getting all the values of an array with jq

I parse a json file with jq:

jq .response[1].text file.json

It works fine, but each time I have to enter the number .response[2].text, .response[3].text etc. I want to get all the values at once (200 values)

But when I do:

jq .response[].text file.json

It gives an error: Cannot index number with string "text"

The file looks like this:

{ "response": [ 1000, { "id": , "date": , "owner_id": , "from_id": , "post_type": "post", "text": "blabla", "attachment": { "type": "photo", "photo": { "pid": , "aid": -7, "owner_id": } }, "attachments": [ { "type": "photo", "photo": { } }, { "type": "link", "link": { "url": "", "title": "", "description": "", "target": "external" } } ], "post_source": { "type": "vk" }, "comments": { "count": 0, "groups_can_post": true, "can_post": 1 }, }, { "id": , "date": , "owner_id": , "from_id": , "post_type": "post", "text": "blabla", "attachment": { "type": "link", "link": { "url": "", "title": "", "description": "", "target": "external", " }

1 Answer

Evidently one of the items in the array is a string. If your jq supports "?", then one possibility would be to use it:

.response[].text?

Another would be to check the type explicitly, e.g.:

.response[] | objects | .text

Yet another possibility:

.response[] | select(type=="object" and has("text")) | .text

If you want to have a placeholder value when there is no "text" field:

 .response[] | if type=="object" and has("text") then .text else null end

So it really depends on your requirements and perhaps the version of jq that you are using.