Bing Maps JSON not parsing with JSON.parse

Question

I'm trying to use Bing Maps for reverse geocoding purposes in a Windows Store Application. My request (using WinJS.xhr) goes through just fine, and I get a response similar to this one from their example page:

{
   "authenticationResultCode":"ValidCredentials",
   "brandLogoUri":"http:\/\/dev.virtualearth.net\/Branding\/logo_powered_by.png",
   "copyright":"Copyright © 2011 Microsoft and its suppliers. All rights reserved. This API cannot be accessed and the content and any results may not be used, reproduced or transmitted in any manner without express written permission from Microsoft Corporation.",
   "resourceSets":[
      {
         "estimatedTotal":1,
         "resources":[
            {
               "__type":"Location:http:\/\/schemas.microsoft.com\/search\/local\/ws\/rest\/v1",
               "bbox":[
                  47.636705672917948,
                  -122.137016420622,
                  47.6444311080593,
                  -122.1217297861384
               ],
               "name":"1 Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052",
               "point":{
                  "type":"Point",
                  "coordinates":[
                     47.640568390488625,
                     -122.1293731033802
                  ]
               },
               "address":{
                  "addressLine":"1 Microsoft Way",
                  "adminDistrict":"WA",
                  "adminDistrict2":"King Co.",
                  "countryRegion":"United States",
                  "formattedAddress":"1 Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052",
                  "locality":"Redmond",
                  "postalCode":"98052"
               },
               "confidence":"Medium",
               "entityType":"Address",
               "geocodePoints":[
                  {
                     "type":"Point",
                     "coordinates":[
                        47.640568390488625,
                        -122.1293731033802
                     ],
                     "calculationMethod":"Interpolation",
                     "usageTypes":[
                        "Display",
                        "Route"
                     ]
                  }
               ],
               "matchCodes":[
                  "Good"
               ]
            }
         ]
      }
   ],
   "statusCode":200,
   "statusDescription":"OK",
   "traceId":"99b1256e09044490bce82bbbba1dab7a"
}

However when I call JSON.parse on the data and try to display it, all it returns is

[object Object]

What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

As others have mentioned, it did parse, you just don't recognise the result.

JSON is a serialisation of an object heirarchy to a string.

JSON.parse(...) turns a JSON serialisation (string) back into an object heirarchy.

That heirrarchy of objects can't juse be displayed -- it can be traversed! -- you'll need to encode it into something that can be displayed (for example HTML).

To do that, you traverse the object heirarchy building up an HTML fragment string. Then you can simply add that to the HTML DOM via the innerHTML propery of an existing element (say a container DIV).