I'm just getting started messing around with the SO api, I haven't worked with JSON before, and I am getting a strange result from a basic call (No API Key).

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
string result = stackClient.DownloadString(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");

The result is:

‹í½I–%&/mÊ{JõJ×àt¡€$Ø@ìÁˆÍæ’ìiG#)«*ÊeVe]f@Ìí¼÷Þ{ï½÷Þ{ï½÷º;N'÷ßÿ?\fdlöÎJÚÉž!€ªÈ?~|?"~ñoœ¤éGM›µEÓÓæ£Gé÷ðQšþbùA߶U›•¿ÿ/ZçÔ¢Z¢É§Ÿ~ºs0ê´X/³es•×ùŒšìîܸ{¯ÛDÄîýýƒûûÝÓj±È—-Zì=ع·ói¯—˪͇vwwöº_O²Ù…|ÿpÿþnþº‘î÷öïïݻﾵ£ûýWyýû/ŠåºÍ©ÙÎøÁ×H±›ìŽ?õî{@¼ž²Uñû_ꌾ³T¦oܧíŒ>²¯ÐWu~Y˜ïvÇ;ãݽ{ûãûŸ>8øÈ4ú%ò ÿøþoœü’äÿNïþìÚ

I'm not sure what sort of formatting I'm missing, but this looks like I'm missing something obvious, it just isn't obvious to me.

Any thoughts?

Edited to add a bit of code to decompress the API data:

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
byte[] compressedData = stackClient.DownloadData(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");
int messageLength = BitConverter.ToInt32(compressedData, 0);

        using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(compressedData,0,compressedData.Length))
        {
            byte[] decompressedData = new byte[messageLength];
            using (GZipStream gZip = new GZipStream(ms, CompressionMode.Decompress))
            {
                gZip.Read(decompressedData, 0, decompressedData.Length);
            }

            string result = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(decompressedData);
        }

I'm just getting started messing around with the SO API. I haven't worked with JSON before, and I am getting a strange result from a basic call (No API Key).

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
string result = stackClient.DownloadString(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");

The result is:

‹í½I–%&/mÊ{JõJ×àt¡€$Ø@ìÁˆÍæ’ìiG#)«*ÊeVe]f@Ìí¼÷Þ{ï½÷Þ{ï½÷º;N'÷ßÿ?\fdlöÎJÚÉž!€ªÈ?~|?"~ñoœ¤éGM›µEÓÓæ£Gé÷ðQšþbùA߶U›•¿ÿ/ZçÔ¢Z¢É§Ÿ~ºs0ê´X/³es•×ùŒšìîܸ{¯ÛDÄîýýƒûûÝÓj±È—-Zì=ع·ói¯—˪͇vwwöº_O²Ù…|ÿpÿþnþº‘î÷öïïݻﾵ£ûýWyýû/ŠåºÍ©ÙÎøÁ×H±›ìŽ?õî{@¼ž²Uñû_ꌾ³T¦oܧíŒ>²¯ÐWu~Y˜ïvÇ;ãݽ{ûãûŸ>8øÈ4ú%ò ÿøþoœü’äÿNïþìÚ

I'm not sure what sort of formatting I'm missing, but this looks like I'm missing something obvious, it just isn't obvious to me.

Any thoughts?

Edited to add a bit of code to decompress the API data:

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
byte[] compressedData = stackClient.DownloadData(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");
int messageLength = BitConverter.ToInt32(compressedData, 0);

        using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(compressedData,0,compressedData.Length))
        {
            byte[] decompressedData = new byte[messageLength];
            using (GZipStream gZip = new GZipStream(ms, CompressionMode.Decompress))
            {
                gZip.Read(decompressedData, 0, decompressedData.Length);
            }

            string result = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(decompressedData);
        }

I'm just getting started messing around with the SO api, I haven't worked with JSON before, and I am getting a strange result from a basic call (No API Key).

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
string result = stackClient.DownloadString(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");

The result is:

‹í½I–%&/mÊ{JõJ×àt¡€$Ø@ìÁˆÍæ’ìiG#)«*ÊeVe]f@Ìí¼÷Þ{ï½÷Þ{ï½÷º;N'÷ßÿ?\fdlöÎJÚÉž!€ªÈ?~|?"~ñoœ¤éGM›µEÓÓæ£Gé÷ðQšþbùA߶U›•¿ÿ/ZçÔ¢Z¢É§Ÿ~ºs0ê´X/³es•×ùŒšìîܸ{¯ÛDÄîýýƒûûÝÓj±È—-Zì=ع·ói¯—˪͇vwwöº_O²Ù…|ÿpÿþnþº‘î÷öïïݻﾵ£ûýWyýû/ŠåºÍ©ÙÎøÁ×H±›ìŽ?õî{@¼ž²Uñû_ꌾ³T¦oܧíŒ>²¯ÐWu~Y˜ïvÇ;ãݽ{ûãûŸ>8øÈ4ú%ò ÿøþoœü’äÿNïþìÚ

I'm not sure what sort of formatting I'm missing, but this looks like I'm missing something obvious, it just isn't obvious to me.

Any thoughts?

I'm just getting started messing around with the SO api, I haven't worked with JSON before, and I am getting a strange result from a basic call (No API Key).

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
string result = stackClient.DownloadString(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");

The result is:

‹í½I–%&/mÊ{JõJ×àt¡€$Ø@ìÁˆÍæ’ìiG#)«*ÊeVe]f@Ìí¼÷Þ{ï½÷Þ{ï½÷º;N'÷ßÿ?\fdlöÎJÚÉž!€ªÈ?~|?"~ñoœ¤éGM›µEÓÓæ£Gé÷ðQšþbùA߶U›•¿ÿ/ZçÔ¢Z¢É§Ÿ~ºs0ê´X/³es•×ùŒšìîܸ{¯ÛDÄîýýƒûûÝÓj±È—-Zì=ع·ói¯—˪͇vwwöº_O²Ù…|ÿpÿþnþº‘î÷öïïݻﾵ£ûýWyýû/ŠåºÍ©ÙÎøÁ×H±›ìŽ?õî{@¼ž²Uñû_ꌾ³T¦oܧíŒ>²¯ÐWu~Y˜ïvÇ;ãݽ{ûãûŸ>8øÈ4ú%ò ÿøþoœü’äÿNïþìÚ

I'm not sure what sort of formatting I'm missing, but this looks like I'm missing something obvious, it just isn't obvious to me.

Any thoughts?

Edited to add a bit of code to decompress the API data:

WebClient stackClient = new WebClient();
byte[] compressedData = stackClient.DownloadData(@"http://api.stackoverflow.com/0.8/stats");
int messageLength = BitConverter.ToInt32(compressedData, 0);

        using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(compressedData,0,compressedData.Length))
        {
            byte[] decompressedData = new byte[messageLength];
            using (GZipStream gZip = new GZipStream(ms, CompressionMode.Decompress))
            {
                gZip.Read(decompressedData, 0, decompressedData.Length);
            }

            string result = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(decompressedData);
        }