Writing a dictionary to a file in python

Question

I want to write a complex List of dictionaries to a file. Below is my list of dictionaries:

[
  {
    "Year": "2015",
    "Movies": {
      "type": "Horror",
      "Total Hours": "3",
      "Trimmed": 3000,
      "List": [
        {
          "date": "20/10/15",
          "time": "10:00:00",
          "type": "Horror",
          "text": "abcjsaadasd",
          "start": 00:00:00,
          "end": 02:59:13
          "Hero":"asfaf"
        },
        {
          "date": "22/10/15",
          "time": "11:00:00",
          "type": "Horror",
          "text": "sdvsdnsdfa",
          "start": 00:00:00,
          "end": 02:55:10,
          "Hero":"dsvsfs"
        }
      ]
    }
  },
  {
    "Year": "2016",
    "Movies": {
      "type": "Thriller",
      "Total Hours": "3",
      "Trimmed":100,
      "List":[]
    }
  }
]

I know how to write to a file in Python but I don't know how to parse this kind of complex list of dictionary.

Also I need to check for the List and If it is empty I should erase that dictionary (Eg: The second dictionary present in the above data) .

Please help me to solve this issue.Thanks a lot!

Answer 1

For something like that, I would use it to write it to a JSON file. You can do that like that

import pandas as pd
df = pd.DataFrame(your_complex_dataset)
df.to_json('file_name.json')

Answer 2

Try this:

import json
# filter out all dicts with empty List
filtered_data = [d for d in data if d.get("Movies", {}).get("List")] 
# write the filtered data 
with open("output.json", "w") as f:
    json.dump(filtered_data, f) into a file

Answer 3

Want to write complex objects to file? Then try to Pickle it.

(Above Answers are good but sharing another way)

Pickle is a way to serialize a python object and save to a file. Once you have done so, you de-serialize back when every you want it.

To Write

import pickle
mylist = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd'] # Instead of list, this can be you dict or so,..
with open('datafile.pickle', 'wb') as fh:
   pickle.dump(mylist, fh)

To Read

import pickle
pickle_off = open ("datafile.txt", "rb")
emp = pickle.load(pickle_off)
print(emp)

Link: https://www.tutorialspoint.com/python-pickling

As for the part of the validation empty list, you can use len function if its empty and do as required.