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Guy\_Matz1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5e925/32.png) [@Guy\_Matz1](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Guy_Matz1)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2016, 3:55pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/json-parsing-with-select/20999/1 "2016-03-28T15:55:55Z")

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Hello! I get JSON like the following returned from a REST API:

{  
“tasks” : [ {  
“id” : “artifactory.VirtualCacheCleanupJob#9e6619bd-1864-4e1a-9fd7-8bb138813bf1”,  
“type” : “org.artifactory.repo.cleanup.VirtualCacheCleanupJob”,  
“state” : “scheduled”,  
“description” : “Virtual Repositories Cache Cleanup”  
}, {  
“id” : “artifactory.ArtifactCleanupJob#63053617-894c-4099-a897-caf5b1a3abd2”,  
“type” : “org.artifactory.repo.cleanup.ArtifactCleanupJob”,  
“state” : “scheduled”,  
“description” : “Remote Repositories Cached Artifacts Cleanup”  
}, {  
“id” : “artifactory.IntegrationCleanupJob#517e5d53-a183-4a18-abe4-b81e1136398d”,  
“type” : “org.artifactory.repo.cleanup.IntegrationCleanupJob”,  
“state” : “scheduled”,  
“description” : “Integration/Snapshot Versions Cleanup”  
} ]  
}

“tasks” is a list, and I need to get the “state” of one of the entries in this list. I can’t depend on the list staying in this order so I can’t use an index to get the element I want. I can get the element I need in shell using a jq query:  
jq ‘.tasks | select(.type == “org.artifactory.repo.cleanup.IntegrationCleanupJob”).state’

which gets the “state” for the specific type. Anyone know of an easy way to do this in ansible? I’m about to write a custom filter, but thought there might be a more concise way. I’d rather not use jq with the command module, although I guess I could do that too.

Thanks!  
Guy

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**Author:** ![sivel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/ansible/user_avatar/forum.ansible.com/sivel/32/1198_2.png) [@sivel](https://forum.ansible.com/u/sivel)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2016, 4:03pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/json-parsing-with-select/20999/2 "2016-03-28T16:03:58Z")

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This is untested, but here is how to do that with jinja2 using built in filters:

(some\_var|selectattr(‘type’, ‘equalto’, ‘org.artifactory.repo.cleanup.IntegrationCleanupJob’)|first)[‘state’]

selectattr always returns a generator/list.

[http://jinja.pocoo.org/docs/dev/templates/#selectattr](http://jinja.pocoo.org/docs/dev/templates/#selectattr)

[http://jinja.pocoo.org/docs/dev/templates/#equalto](http://jinja.pocoo.org/docs/dev/templates/#equalto)

[http://jinja.pocoo.org/docs/dev/templates/#first](http://jinja.pocoo.org/docs/dev/templates/#first)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Guy\_Matz1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5e925/32.png) [@Guy\_Matz1](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Guy_Matz1)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2016, 4:15pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/json-parsing-with-select/20999/3 "2016-03-28T16:15:09Z")

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Awesome!!!