Reading and writing JSON in F#
F# is a language running on the CLR and .NET that excels in functional and object-oriented programming tasks. Because it's on top of .NET, you can use third-party libraries such as Json.NET (mentioned in Chapter 1, Reading and Writing JSON on the Client) to convert between JSON and CLR objects. However, there's a better way: the open source library F# Data, which creates native data type providers to process data in a number of different structured formats, including JSON.
Getting ready
Begin by getting a copy of the library, available at https://github.com/fsharp/FSharp.Data. Once you download it, you'll need to build it; you can do this by running the build.cmd build batch file that comes with the distribution (for details, see the F# Data website). Alternatively, you can find the same package on NuGet, by choosing Manage NuGet Packages from the Projects menu and searching for F# Data. Once you find it, click on Install. I prefer using NuGet...
