Start at the root
01An empty pointer selects the whole document. Each slash-prefixed token then selects one child value.
The next token is name; its value is the string Ada in this example.
Source for this drawing: RFC 6901 · Read RFC section 4 ↗
New to this? Start hereA quick picture + helpful background
A message needs an address.
Think of a packet as a small addressed envelope. Devices pass it onward; transport protocols decide what delivery promises an application gets.
Helpful first, if these ideas are unfamiliar
These pictures are analogies to help you learn. The linked RFC explains the actual rules.
Terms in this drawing
- Root value
- The whole JSON document before any tokens are evaluated.
- Reference token
- One name or index following a slash in a pointer.
Related RFCs and changes
“Updates” changes part of an earlier RFC. “Obsoletes” replaces it. This list shows selected related documents.
Follow tokens one at a time from the root value.
- A JSON Pointer is a Unicode string of zero or more slash-prefixed reference tokens. The empty string selects the entire document; / contains one empty token and selects an object member named with the empty string, if it exists.
- For an object, a decoded token selects a member with exactly the same name. No Unicode normalization is performed. If that referenced name is not unique, the referenced member is undefined and evaluation fails.
- Each token is evaluated against the value selected by the previous token. Invalid syntax or a missing value is an error; absent an application-defined error action, evaluation terminates. Applications SHOULD specify the impact and handling of errors.
The example document is {"profile":{"name":"Ada"}}. Quotation marks around displayed pointers show string boundaries; they are not part of the pointer value. A pointer identifies a value; it does not itself modify it, validate a schema, or grant access.
Read the RFC section ↗