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Store an extract definition in JSON format

Source: R/api_define_extract.R
save_extract_as_json.Rd

Read and write an ipums_extract object to a JSON file that contains the extract definition specifications.

Use these functions to store a copy of an extract definition outside of your R environment and/or share an extract definition with another registered IPUMS user.

Learn more about the IPUMS API in vignette("ipums-api").

Usage

save_extract_as_json(extract, file, overwrite = FALSE)

define_extract_from_json(extract_json)

Arguments

extract

An ipums_extract object.

file

File path to which to write the JSON-formatted extract definition.

overwrite

If TRUE, overwrite file if it already exists. Defaults to FALSE.

extract_json

Path to a file containing a JSON-formatted extract definition.

Value

An ipums_extract object.

API Version Compatibility

As of v0.6.0, ipumsr only supports IPUMS API version 2. If you have stored an extract definition made using version beta or version 1 of the IPUMS API, you will not be able to load it using define_extract_from_json(). The API version for the request should be stored in the saved JSON file. (If there is no "api_version" or "version" field in the JSON file, the request was likely made under version beta or version 1.)

If the extract definition was originally made under your user account and you know its corresponding extract number, use get_extract_info() to obtain a definition compliant with IPUMS API version 2. You can then save this definition to JSON with save_extract_as_json().

Otherwise, you will need to update the JSON file to be compliant with IPUMS API version 2. In general, this should only require renaming all JSON fields written in snake_case to camelCase. For instance, "data_tables" would become "dataTables", "data_format" would become "dataFormat", and so on. You will also need to change the "api_version" field to "version" and set it equal to 2. If you are unable to create a valid extract by modifying the file, you may have to recreate the definition manually using the appropriate define_extract_*() function.

See the IPUMS developer documentation for more details on API versioning and breaking changes introduced in version 2.

See also

define_extract_*() to define an extract request manually.

get_extract_info() to obtain a past extract to save.

submit_extract() to submit an extract request for processing.

add_to_extract() and remove_from_extract() to revise an extract definition.

Examples

my_extract <- define_extract_usa(
  description = "2013-2014 ACS Data",
  samples = c("us2013a", "us2014a"),
  variables = c("SEX", "AGE", "YEAR")
)

extract_json_path <- file.path(tempdir(), "usa_extract.json")
save_extract_as_json(my_extract, file = extract_json_path)

copy_of_my_extract <- define_extract_from_json(extract_json_path)

identical(my_extract, copy_of_my_extract)
#> [1] TRUE

file.remove(extract_json_path)
#> [1] TRUE