Getting specific fields' values of a text using awk, sed, and grep - bash

Question

I would like to get the values of the name fields of the following text, using sed, awk, grep or similar.
{
"cast": [
{
"character": "",
"credit_id": "52532e3119c29579400012b5",
"gender": null,
"id": 23629,
"name": "Brian O'Halloran",
"order": 0,
"profile_path": "/eJsLxovTdcm6QK9PDB2pCe5FMqK.jpg"
},
{
"character": "",
"credit_id": "52532e3119c2957940001315",
"gender": null,
"id": 19302,
"name": "Jason Mewes",
"order": 1,
"profile_path": "/so3nT2vgSCZMO2QXDVHF3ubxaFX.jpg"
},
{
"character": "",
"credit_id": "52532e3119c295794000133d",
"gender": null,
"id": 23630,
"name": "Jeff Anderson",
"order": 2,
"profile_path": "/vjt5WhpJAx0jxvmiGc5PAOBzzb7.jpg"
},
{
"character": "Silent Bob",
"credit_id": "52532e3219c2957940001359",
"gender": null,
"id": 19303,
"name": "Kevin Smith",
"order": 4,
"profile_path": "/3XXThSMqHQgQFjM4bMJ25U1EJTj.jpg"
}
],
"crew": [
{
"credit_id": "55425dbe9251410efa000094",
"department": "Visual Effects",
"gender": null,
"id": 1419667,
"job": "Animation Manager",
"name": "Richard J. Gasparian",
"profile_path": null
},
{
"credit_id": "5544521dc3a3680ce60037e8",
"department": "Art",
"gender": null,
"id": 1450356,
"job": "Background Designer",
"name": "Tristin Cole",
"profile_path": null
},
{
"credit_id": "554a142dc3a3683c84001851",
"department": "Art",
"gender": null,
"id": 1447432,
"job": "Background Designer",
"name": "Nadia Vurbenova",
"profile_path": null
},
{
"credit_id": "554bcd2b9251414692002c9b",
"department": "Production",
"gender": null,
"id": 1447493,
"job": "Location Manager",
"name": "Simon Rodgers",
"profile_path": null
},
{
"credit_id": "52532e3219c29579400013cd",
"department": "Production",
"gender": null,
"id": 19303,
"job": "Executive Producer",
"name": "Kevin Smith",
"profile_path": "/3XXThSMqHQgQFjM4bMJ25U1EJTj.jpg"
},
{
"credit_id": "52532e3319c2957940001405",
"department": "Production",
"gender": null,
"id": 59839,
"job": "Producer",
"name": "Harvey Weinstein",
"profile_path": "/k4UCnh7n0r5CEjq30gAl6QCfF9g.jpg"
},
{
"credit_id": "52532e3319c29579400014a7",
"department": "Production",
"gender": null,
"id": 1307,
"job": "Producer",
"name": "Bob Weinstein",
"profile_path": "/oe5Oxp034UOubnvZqqhurp6a1EP.jpg"
}
],
"id": 2
}

Answer 1

jq is the right tool for processing JSON data:
getting all name key values:
jq '[.cast[], .crew[] | .name]' file
The output:
[
"Brian O'Halloran",
"Jason Mewes",
"Jeff Anderson",
"Kevin Smith",
"Richard J. Gasparian",
"Tristin Cole",
"Nadia Vurbenova",
"Simon Rodgers",
"Kevin Smith",
"Harvey Weinstein",
"Bob Weinstein"
]
To get just a list of strings, use the following:
jq '.cast[], .crew[] | .name' file
The output:
"Brian O'Halloran"
"Jason Mewes"
"Jeff Anderson"
"Kevin Smith"
"Richard J. Gasparian"
"Tristin Cole"
"Nadia Vurbenova"
"Simon Rodgers"
"Kevin Smith"
"Harvey Weinstein"
"Bob Weinstein"
To get just a list of unquoted " strings, add the -r (--raw-output) option:
jq -r '.cast[], .crew[] | .name' file

Answer 2

Another jq approach :
jq '.[]?|.[]?|.name' file
"Brian O'Halloran"
"Jason Mewes"
"Jeff Anderson"
"Kevin Smith"
"Richard J. Gasparian"
"Tristin Cole"
"Nadia Vurbenova"
"Simon Rodgers"
"Kevin Smith"
"Harvey Weinstein"
"Bob Weinstein"
Note: The .foo? usage [ see manpage ] does not output even an error when . is not an array or an object.

Answer 3

Helo buddy, with awk just do it:
awk '/name/{gsub("[\",]*", "");print $2}' yourFile.txt
Best regards!! ;)

Answer 4

try with another following awk solutions too here.
1st approach: IN case you need to have double course around the and name values.
awk -F'[:,]' '/name/{sub(/^ +/,"",$2);print $2}' Input_file
2nd approach: In case if you need only the name's values then following may help you in same.
awk -F'[":,]' '/name/{print $5}' Input_file
Explanation of 1st approach: Simply making (: and ,) as field separators and then looking for string name in a line if it contains then substituting the initial space of 2nd field with NULL and then printing the 2nd field's value.
Explanation of 2nd approach: Making (" : and ,) as field separators. Then searching for string name in a line, if it has it then printing the 5th field of that line.

Answer 5

You should parse the JSON file rather than use a regex.
You can use Ruby to do:
$ ruby -0777 -r json -lane '
d=JSON.parse($_)
(d["cast"]+d["crew"]).each { |x| p x["name"] }' json
"Brian O'Halloran"
"Jason Mewes"
"Jeff Anderson"
"Kevin Smith"
"Richard J. Gasparian"
"Tristin Cole"
"Nadia Vurbenova"
"Simon Rodgers"
"Kevin Smith"
"Harvey Weinstein"
"Bob Weinstein"
Or if you want to separate cast from crew:
$ ruby -0777 -r json -lane '
d=JSON.parse($_)
%w(cast crew).each {|w|
puts "#{w.capitalize}:"
(d[w]).each { |x| puts "\t#{x["name"]}" }}' json
Cast:
Brian O'Halloran
Jason Mewes
Jeff Anderson
Kevin Smith
Crew:
Richard J. Gasparian
Tristin Cole
Nadia Vurbenova
Simon Rodgers
Kevin Smith
Harvey Weinstein
Bob Weinstein