Editing Openai/6937ffdf-2f14-800e-816d-c3a88af3ea11 (section)

== gpt-5-1 ==
=== User: I'm using jsonpathng.ext for a project that maps a JSON source to a target. ===
I'm using jsonpath_ng.ext for a project that maps a JSON source to a target. It's largely metadata driven and in many cases a simple jsonpath like "$.email" can map to a target field. In some cases concatenation is required like this; "$.firstName + ' ' + $.lastName". So far, so good. This works.

But; I have an issue whereby source data can have None for an attribute value and this results in the jsonpath parse returning an empty list. I need something similar to this pseudo "($.firstName or '') + ' ' + ($.lastName or '')".

Any idea how I can coalesce None to empty string so my concatenation doesn't result in None?

=== Assistant: Here are three practical, working approaches you can use with jsonpathng.ext to safely coalesce None values to empty st… ===
Here are three practical, working approaches you can use with jsonpath_ng.ext to safely coalesce None values to empty strings during concatenation.

=== ✅ Problem Recap ===
* You have expressions like:

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">"$.firstName + ' ' + $.lastName"

</syntaxhighlight>
* But if firstName or lastName is None (or missing), jsonpath_ng returns an empty list, causing the expression to fail (or produce None / empty output).
* You want something like:

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">($.firstName or '') + ' ' + ($.lastName or '')

</syntaxhighlight>

=== 🔥 Important Detail ===

jsonpath_ng itself does not support <code>or</code>, boolean logic, or default operators inside expressions.

But you can still safely coalesce values by using Python and jsonpath together.

=== ✅ Solution 1: Use a helper to get a string-safe value ===

This is the recommended and cleanest approach.

===== Helper: =====

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">from jsonpath_ng.ext import parse

def extract_safe(data, expr):
    match = parse(expr).find(data)
    if not match:
        return ''           # missing
    value = match[0].value
    return value or ''      # None → '', '' stays ''

</syntaxhighlight>

===== Usage: =====

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">full_name = f"{extract_safe(data, '$.firstName')} {extract_safe(data, '$.lastName')}"

</syntaxhighlight>

This handles:
* missing values
* None
* empty string
* type safety

=== ✅ Solution 2: Wrap your jsonpath resolution with .get() logic ===

If your JSON looks like:

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">data = {
    "firstName": None,
    "lastName": "Ali"
}

</syntaxhighlight>

You can bypass jsonpath for single-level fields:

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">full_name = f"{data.get('firstName') or ''} {data.get('lastName') or ''}"

</syntaxhighlight>

But this only works for simple paths, not nested jsonpath queries.

=== ✅ Solution 3: Pre-clean your source dict recursively ===

If you want jsonpath to always receive "safe" data, convert every None to "":

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">def coalesce_none(obj):
    if isinstance(obj, dict):
        return {k: coalesce_none(v) for k, v in obj.items()}
    if isinstance(obj, list):
        return [coalesce_none(v) for v in obj]
    return '' if obj is None else obj

</syntaxhighlight>

Then:

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">data = coalesce_none(raw_data)

</syntaxhighlight>

Now jsonpath always gets strings instead of None.

=== 🔥 Solution 4 (Advanced): Extend jsonpath_ng to add a default() function ===

If you need to write expressions like this:

<syntaxhighlight>default($.firstName, '') + ' ' + default($.lastName, '')

</syntaxhighlight>

You can extend the grammar—but this requires custom parser work.
If you want, I can generate a full working DefaultFunction extension for jsonpath_ng.ext.

=== 🚀 Which approach should you use? ===

| Approach                 | Best for                        | Pros                   | Cons                             |
| ------------------------ | ------------------------------- | ---------------------- | -------------------------------- |
| extract_safe() helper    | Concatenation & mapping systems | Simple, explicit, safe | Requires wrapping your paths     |
| dict.get()               | Shallow fields                  | Very easy              | Doesn't support complex jsonpath |
| Recursive cleaning       | Large JSON transformations      | One-time cleanup       | Mutates or copies whole JSON     |
| Custom jsonpath function | Expression-level control        | Most flexible          | Requires grammar extension       |

=== 🎯 Recommended for your mapping engine ===

Use Solution 1 because your mapping is metadata-driven:

<syntaxhighlight lang="python">first = extract_safe(data, '$.firstName')
last = extract_safe(data, '$.lastName')

target["fullName"] = f"{first} {last}".strip()

</syntaxhighlight>

If you want, I can also:
* Add trimming rules
* Add None → '' handling for lists
* Build a more powerful mapping engine wrapper
* Extend jsonpath to support or or default() syntax

Just tell me!