Old vs New Framework JSON benchmarks

General
1

For my own curiosity I decided to benchmark the loading speeds of the old framework JSONItem class, compared to the new framework xojo.Data.ParseJSON method, to determine if there are any significant speed differences between them.

Code used for testing…

OLD FRAMEWORK:

  Dim jsonObject As JSONItem
  Dim i As Integer
  
  for i = 1 to 100000
    jsonObject = new JSONItem("{""abc"":1,""def"":2,""ccc"":[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]}")
  next i
  
  MsgBox jsonObject.Value("abc")

NEW FRAMEWORK:

  Dim jsonObject As xojo.Core.Dictionary
  Dim i As Integer
  Dim num As Integer
  
  for i = 1 to 100000
    jsonObject = xojo.Core.Dictionary(xojo.Data.ParseJSON("{""abc"":1,""def"":2,""ccc"":[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]}"))
  next i 
  
  num = jsonObject.Value("abc")
  MsgBox num.ToText()

I’m still a novice when it comes to the new framework, and aren’t sure if there are perhaps ways to improve the code I used?

RESULTS:

The new framework is the clear winner, in terms of parsing speed.

2

Now try generating a large json object. :slight_smile:

3

Dang, the new generation method is fast.

I used the code below to generate an “old” JSONItem object, as well as a matching “new” xojo.Core.Dictionary object. The object initialization code was separated from the speed testing code as to not interfere with the profiling speeds. These two test objects are pretty decent in size, and produces the exact same JSON result string.

CREATE TEST OBJECTS:

  Dim i As Integer
  Dim j As Integer
  Dim k As Integer
  Dim arrInt() As Integer
  Dim arrText() As Text
  Dim arrStr() As String
  Dim tmpJSON As JSONItem
  
  for i = 1 to 1000
    arrInt.Append i
    arrText.Append i.ToText()
    arrStr.Append Str(i)
  next i
  
  // old JSON object
  
  oldJSONObject = new JSONItem()
  oldJSONObject.Value("abc") = 1
  oldJSONObject.Value("def") = "qwe"
  for i = 1 to 10
    tmpJSON = new JSONItem("[]")
    for k = 0 to arrInt.Ubound
      tmpJSON.Append arrInt(k)
    next k
    oldJSONObject.Value("arri" + i.ToText) = tmpJSON
  next i
  for i = 1 to 10
    tmpJSON = new JSONItem("[]")
    for k = 0 to arrStr.Ubound
      tmpJSON.Append arrStr(k)
    next k
    oldJSONObject.Value("arrt" + i.ToText) = tmpJSON
  next i
  oldJSONObject.Value("yui") = "yui"
  
  // new JSON object
  
  newJSONObject = new xojo.Core.Dictionary()
  newJSONObject.Value("abc") = 1
  newJSONObject.Value("def") = "qwe"
  for i = 1 to 10
    newJSONObject.Value("arri" + i.ToText) = arrInt
  next i
  for i = 1 to 10
    newJSONObject.Value("arrt" + i.ToText) = arrText
  next i
  newJSONObject.Value("yui") = "yui"
  
  msgbox "done"

The following methods were used to test the speed of generating JSON strings from the two test objects:

OLD FRAMEWORK:

  Dim i As Integer
  Dim jsonStr As String
  
  // test generation speed
  
  for i = 1 to 10
    jsonStr = oldJSONObject.ToString()
  next i

NEW FRAMEWORK:

  Dim i As Integer
  Dim jsonText As Text
  
  // test generation speed
  
  for i = 1 to 10
    jsonText = xojo.Data.GenerateJSON(newJSONObject)
  next i

… and the results…

4

This is really promising and I look forward to utilizing it more.