How do you properly extract JSON (Zip) files so you can view their contents correctly?

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Hi. I recently put in a request to download data at Yahoo! Answers to download data for my current Yahoo! Answers account.

I want to save all the questions and answers I had on this account.

My data was given to me in a datapack after I downloaded it:

yahoo-answers-datapack-2021-04-19

I used Winzip to open the datapack. There is a JSON folder containing two files - one for my questions (questions.json) and one for my answers (answers.json).

I don't want to lose this data. How do I properly extract these files so I can view their contents correctly?

Should I have used Winzip to open the datapack or should I have used another program?

I have tried using certain programs to read and convert the files to other formats so I can read them, but I don't know what I am doing.

This is important to me. Yahoo! Answers is shutting down soon. I don't want to lose any of my data.

Please help. Thank you.

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Is anyone here an expert on extracting data files? Please help. Thank you.

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Found this on Google just by searching "JSON"

Quote:

How do I open a JSON file?

Because JSON files are plain text files, you can open them in any text editor, including:

Microsoft Notepad (Windows)
Apple TextEdit (Mac)
Vim (Linux)
GitHub Atom (cross-platform)

You can also open a JSON file in the Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox web browsers by dragging and dropping the file into your browser window.

https://fileinfo.com/extension/json

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@Rebelofnj,

Thank you. I tried opening the JSON files using Wordpad and Notepad, which are built into my laptop, but I get a bunch of garbled text.

I downloaded a program called File Viewer Plus 4. I hope that works.

How do I drag my JSON files into my Google Chrome browser window?

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Ok. Let's start with the basics. Zip and JSON are two very different things.

Think of ZIP as a box that you put other files inside. There are two advantages to ZIP. First it lets you put multiple files into one file (just like a box). Second, it has some math that makes the files smaller (you don't need to worry about this).

So when you open a ZIP file, you will see other files inside of it. You can take these files do whatever you want to them. You will see the option to "extract" files.... this just means taking the files out of the ZIP and storing them on your hard drive.

JSON refers to a specific way of representing information. You can think of it as an outline, there are headings and sub headings and columns. The good news about JSON is that you can read it as a human being and pretty much understand what it says even if you nothing about JSON.

So what you have is a couple of JSON outlines in a ZIP box.

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@JGoldman10,

Can you explain the process you used to do this?

If you double-click a json file inside of winzip, and select wordpad... it should be ungarbled text (i.e. you should be able to read words in english along with some symbols).

Are you getting this?

2 Replies

@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

Can you explain the process you used to do this?

If you double-click a json file inside of winzip, and select wordpad... it should be ungarbled text (i.e. you should be able to read words in english along with some symbols).

Are you getting this?

No. I tried double-clicking both JSON files, the answers file and the questions file, in Winzip. They get opened as Notepad files.

I just spoke to someone from Yahoo! regarding accessing my data from Yahoo! Answers. They told me the only way to open JSON files is with a JSON parser. There are free online JSON parsers you can use but they suggested downloading a free one. They can't suggest which parser to use because that has nothing to do with Yahoo!

1 Reply

@maxdancona,

What process are you talking about? The process to open the JSON files in Wordpad and Notepad?

0 Replies

@JGoldman10,

You should be able to read your data with notepad.

Json is a format that looks like this

{
"title": "some thread title",
"tags": ["tag1", "tag2", "tag3"],
"content": "This is the best president ever"
}

In other words.. it has a structure, but everything in it should be readable words. It shouldn't have any emoji types characters or other things that you wouldn't find on a typewriter.

Are you getting that? If you aren't getting readable words in some structure, then I don't know what you have".

0 Replies

@JGoldman10,

I should also mention:

The JSON files from Yahoo Answers will only have your own written questions and answers. It will not have the answers written by other people to your questions.

I looked through my questions.json file (which I done by saving the file on my Microsoft OneDrive and opening it on the Chrome browser; it looks incoherent but it makes sense) and it only had what I had written; the answers written by other people was not in the file.

