I'm just diving into JSON and found the following .json file from data.gov: http://data.consumerfinance.gov/api/views.json
Why don't I need the ?jsoncallback=? to retrieve the data?
(function() {
$.getJSON('http://data.consumerfinance.gov/api/views.json', function (data) {
console.log(data);
});
})();
The posted code works. Is it because I use an anonymous callback function? Can I retrieve any .json file from any server or (what for) do I need an API?
That code will attempt to use XMLHttpRequest to fetch the data.
By default, the Same Origin Policy will prevent JavaScript in a webpage from reading data across domains.
JSONP is a hack to work around the Same Origin Policy (it depends on the data being expressed in the form of a JavaScript program).
CORS was developed as a standard, and more nuanced, method to allow access to cross-origin resources.
data.consumerfinance.gov implements CORS.
This involves adding extra HTTP response headers which give explicit permission to the browser for it to share the data with JavaScript on other websites.
That server sends Access-Control-Allow-Origin: * in the response, which tells your browser to ignore the Same-Origin Policy.
Therefore, you can do a normal AJAX request, without needing JSONP.
