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Has this happened to you? You're logged into a remote server and trying to read a config file or log file. The problem is its in a minified JSON format and look

Has this happened to you? You're logged into a remote server and trying to read a config file or log file. The problem is its in a minified JSON format and looks like a solid wall of noise when you try to use `less`. You reach for your go-to JSON swiss army knife `jq` but it's not installed! You don't have root access to install it via `apt-get` so you need a script you can run locally. Just copy the `jqjq` and `jqjq.jq` files to your local directory, and now you can access the full power of jq just by running `./jqjq`. Problem solved! And the best part is that the only dependency is `jq`, which should be installed pretty much everywhere.

rpadovani 4y ago
> And the best part is that the only dependency is `jq`, which should be installed pretty much everywhere. I am confused by this sentence. Wasn't the entire premise that js is NOT installed?
- jjice 4y ago
  I believe that that was the joke
- omaranto 4y ago
  You understood the joke, you just didn't find it funny.
foob 4y ago
Jokes aside, this is a actually a pretty common scenario for some people, and I wrote a tool called Exodus to solve it [1]. Exodus makes it trivial to relocate Linux binaries like jq from your local machine [1]. You can simply run exodus jq | ssh my-server locally, and then immediately have access to jq on the server. I personally find it very useful when working with servers or containers that have limited package repositories or where I don't have root access. [1] - https://github.com/intoli/exodus https://github.com/intoli/exodus
- efrecon 4y ago
  Ooh. Thank you for Exodus! It is fantastic!
- andai 4y ago
  >Exodus handles bundling all of the binary's dependencies, compiling a statically linked wrapper for the executable that invokes the relocated linker directly, and installing the bundle in ~/.exodus/ on the remote machine. That's really neat.
- fwsgonzo 4y ago
  That is very cool, and it's going to help me alot on old RHELs I think. Looks like it was actually very complicated to make!
- metadat 4y ago
  Discussed 11 months ago: Exodus – relocation of Linux binaries–and all of their deps–without containers https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29446297 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29446297 (307 points, 65 comments)
kasbah 4y ago
In all seriousness Python's json.tool is a great option here. cat big.json | python3 -m json.tool or python3 -m json.tool big.json
- jwilk 4y ago
  There's also json_pp(1), provided by Perl.
ilyt 4y ago
Joking aside ssh badly-managed-server cat file | jq . Problem solved ! I actually made a wrapper that just guesses (based on which parser returns error basically) type of serializing and then displays it nicely.
- eurasiantiger 4y ago
  Thanks for this. The pattern is useful for much more and sure beats pushing ad-hoc 3rd-party-relinked binaries to production containers. Then again, why not scp the file to local? Bandwidth usage isn’t good for the environment.
  - TheReveller 4y ago
    Why stop at one file, is it possible to locally mount a remote folder over ssh?
    - Too 4y ago
      Yep, it's called sshfs, very easy to use.
    - ilyt 4y ago
      here is function I use sshmount () { SSHFS_SERVER_DIR='/home/user' if [ "z$1" = "z" ] then echo "specify server [server_dir]" return fi SSHFS_SERVER=$1 if [ "z$2" != "z" ] then SSHFS_SERVER_DIR=$2 fi SSHFS_TARGET_DIR="/home/user/mnt/$SSHFS_SERVER" echo "Mounting $SSHFS_SERVER:$SSHFS_SERVER_DIR into $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR" mkdir -p $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR sshfs -o idmap=user -o allow_other -o kernel_cache $SSHFS_SERVER:$SSHFS_SERVER_DIR $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR && cd $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR } sshmount servername will mount server's home in directory /home/user/mnt/servername, second parameter changes the server dir to specified one
cerved 4y ago
You can use cut, tr and sed https://stackoverflow.com/a/70614580/1507124 https://stackoverflow.com/a/70614580/1507124 it's not full pretty, rather just newline delimits arrays. Incidentally, it's much faster than jq. Probably wouldn't use it for anything serious
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
blackhaz 4y ago
Just out of curiosity, why would anyone want to store a config file in a minified JSON format?
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
  Probably computer generated and defaulted to compact output.
yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
Bravo; I got most of the way through before catching the joke:)

rpadovani 4y ago

> And the best part is that the only dependency is `jq`, which should be installed pretty much everywhere. I am confused by this sentence. Wasn't the entire premise that js is NOT installed?

jjice 4y ago
I believe that that was the joke
omaranto 4y ago
You understood the joke, you just didn't find it funny.

foob 4y ago

Jokes aside, this is a actually a pretty common scenario for some people, and I wrote a tool called Exodus to solve it [1]. Exodus makes it trivial to relocate Linux binaries like jq from your local machine [1]. You can simply run exodus jq | ssh my-server locally, and then immediately have access to jq on the server. I personally find it very useful when working with servers or containers that have limited package repositories or where I don't have root access. [1] - https://github.com/intoli/exodus https://github.com/intoli/exodus

efrecon 4y ago
Ooh. Thank you for Exodus! It is fantastic!
andai 4y ago
>Exodus handles bundling all of the binary's dependencies, compiling a statically linked wrapper for the executable that invokes the relocated linker directly, and installing the bundle in ~/.exodus/ on the remote machine. That's really neat.
fwsgonzo 4y ago
That is very cool, and it's going to help me alot on old RHELs I think. Looks like it was actually very complicated to make!
metadat 4y ago
Discussed 11 months ago: Exodus – relocation of Linux binaries–and all of their deps–without containers https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29446297 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29446297 (307 points, 65 comments)

kasbah 4y ago

In all seriousness Python's json.tool is a great option here. cat big.json | python3 -m json.tool or python3 -m json.tool big.json

jwilk 4y ago
There's also json_pp(1), provided by Perl.

ilyt 4y ago

Joking aside ssh badly-managed-server cat file | jq . Problem solved ! I actually made a wrapper that just guesses (based on which parser returns error basically) type of serializing and then displays it nicely.

eurasiantiger 4y ago
Thanks for this. The pattern is useful for much more and sure beats pushing ad-hoc 3rd-party-relinked binaries to production containers. Then again, why not scp the file to local? Bandwidth usage isn’t good for the environment.
- TheReveller 4y ago
  Why stop at one file, is it possible to locally mount a remote folder over ssh?
  - Too 4y ago
    Yep, it's called sshfs, very easy to use.
  - ilyt 4y ago
    here is function I use sshmount () { SSHFS_SERVER_DIR='/home/user' if [ "z$1" = "z" ] then echo "specify server [server_dir]" return fi SSHFS_SERVER=$1 if [ "z$2" != "z" ] then SSHFS_SERVER_DIR=$2 fi SSHFS_TARGET_DIR="/home/user/mnt/$SSHFS_SERVER" echo "Mounting $SSHFS_SERVER:$SSHFS_SERVER_DIR into $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR" mkdir -p $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR sshfs -o idmap=user -o allow_other -o kernel_cache $SSHFS_SERVER:$SSHFS_SERVER_DIR $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR && cd $SSHFS_TARGET_DIR } sshmount servername will mount server's home in directory /home/user/mnt/servername, second parameter changes the server dir to specified one

cerved 4y ago

You can use cut, tr and sed https://stackoverflow.com/a/70614580/1507124 https://stackoverflow.com/a/70614580/1507124 it's not full pretty, rather just newline delimits arrays. Incidentally, it's much faster than jq. Probably wouldn't use it for anything serious

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

blackhaz 4y ago

Just out of curiosity, why would anyone want to store a config file in a minified JSON format?

yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
Probably computer generated and defaulted to compact output.

yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago

Bravo; I got most of the way through before catching the joke:)