Similar with the answers.json file: while the question title and details by other people were saved, only my answers were shown.

So if you were expecting the files to have saved the answers by other people to your questions, that is not the case.

If you really want the answers to your questions, you would need to go to Yahoo Answers and copy/paste and/or screenshot whatever you want before the May 4th deadline.

5 Replies

@Rebelofnj,

Rebelofnj wrote:

I should also mention:

The JSON files from Yahoo Answers will only have your own written questions and answers. It will not have the answers written by other people to your questions.

I looked through my questions.json file (which I done by saving the file on my Microsoft OneDrive and opening it on the Chrome browser; it looks incoherent but it makes sense) and it only had what I had written; the answers written by other people was not in the file.

Similar with the answers.json file: while the question title and details by other people were saved, only my answers were shown.

So if you were expecting the files to have saved the answers by other people to your questions, that is not the case.

Oh crap. Thank you for sharing. YES, I was expecting OTHER PEOPLES' ANSWERS given to the questions I posted.

How did you open your JSON files on the Chrome browser? I tried doing that on my own and I didn't know how to. I tried asking the rep from Yahoo! Answers I spoke to on the phone to explain how to do that, he said he couldn't tell me.

You can always bookmark caches of pages, if they are available. That saves a lot of time when you're archiving your questions.

1 Reply

@Rebelofnj,

I don't get the point of having questions and answers JSON files that DON'T include other people's answers to questions. That's dumb.

I don't know how many questions I answered but I probably asked 100's to 1000's of questions. The questions I posted are more important.

This being said, hopefully I can sift through my email from my two main Yahoo! accounts and find and save the questions from Yahoo! Answers that were answered that are the most important.

I had a few accounts between them that were deleted and/or suspended. I don't recall what SN's I used for these accounts.

For some odd reason, questions that were posted using accounts that were suspended and/or deleted get remarked as "anonymous".

Fortunately I do remember SOME old questions I posted on Yahoo! Answers on suspended/deleted accounts. I was able to copy the contents and save them in my email. I bookmarked cached pages of questions to save time.

0 Replies

@Rebelofnj,

That was nice of you to help me. Thank you.

0 Replies

@JGoldman10,

Quote:

How did you open your JSON files on the Chrome browser?

When you open the browser, just type the file location from your hard drive on to the address bar.

The file location should look like this or similar (not the exact same due to everyone having different hard drives):

Quote:

C:/Program Files/Downloads/answers.json

As mentioned, it will still look like a jumbled mess, but it is readable.

1 Reply

@Rebelofnj,

Hi. Thank you for your help. I typed in the directories for my questions.json and answers.json files from my Yahoo! Answers datapack into the search bar in my Google Chrome browser and bookmarked the pages the data is on.

Yes, the data does look like a jumbled mess.

1 Reply

@JGoldman10,

JSON is just a text file, that should be readable. Are you atill h aving troubles....I would guess not.

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I am wondering, will cached pages of Yahoo! Answers questions still be available online once Yahoo! Answers is down?

I still have time to archive questions. I haven't had the time to do this in the past few days. I was busy.

I'm going to do this over the weekend.

1 Reply

@JGoldman10,

JGoldman10 wrote:

I am wondering, will cached pages of Yahoo! Answers questions still be available online once Yahoo! Answers is down?

I still have time to archive questions. I haven't had the time to do this in the past few days. I was busy.

I'm going to do this over the weekend.

Okay. Why is no one responding to this?

1 Reply

@JGoldman10,

Because people here genuinely do not know.

I'm going to make an educated guess (because I don't know for sure) and say yes, via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine.

1 Reply

@Rebelofnj,

I meant when you find questions in Google or Bing will you still be able to access the cached webpages for webpages with the questions on them, assuming the webpages the questions are on had cached webpages?

I should contact Yahoo! Customer Service and ask them about this.

0 Replies

How do you properly extract JSON (Zip) files so you can view their contents correctly?

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